Publication Name

Environment and Security

When looking at the processes behind conflict it is es-

sential to identify players with an incentive for violence.

They need to access resources that facilitate mobilization

and expansion of violence.

What is critical is not whether

people actually have a reason to commit violence, but

what enables them to carry it out under particular circum-

stances

. In their research, Collier and Hoeffler (2001) argue

that conflict may be explained either by

grievance or by

greed

. They conclude that if we want to understand the

causes of contemporary civil wars we should focus less

on explanations based on grievances and look instead at

the greed of those who have an interest in using violence

to achieve their goals. Even when people have reasons

to be unhappy about their situation, this does not mean

that their discontent escalates into violence. There should

be someone able to extract ‘economic’ profit in order for

violence to occur. Access to specific natural resources is

a factor that can motivate actors to use violence as means

of control (diamonds, oil, timber wars).

But society is not powerless when confronted with con-

flict. It has ways of dealing with it. Institutions, particularly

political institutions and civil society, can work to defuse

conflict situations or they can fuel discontent through poor

governance, corruption and inefficiency. Finally, regional

and global factors can increase or decrease the possibility

of conflict. When a variety of these factors are at work, there

will be windows of vulnerability, moments when events such

as elections, or even natural disasters, can trigger hostility

or even full-scale violence.

��