Natural Resource Wealth, Conflict and Peacebuilding - Literature review Example

Natural Resources

The scholars commenced the study between the endowment of natural resources and civil war in the last two decades. Civil war has been an uprising international conflict; countries that rely on the exportation of primary commodities have been susceptible to civilian violence. Collier and Hoeffler (2004) asserts that conflict can be described using either greed or by grievances, for instance, politics or tribe marginalization. They continue to comprehend the causes of modern-day civil and state that we should overlook the political and cultural misunderstandings and concentrate instead on the greed the rebels have mainly concerning their trade of the natural resources. However, we should not settle on the ideology that the greediness of the rebels is the only source of civil war to finance their campaigns and trade because they are other triggers. The studies have proven that a progression of high-profile conflicts in the developing countries such as Liberia, Sierra Leone, Angola, and Sudan influences natural resources and conflict war.

According to Collier and Hoeffler (2012), the natural resources are distributed unevenly across the globe. Therefore, some countries are endowed with more natural resources while others do not possess any valuable natural resources. Historically, natural resources that are more valuable are perceived to be accompanied with opportunities and high revenues thus triggering development and economic stability. However, in the past four decades, the endowment of natural resources has created a greater risk of unfulfilled potential, exploitation, and vulnerability to civil violence. Moreover, the abundance of resources has been viewed as the breeding zone for problems and hence, it has attracted the attention of the international community and the media. They have become so immersed in discovering the possible actions that could be employed to mitigate what has turned into the "resource curse." The centre of this article is to investigate whether the natural resources have become a source of income and development or a source of civil war and endless battles in the developing countries. The investigation results are essential for the post-conflict countries to determine what should be done to enhance utilization and distribution of the available fortune to enhance peacebuilding. Additionally, addressing the root of the problem does not necessarily mean that a remedy has been established, one has to understand the causes to ensure peacebuilding initiatives are not viewed as a struggle.

Stiglitz (2012) asserted that countries rich in natural resources are suffering from poverty as compared to countries without the resources. Therefore, instead of flourishing and developing, they have been sluggish in growth and possessed greater inequality- just opposite of many expectations. Usually, the countries tend to tax highly on the natural resources; the tax revenue can be used to invest in education, transportation, healthcare, and development. Hence, the fortune has brought an economic and political curse instead of the blessing in several developing countries. In the 1960s, it was acknowledged that the resource richness in the developing countries could ensure the manufacturing take off and facilitate the transition from underdevelopment. However, in the 1990s, the international community, and several non-governmental organizations embraced that the earlier assumption was flawed, and it dawned on them that the former colonies had the power to abuse and exploit the developing countries natural resources (Smit, 2008). The developing countries were at a significant disadvantage because they relied on the natural resource exportation.

The developing countries with natural resources abundance have failed to strategize in the redistribution of their resources. They do not pay attention in investing their resource revenues in productive investment and hence, they continue to be exploited by the western imperialists while vanquishing in poverty. Moreover, the political instability amplifies the issue, as the violence over access to the resource revenues paves the way to the increased levels of corrupt and dictatorship governments. According to Collier and Hoeffler (2012), the risk of conflict in countries is dependent on the levels of primary commodity exports, the lesser principal exports, the risk of conflict is low. The dependency on the natural resources also triggers the possibility of violence. Therefore, the duration of the conflict increases when the dependency on the natural resources is high.

Development Problems

Most of the developing countries have given the western imperialists the advantage to their natural resources. They have already signed contracts that guarantee the foreigners a bigger share of the revenues of the resources. The foreign countries tend to take the advantage and exploit the developing countries and hence when they are pushed for a renegotiation they threaten to leave and cut the aid support provided to the countries. Therefore, the abundance of the natural resources creates a comfort zone to trigger the interested groups to engage themselves in conflicts. The rebels are often driven by the desire to control the natural resources rent since they are more reliable in rent than aid. However, it has proven to be a challenge to distinguish the natural resources revenues that are used for criminal predation and those employed revenues by the government to fund legit investments. Additionally, the objective of the groups can transform any time. For instance, a group in Columbia commenced as Revolutionary Armed Forces of Columbia (RAFC) it represented the radical political movement but contemporary it is a drug trafficking operation (Collier & Hoeffler, 2012). Additionally, a similar case can be drawn from Niger Delta where a movement was formed to protest against environmental degradation, only for it to be transformed and start developing gang warfare that is involved with kidnapping.

Resource Curse

Before the 1980s, the endowment of natural resources was viewed to be advantages to the developing countries. However, several scholarly emerged in the late 1980s and suggested that richness in the natural resources exposes the country to experience negative growth and development, political and economic curse along with disadvantaged economic growth, dictatorship, and civil violence. McNeish (2011) affirms that the literature became embraced worldwide, and now people believe the opposite of what was perceived in the 1980s. Therefore, the modern world has been influenced by the term resource curse: it is conventionally described as the countries rich in resources are blind to utilize the resources to invest in productive projects instead, they sign bad contracts to foreign companies who exploit their resources as they suffer in poverty. The resource curse has been the centre of investigation; the focus has shifted from exploitation, imperialism, dependency, and influence of foreign investments. The research aims at establishing the inefficiency of the developing countries to strategize on the best ways to establish themselves economically.

Stiglitz (2012) contends that the three economic triggers for the resource curse include how the countries who are rich in the natural resources have a tendency of having strong currencies, which encumber other exports. Secondly, the extraction of the natural resources creates little job opportunities that result in unemployment rising. Lastly, unstable supplies prices that keep changing all the time; the international banks to rush when the price of the commodity is high but disappear when the prices drop.

Additionally, Smit (2008), states that poor economic management has influenced economic disability in the developing countries. The politics have taken control over the resource curse; the political variables oversee the correlation between the natural resources abundance and economic outcomes. The countries, which are endowed, have been crippled by the overreliance on the natural resources that it has proven difficult to diversify economically. The lack of diversification and competitive advantage has exposed the developing countries to the vulnerability of resource curse. However, the poor economic management can be remedied through appropriate policy reforms. An example of poor financial management includes policy wastefulness, hyped currencies, underutilization of resources, and excessive protection. However, poor economic governance cannot be established as the underlying cause of poor economic performance in the developing countries.

Encourages Secessionist Movements

It is believed that the abundance in natural resources affluence tends to attract violent secession. Collier and Hoeffler (2012) argues that in the similar way that the natural resources are distributed unevenly globally, it happens in the country. Some locations are blessed with the natural resources while others are deprived and hence, the people residing in the endowed areas tend to claim the economic interest for themselves while excluding their counterparts. However, the natural resources are perceived as a public commodity rather than private and hence, such an oblivious claim of private ownership might create a tantamount claim for independence. The presence of the natural resources grants the community the opportunity to request a credible economic argument concerning their threshold towards the resources; they feel like they have the authority to rule over the other marginalized communities.

For instance, a violent oil secession movement occurred in Biafra, Nigeria in 1967 when the central government attempted to claim the oil revenue as a national asset. Despite having the ethnic clashes as one of the contributors in the attempted secession, the oil-enriched resource was the aim (Collier & Hoeffler, 2012). Therefore, it settles on the ideology that most countries that depend on the primary commodity exports face a greater risk of experiencing violent secession. However, it is crucial to grasp that, civil wars exist in two kinds either secessionist war or ideology war. Therefore, countries that depend on oil exports will experience secessionist conflicts whereas the non-oil countries experiences ideological civil war.

Economic Performance

Historically, it has been debated that the natural resource and economic performance are associated in nature. McNeish (2011) declares that resources endowed countries have a tendency of suffering from trade decline occasionally and hence, constraining their objective of economic growth and development. Therefore, several scholars argued that the international market for natural resources is unstable, and thus, the instability is transferred to the domestic economies, which affects the government revenues and foreign commodity supplies and dramatically discouraging the private investors. Early in the 1980s, several researchers debated that most developed countries that are endowed with resources tend to be vulnerable to a prevalent Dutch disease- a situation whereby the exchange rates tend to appreciate due to the resource boom and the manufacturers and other tradable departments tend to suffer the consequences.

Additionally, countries who have high production per capita of the resource tend to be less susceptible to conflict unlike those that are resource dependent since it implies their revenues depend highly on the country’s exports. Recent studies have shifted their focus on the renewable vs. non-renewable resources and how they are linked to conflict; the focus tends to explain if the non-renewable resource endowment influences high market value while the scarcity of renewable resources encourages lower value (Samset, 2009). However, Kahl (2006) through a statistical analysis established it to have a weak connection. However, the more the resource is easier to extract; the market value tends to be high per unit weight. The simplified process tends to be economical.

Civil War

Abundance in natural resources triggers the civil war and typically dictates the duration and concentration of the civil violence. Some studies vouch that the natural resource might extend the civil war period. Doyle and Sambanis (2000) concluded that abundance in natural resources is significant and negatively associated with successful peacebuilding initiatives. Additionally, the failure of peacebuilding efforts and the extension of the civil war duration confirm that endowment in natural resources is linked to civilian violence. Countries that have been blessed with resources such as diamonds and gold tend to suffer significant civil violence. However, it is essential to comprehend how natural resources are associated with the onset of civil violence.

According to Collier and Hoffleir (2012), civil war is caused by grievances and greediness. The complaints stem from the unequal distribution of wealth, marginalized political rights, ethnic divisions, or religious differences. The greediness is that which motivates the insurgent groups. The objective of the insurgent groups is to enrich themselves and their members. Collier discovered that an economy that is rich in natural resources but has young men who are illiterate created a viable environment for civil war. Thus, he continues to argue that the root for civil violence is greed rather than grievances; the causes of civil war are not the loud sentiments of grievances, but the silent constraints of greed. The lootable resource rent tends to attract the warlords and gang members, and they perpetrate the economy war as a means of survival. Additionally, the foreign intervention tends to pressure the possibility of civil war because they finance the rebel groups for their selfish motives.

According to McNeish (2011), the rebel group requires resources since they are always in seclusion, and they cannot finance themselves sufficiently especially in large scale. Therefore, they need the resources for their financing. When the resources are located, in the rural areas, they tend to be more vulnerable and weak to defend against looters and hence, rebels can quickly loot them and cause the civil war.

Conclusion

The developing countries that are endowed with natural resources end up being poor and underdeveloped that their counterparts. Instead of the resources to be a blessing to them and assist the countries to invest in productive projects while financing education and healthcare, the resources are viewed as a curse that facilitates civil war, political instability, greed, and ethnic divisions. Therefore, for the countries to eliminate the resource curse, they should ensure their citizens enjoy the full value of their natural resources to avoid grievances. The contracts signed by the foreign investors should be renegotiated, and the policies are reviewed to ensure the resource revenues are maximized while reducing the possibility of the exploitation. Additionally, the contracts should be transparent to avoid the domestic economies from experiencing the windfall. Similarly, the money accrued from the natural resources should be invested wisely to ensure rapid growth and development. Finally, the resources should generate a high capita income; it should be appreciated as a blessing rather than a curse.