ABSTRACT
Disputes among scholars about how to conceptualize environmental stress have long hindered research on the links between this stress and violent conflict. Nils Petter Gleditsch additionally contends that past research into the links between environment and conflict consisted merely of exploratory case studies that failed to demonstrate causal connections. Gleditsch's criticizes Thomas Homer-Dixon's concept of environmental scarcity—which integrates supply, demand, and distributional sources of the scarcity of renewable resources—suggesting it 'muddies the waters', although he fails to explain why. Gleditsch asserts that little systematic research has been conducted to date on the link between environmental scarcity and violent conflict. By systematic research, he seems to mean either experimental or quasi-experimental analyses. Gleditsch claims that environment-conflict researchers have neglected this possibility of reverse causation and have similarly failed to consider the possibility that environmental scarcity and violent conflict are related to each other in a positive feedback loop— that is, a vicious circle.
