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MNCs: A Partner for Reducing Civil Conflict and Improving Economic Wellbeing
by Nita Nautiyal & Donald Sutherland
Today, there is a growing body of evidence that strongly indicates that as states move
toward what can be described as self-sustaining representative democracies, their risk of
experiencing significant internal strife or civil war diminishes. This finding has
important implications for international policymaking. “Most wars are now civil wars
even though international wars attract enormous global attention; they have become
infrequent and brief. Civil wars usually attract less attention, but they have become
increasingly common and typically go on for years,”
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a 2001 World Bank study entitled
Breaking the Conflict Trap reveals. From 1965-1999, there were a total of 73 civil wars
according to a 2000 World Bank report, Economic Causes of Civil Conflict and Their
Implications for Policy, many of which have occurred during the 1990s.
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The United
Nations Development Program’s Human Development Report 2002 reveals that there
have been 53 such conflicts during the 1990s resulting in an estimated 3.6 million
deaths.
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Civil wars have a substantial adverse impact on the societies that they impact.
According to the 2001 World Bank study, at the end of a civil war, incomes are generally
15% below what they would otherwise have been and 30 percent more people live in
absolute poverty than would otherwise be the case.
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The World Bank study adds, “Civil
war creates territory outside the control of any recognized government. One major use for
this territory is to produce and transport drugs: 95 percent of the global production of
hard drugs occurs in countries with civil wars and the major supply routes run through
conflict territories. A more speculative possible global cost of civil war is the current
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Convention