ABSTRACT
Since the mid-twentieth century, armed conflict has changed: instead of involving wars between different countries, armed conflict is more likely to involve governments and opposition groups; moreover, it usually occurs in regions where people depend on land and natural resources for their livelihoods. Of the thirty-seven armed conflicts under way in 2011, for example, only one was interstate, nine were internationalized internal armed conflicts, and thirty-four were located in developing agrarian economies (Themnér and Wallensteen 2012; UCDP n.d.). And in all but three of the more than thirty intrastate conflicts that occurred between 1990 and 2009, land-related issues played a substantial role (UNFT 2012; Alden Wily 2009). The shift to intrastate conflicts in resource-dependent regions has increased the associated risks: studies show that conflicts related to natural resources are more likely to relapse than those that are not, and do so twice as quickly (UNFT 2012).
