Government & International Relations Seminar Series:

Can Peace Operations Mitigate the Effect of Armed Conflict on Malnutrition? Evidence from Côte d’Ivoire

Presenter: Kyle Beardsley (Duke)

A02, Room 650 and Zoom

Armed conflict increases food insecurity, but can peace operations mitigate the increased prevalence of malnutrition in conflict zones? This study uses nutrition outcomes in women as a lens through which to understand the downstream, long-term, consequences of exposures to political violence both with and without peace operations. It proposes potential pathways by which armed conflict can exacerbate problems of malnutrition for women and for peace operations to mitigate those challenges. Comparing data of adult women in Côte d’Ivoire from the Demographic and Health Surveys (DHS), across two waves that cover pre-conflict and post-conflict periods, shows that peace-operation deployments mitigated the relationship between conflict and malnutrition. Exposure to armed conflict in the absence of peace operations is associated with an increased propensity for underweight, while exposure to armed conflict in the presence of peacekeeping troops is not associated with an increased propensity for underweight. A cross-national analysis using data from the Food and Agriculture Organization(FAO) also confirms that food security, as well as cereal and meat production, in the wake of conflict improve with peace-operation deployments.

Kyle Beardsley (Ph.D., UCSD, 2006) is Professor of Political Science at Duke University and a Fulbright Distinguished Chair in the Social Sciences at ANU. He is co-director of the International Crisis Behavior data project, and the Deputy Director of the Triangle Institute of Security Studies (TISS). His research focuses on the quantitative study of international conflict and peace processes. He is particularly interested in questions related to the role of third parties in shaping conflict dynamics, the interdependence of networks of conflict and cooperation, the links between armed conflict and gender power imbalances, and the impact of nuclear weapons on international crisis behavior.