Conflict

Why Root Causes Are Important

The debate surrounding the events of September 11 is being clouded by sloppy logic and analysis in the haste to say something — anything — that makes sense of the situation. One issue that has become clouded is whether it’s reasonable to talk about terrorism’s “root causes.”

Now Comes the Real Danger

Some events shatter the order of things — the routines and regularities of our lives that we rely upon for our sense of safety and our sense, most importantly, of who we are and where we are going. Some events change our perceptions forever. The world never looks the same again afterward. Suddenly, the reliable landmarks of life seem strange and distorted — recognizable, yet simultaneously weirdly unrecognizable.

Resource Scarcity and Innovation: Can Poor Countries Attain Endogenous Growth?

Edward Barbier and Thomas Homer-Dixon | Endogenous growth models have revived the debate over the role of technological innovation in economic growth and development. The consensus view is that institutional and policy failures prevent poor countries from generating or using new technological ideas to reap greater economic opportunities. However, this view omits the important contribution of natural-resource degradation and depletion to institutional instability

Environmental Scarcity and Violent Conflict: The Case of Rwanda

Valerie Percival and Thomas Homer-Dixon | On April 6, 1994, President Juvenal Habyarimana’s plane exploded in the skies above the Kigali region of Rwanda. Violence gripped the country. Between April and August of 1994, as many as 1 million people were killed and more than 2 million people became refugees.

Strategies for Studying Causation in Complex Ecological-Political Systems

This paper shows that some commonly advocated methodological principles of modern political science are inappropriate for the study of complex ecological-political systems. It also provides conceptual tools for thinking about the causal roles of environmental and demographic factors, and it discusses various strategies for hypothesis and inference testing.

Correspondence: Environment and Security

Professor Marc Levy of Princeton University has published several critiques of recent scholarship on environmental security, including one in International Security. Thomas Homer-Dixon responds to his comments.

The Myth of Global Water Wars

At a meeting in Stockholm this past August, Ismail Serageldin, the World Bank’s Vice President for Environmentally Sustainable Development, released a new report on global water issues.