Conflict and Violence: targets for the post-2015 development agenda

The Post-2015 Consensus' third set of papers is focused on Conflict and Violence targets for the post-2015 development agenda.

When thinking about the costs of violence, the international community has focused primarily on civil wars. However the main impacts of civil war are concentrated in a small number of countries, and policy instruments for reducing the major negative effects are distinctly limited.

Our economists have measured the costs of all such conflict, from the death toll from civil wars, regular wars, terrorism along with the costs of refugees but also including the way conflicts can blight countries’ economic growth for decades. Yet, their total impact, though important in specific hot-spots, is globally fairly small, with a total cost of about 0.2% of global GDP.

In contrast, for every civil war battlefield death, roughly nine people – 7% of whom are children – are killed in interpersonal disputes. Thus, physical violence is much larger and more pervasive than civil wars alone. Surprisingly, other forms of violence are likely a much greater problem and they certainly deserve more of the world’s attention.

In fact, domestic violence against children and women costs more than $8 trillion a year. Each year, 15% of all children experience what the United Nations categorizes as severe physical punishment. Each year, 28% of all women in Sub-Saharan Africa report intimate partner violence, which includes being slapped, pushed, shoved, kicked, choked, burnt on purpose and forced to have sex. These forms of violence deserve more of the world’s attention and this is the argument made by James Fearon and Anke Hoeffler.

Anke Hoeffler, Research Officer at Oxford, and James Fearon, Professor of Political Science at Stanford University, break new ground in estimating the global costs of violence and conflict their assessment paper for the Post-2015 Consensus. The paper shows that the costs of collective, interpersonal violence, harsh child discipline, intimate partner violence and sexual abuse represent 11% of worldwide GDP. Interestingly, the types of violence that are most costly to society are ones that tend to attract less attention, in both development spending and public imagination. Violence in the home is 6.5 times more costly than homicide, and 50 times more costly than civil war. The paper does not offer definitive benefit-cost ratios for targets, pointing to scant evidence with which to base assessments. Nevertheless, the authors strongly recommend that targets to address violence should be included in the final post-2015 list.

Although the goal of eliminating violence against women and children by 2030 as advocated by the United Nation’s High Level Panal must be seen as purely aspirational, substantial reductions can be made. Halving the current high level of intimate partner violence would dramatically improve the welfare of millions of women and help break ongoing cycles of violence.

In fact, our research finds that the smartest post-2015 targets to redress conflict and violence are:

1. Reduce assaults which has limited evidence but a UK pilot study found that for every dollar spent the world can gain $17.

2. Eliminate sever physical violence as a method of child discipline which would return $11 for every dollar spent.

To find out more information you can read the all the reports at www.post2015consensus.com/conflictandviolence

Here, Copenhagen Consensus Center has released its research on Conflict and Violence targets for the post-2015 agenda. Anke Hoeffler, Research Officer at University of Oxford and James Fearon, Professor of Political Science at Stanford write the main report, peer-reviewed in Perspective papers by S. Brock Blomberg, Professor at Claremont McKenna College and Rodrigo R. Soares, Professor at Sao Paulo School of Economics. Additionally, NGOs and stakeholders such as Cure Violence, Conflict Prevention and Peace Forum, Stability: International Journal of Security and Development, and Women’s International League for Peace and Freedom present Viewpoint papers concerning Hoeffler and Fearon’s analysis.