Hostname: page-component-586b7cd67f-rcrh6 Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-23T23:37:04.820Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Technology and Collective Action: The Effect of Cell Phone Coverage on Political Violence in Africa

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  27 March 2013

JAN H. PIERSKALLA  and
FLORIAN M. HOLLENBACH
JAN H. PIERSKALLA*
Affiliation:
German Institute of Global and Area Studies (GIGA)
FLORIAN M. HOLLENBACH*
Affiliation:
Duke University
*
Jan H. Pierskalla is a Postdoctoral Fellow, German Institute of Global and Area Studies (GIGA), FSP 2, Neuer Jungfernstieg 21, 20354 Hamburg, Germany ([email protected]).
Florian M. Hollenbach is a Ph.D. candidate, Department of Political Science, Duke University, Perkins Library 326, Box 90204, Durham NC 27708, USA ([email protected]).
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

The spread of cell phone technology across Africa has transforming effects on the economic and political sphere of the continent. In this paper, we investigate the impact of cell phone technology on violent collective action. We contend that the availability of cell phones as a communication technology allows political groups to overcome collective action problems more easily and improve in-group cooperation, and coordination. Utilizing novel, spatially disaggregated data on cell phone coverage and the location of organized violent events in Africa, we are able to show that the availability of cell phone coverage significantly and substantially increases the probability of violent conflict. Our findings hold across numerous different model specifications and robustness checks, including cross-sectional models, instrumental variable techniques, and panel data methods.

Type
Research Article
Information
American Political Science Review , Volume 107 , Issue 2 , May 2013 , pp. 207 - 224
Copyright
Copyright © American Political Science Association 2013 

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

REFERENCES

Abraham, Reuben. 2007. “Mobile Phones and Economic Development: Evidence from the Fishing Industry in India.” Information Technologies and International Development 4 (1): 5–17.Google Scholar
Aday, Sean, Henry, Farrell, Marc, Lynch, John, Sides, and Freelon, Deen. 2012. Blogs and Bullets II: New Media and Conflict after the Arab Spring. Tech. rept. United States Institute of Peace.Google Scholar
Africa Partnership Program. 2008. “ICT in Africa: Boosting Economic Growth and Poverty Reduction.” Working Paper. 10th Meeting of the Africa Partnership Forum. http://www.oecd.org/dataoecd/46/51/40314752.pdf.Google Scholar
Aker, Jenny C. 2010. “Information from Markets Near and Far: Mobile Phones and Agricultural Markets in Niger.” American Economic Journal: Applied Economics 2: 46–59.Google Scholar
Aker, Jenny C., Collier, Paul, and Vincente, Pedro C.. 2011. “Is Information Power? Using Cell Phones during an Election in Mozambique.” Working Paper. http://www.pedrovicente.org/cell.pdf (Accessed April 22, 2012).CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Aker, Jenny C., Ksoll, Christopher, and Lybbert, Travis J.. 2012. “Can Mobile Phones Improve Learning? Evidence from a Field Experiment in Niger.” American Economic Journal: Applied Economics 4 (4): 94–120.Google Scholar
Aker, Jenny C., and Mbiti, Isaac M.. 2010. “Mobile Phones and Economic Development in Africa.” Journal of Economic Perspectives 24 (3): 207–32.Google Scholar
Alliy, Mbwana. 2011. Visa Gets Serious: Let the Africa Mobile Payment Wars Begin. Afrinnovator: Putting Africa on the Map. http://afrinnovator.com/blog/2011/11/20/visa-gets-serious-let-the-africa-mobile-payments-wars-begin/ (Accessed March 22, 2011).Google Scholar
Angrist, Joshua D., and Imbens, Guido. 1994. “Identification and Estimation of Local Average Treatment Effects.” Econometrica 62 (2): 467–75.Google Scholar
Angrist, Joshua D., and Pischke, Joern-Steffen. 2009. Mostly Harmless Econometrics. Princton, NJ: Princeton University Press.Google Scholar
Bailard, Catie Snow. 2009. “Mobile Phone Diffusion and Corruption in Africa.” Political Communication 26 (3): 333–53.Google Scholar
Beck, Neal, Gleditsch, Kristian Skrede, and Beardsley, Kyle. 2006. “Space Is More than Geography: Using Spatial Econometrics in the Study of Political Economy.” International Studies Quarterly 50 (1): 27–44.Google Scholar
Bell, Andrew, and Jones, Kelvyn. 2012 (May). “Explaining Fixed Effects: Random Effects Modelling of Time-Series Cross-Sectional and Panel Data.” Working Paper.Google Scholar
Berman, Sheri. 1997. “Civil Society and the Collapse of the Weimar Republic.” World Politics 49 (3): 401–29.Google Scholar
Berman, Eli, Felter, Joseph, and Shapiro, Jacob N.. 2009. “Do Working Men Rebel? Insurgency and Unemployment in Iraq and the Philippines.” NBER Working Paper.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Blattman, Christopher. 2009. “From Violence to Voting: War and Political Participation in Uganda.” American Political Science Review 103 (2): 231–47.Google Scholar
Blattman, Christopher, and Miguel, Edward. 2010. “Civil War.” Journal of Economic Literature 48 (1): 3–57.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Bradshaw, Tim. 2009. “Twitter Used by Protest Groups to Galvanise Forces.” Financial Times. http://search.proquest.com/docview/250171039?accountid=10598 (Accessed September 15, 2012).Google Scholar
Brand, Jon. 2007. “Iraqi Insurgents Target Water and Electricity, But Spare the Cell Phone.” PBS Online NewsHour. http://www.pbs.org/newshour/extra/features/jan-june07/infrastructure_1-29.html (Accessed October 13, 2012).Google Scholar
Breuer, Anita, Landman, Todd, and Farquhar, Dorothea. 2012. “Social Media and Protest Mobilization: Evidence from the Tunisian Revolution.” Paper prepared for the 4th European Communication Conference for the Euopean Communication Research and Education Conference (ECREA) 2012.Google Scholar
Buhaug, Halvard, Gleditsch, Kristian Skrede, Holtermann, Helge, Østby, Gudrun, and Forø, Andreas. 2011. “It's the Local Economy, Stupid! Geographic Wealth Dispersion and Conflict Outbreak Location.” Journal of Conflict Resolution 55 (5): 814–40.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Buhaug, Halvard, and Rød, Jan Ketil. 2006. “Local Determinants of African Civil Wars, 1970–2001.” Political Geography 25 (3): 315–35.Google Scholar
Buys, Piet, Dasgupta, Susmita, and Thomas, Timothy. 2009. “Determinants of a Digital Divide in Sub-Saharan Africa: A Spatial Econometric Analysis of Cell Phone Coverage.” World Development 37 (9): 1494–505.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Cederman, Lars-Erik, and Girardin, Luc. 2007. “Beyond Fractionalization: Mapping Ethnicity onto Nationalist Insurgencies.” American Political Science Review 101 (1): 173–85.Google Scholar
Cederman, Lars-Erik, Weidmann, Nils B., and Gleditsch, Kristian Skrede. 2011. “Horizontal Inequalities and Ethnonationalist Civil War: A Global Comparison.” American Political Science Review 105 (3): 478–95.Google Scholar
Cederman, Lars-Erik, Wimmer, Andreas, and Min, Brian. 2010. “Why Do Ethnic Groups Rebel? New Data and Analysis.” World Politics 62 (1): 87–119.Google Scholar
Chassang, Sylvain, and Padro-i-Miguel, Gerard. 2009. “Economic Shocks and Civil War.” Quarterly Journal of Political Science 4 (3): 211–28.Google Scholar
CIESIN. 2005. “Center for International Earth Science Information Network (CIESIN), Columbia University; and Centro Internacional de Agricultura Tropical (CIAT).” Gridded Population of the World Version 3 (GPWv3): Population Density Grids. Palisades, NY: Socioeconomic Data and Applications Center (SEDAC), Columbia University. http://sedac.ciesin.columbia.edu/gpw (Accessed June 20, 2011).Google Scholar
Collier, Paul, Elliott, V. L., Hegre, Harvard, Hoeffler, Anke, Reynal-Querol, Marta, and Sambanis, Nicolas. 2003. Breaking the Conflict Trap. Civil War and Development Policy. Washington, DC and New York, NY: World Bank and Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Collier, Paul, and Hoeffler, Anke. 2004. “Greed and Grievance in Civil War.” Oxford Economic Papers 56 (4): 563–95.Google Scholar
Collier, Paul, and Hoeffler, Anke. 2007. “Civil War.” Handbook of Defense Economics, Vol. 2, eds. Sandler, Todd, and Hartley, Keith. New York, NY: Elsevier B.V., 712–738.Google Scholar
Cordesman, Anthony H. 2005. “Iraq's Evolving Insurgency.” Working Paper. Center for Strategic and International Studies.Google Scholar
Dal Bó, Ernesto, and Bó, Pedro Dal. 2011. “Workers, Warriors and Criminals: Social Conflict in General Equilibrium.” Journal of the European Economic Association 9 (4): 646–77.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Diamond, Larry. 2012. “Liberation Technology.” Liberation Technology: Social Media and the Struggle for Democracy, eds. Diamond, Larry, and Plattner, Marc F.. Baltimore, MD: The Johns Hopkins University Press, 3–17.Google Scholar
Diamond, Larry, and Plattner, Marc F., eds. 2012. Liberation Technology: Social Media and the Struggle for Democracy. Baltimore, MD: Johns Hopkins University Press.Google Scholar
Donner, Jonathan, and Tellez, Camilo Andres. 2008. “Mobile Banking and Economic Development: Linking Adoption, Impact, and Use.” Asian Journal of Communication 18 (4): 332.Google Scholar
Dube, Oeindrila, and Vargas, Juan. “Commodity Price Shocks and Civil Conflict: Evidence from Colombia.” Review of Economic Studies. Forthcoming.Google Scholar
Earl, Jennifer, and Kimport, Katrina. 2011. Digitally Enabled Social Change: Activism in the Internet Age. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.Google Scholar
Earl, Jennifer, Martin, Andrew, McCarthy, John D., and Soule, Sarah A.. 2004. “The Use of Newspaper Data in the Study of Collective Action.” Annual Review of Sociology 30: 65–80.Google Scholar
Eck, Kristine. 2012. “In Data We Trust? A Comparison of UCDP GED and ACLED Conflict Events Datasets.” Cooperation and Conflict 47 (1): 124–41.Google Scholar
Edmond, Chris. 2012. “Information Maniplation, Coordination, and Regime Change.” Working Paper.Google Scholar
Fearon, James D., Kasara, Kimuli, and Laitin, David D.. 2007. “Ethnicity Minority Rule and Civil War Onset.” American Political Science Review 101 (1): 187–93.Google Scholar
Fearon, James D., and Laitin, David D.. 2003. “Ethnicity, Insurgency, and Civil War.” American Political Science Review 97 (1): 75–88.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Foster, Vivien, and Garmendia, Cecilia Briceño, eds. 2010. “Information and Communication Technologies: A Boost for Growth.” Africa's Infrastructure: A Time for Transformation. Washington, DC: The International Bank for Reconstruction and Development/The World Bank, 165–180.Google Scholar
Fowler, Geoffrey A. 2007. “‘Citizen Journalists’ Evade Blackout on Myanmar News.” Wall Street Journal. http://online.wsj.com/article/SB119090803430841433.html?mod=hps_us_pageone (Accessed May 29, 2012).Google Scholar
Franzese, Robert J., and Hays, Jude C.. 2008. “Interdependence in Comparative Politics: Substance, Theory, Empirics, Substance.” Comparative Political Studies 41 (4/5): 742–80.Google Scholar
Gelman, Andrew, and Hill, Jennifer. 2008. Data Analysis Using Regression and Multilevel/Hierarchical Models. New York, NY: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Gilmore, Elisabeth, Gleditsch, Nils Petter, Lujala, Päivi, and Rød, Jan Ketil. 2005. “Conflict Diamonds: A New Dataset.” Conflict Management and Peace Science 22 (3): 257–92.Google Scholar
Greenhill, Brian, Ward, Michael D., and Sacks, Audrey. 2011. “The Separation Plot: A New Visual Method for Evaluating the Fit of Binary Models.” American Journal of Political Science 55 (4): 991–1002.Google Scholar
Grossman, Herschel I. 1991. “A General Equilirium Model of Insurrections.” American Economic Review 81 (4): 912–21.Google Scholar
Grossman, Herschel I., and Kim, Minseong. 1995. “Swords or Plowshares? A Theory of the Security of Claims to Property.” Journal of Political Economy 103 (6): 1275–88.Google Scholar
Hays, Jude, and Franzese, Robert. 2007. “Spatial-Econometric Models of Cross-Sectional Interdependence in Political Science Panel and TSCS Data.” Political Analysis 15 (2): 140–64.Google Scholar
Iacus, Stefano M., King, Gary, and Porro, Giuseppe. 2011. “Multivariate Matching Methods that are Monotonic Imbalance Bounding.” Journal of the American Statistical Association 106 (493): 345–361.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Iacus, Stefano M., King, Gary, and Porro, Giuseppe. 2012. “Causal Inference Without Balance Checking: Coarsened Exact Matching.” Political Analysis 20 (1): 1–24.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Kalyvas, Stathis N. 2006. The Logic of Violence in Civil Wars. Cambridge, MA: Cambridge University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Kalyvas, Stathis N., and Kocher, Matthew Adam. 2007. “How ‘Free’ is Free Riding in Civil Wars? Violence, Insurgency, and the Collective Action Problem.” World Politics 59 (2): 177–216.Google Scholar
King, Gary, Tomz, Michael, and Wittenberg, Jason. 2000. “Making the Most of Statistical Analyses: Improving Interpretation and Presentation.” American Journal of Political Science 44 (2): 347–61.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Kuran, Timur. 1991. “Now Out of Never: The Element of Surprise in the East European Revolution of 1989.” World Politics 44 (1): 7–48.Google Scholar
Lapper, Richard. 2010 (January 29). Youthful Protesters Help Shape New Kind of Politics. Financial Times. http://search.proquest.com/docview/250264463?accountid=10598 (Accessed May 29, 2012).Google Scholar
Leahy, Kevin C. 2005. “The Impact of Technology on the Command, Control, and Organizational Structure of Insurgent Groups.” Masters thesis. U.S. Army Command and General Staff College.Google Scholar
LeSage, James, and Pace, R. Kelley. 2009. Introduction to Spatial Econometrics. Boca Raton, FL: CRC Press.Google Scholar
Livingston, Steven. 2011. “Africa's Evolving Infosystems: A Pathway to Security and Stability.” Africa Center for Strategic Studies Research Paper No. 2.Google Scholar
Lohmann, Susanne. 1994. “Dynamics of Informational Cascades: The Monday Demonstrations in Leipzig, East Germany, 1989-1991.” World Politics 47: 42–101.Google Scholar
Lujala, Päivi, Buhaug, Halvard, and Gates, Scott. 2009. “Geography, Rebel Capability, and the Duration of Civil Conflict.” Journal of Conflict Resolution 53 (4): 544–69.Google Scholar
Lujala, Päivi, Gleditsch, Nils Petter, and Gilmore, Elisabeth. 2005. “A Diamond Curse? Civil War and a Lootable Resource.” Journal of Conflict Resolution 49 (4): 538–62.Google Scholar
Lujala, Päivi, Rød, Jan Ketil, and Thieme, Nadia. 2007. “Fighting Over Oil: Introducing a New Dataset.” Conflict Management and Peace Science 24 (3): 239–56.Google Scholar
Mattes, Robert, Bratton, Michael, Davids, Yul Derek, and Africa, Cherrel. 2010. Afrobarometer: Round IV 2008. Dataset.Google Scholar
Melander, Erik, and Sundberg, Ralph. 2011. “Climate Change, Environmental Stress, and Violent Conflict—Test Introducing the UCDP Georeferenced Event Dataset.” Paper presented at the International Studies Association, March 16–19, Montreal, Canada.Google Scholar
Metternich, Nils W. 2011. “Expecting Elections: Interventions, Ethnic Support, and the Duration of Civil Wars.” Journal of Conflict Resolution 55 (6): 909–37.Google Scholar
Mutua, Will. 2011. “Startup Watch: Esoko Ltd: Powering an Agric Revolution.” Afrinnovator: Putting Africa on the Map. http://afrinnovator.com/blog/2011/08/13/startup-watch-esoko-ltd-powering-an-agric-revolution/ (Accessed April 22, 2012).Google Scholar
Neumayer, Eric, and Plümper, Thomas. 2012. “Conditional Spatial Policy Dependence: Theory and Model Specification.” Comparative Political Studies 45 (7): 819–49.Google Scholar
Nordhaus, William D. 2006. “Geography and Macroeconomics: New Data and New Findings.” Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the USA 103 (10): 3510–17.Google Scholar
Olson, Mancur. 1965. The Logic of Collective Action. Public Goods and the Theory of Groups. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.Google Scholar
Peterson, Scott. 2012. “Syria's iPhone Insurgency Makes for Smarter Rebellion.” The Christian Science Monitor. http://www.csmonitor.com/World/Middle-East/2012/0801/Syria-s-iPhone-insurgency-makes-for-smarter-rebellion (Accessed November 13, 2012).Google Scholar
Philippine Daily Inquirer. 2001. “Text Messages Bring Political Protests to Cyberspace.” Philippine Daily Inquirer (January) http://news.google.com/newspapers?id=PX42AAAAIBAJ&sjid=hCUMAAAAIBAJ&dq=political 2012).Google Scholar
Quandzie, Ekow. 2011. “Africa Leads in Mobile Money Deployment as Users Hit Over 40 Million.” Ghana Business News. http://www.ghanabusinessnews.com/2011/10/30/africa-leads-in-mobile-money-deployment-as-users-hits-over-40-million/ (Accessed April 22, 2012).Google Scholar
Raleigh, Clionadh, Linke, Andrew, Hegre, Havard, and Karlsen, Joakim. 2010. “Introducing ACLED-Armed Conflict Location and Event Data.” Journal of Peace Research 47 (5): 1–10.Google Scholar
Reno, William. 2011. Warfare in Independent Africa. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Ross, Michael L. 2006. “A Closer Look At Oil, Diamonds, and Civil War.” Annual Review of Political Science 9: 265–300.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Sacks, Audrey, and Larizza, Marco. 2012 (February). “Why Quality Matters: A Multi-Level Analysis of Decentralization, Local Government Performance and Trustworthy Government in Post-Conflict Sierra Leone.” Working Paper.Google Scholar
Salehyan, Idean, Hendrix, Cullen S., Case, Christina, Linebarger, Christopher, Stull, Emily, and Williams, Jennifer. 2012. “The Social Conflict in Africa Database: New Data and Applications.” International Interactions 38 (4): 503–11. www.scaddata.org (Accessed June 25, 2012).Google Scholar
Sambanis, Nicholas. 2002. “A Review of Recent Advances And Future Directions in the Quantitative Literature on Civil War.” Defence and Peace Economics 13 (3): 215–43.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Shadmehr, Mehdi, and Bernhardt, Dan. 2011. “Collective Action with Uncertain Payoffs: Coordination, Public Signals, and Punishment Dilemmas.” American Political Science Review 105 (4): 829–51.Google Scholar
Shapiro, Jacob N., and Weidmann, Nils B.. 2012. “Is the Phone Mightier than the Sword? Cell Phones and Insurgent Violence in Iraq.” Working Paper. www.princeton.edu/~jns/papers/SW_2011_Cell_Phones_Insurgency_06SEP12.pdf (Accessed September 20, 2012).Google Scholar
Sherwood, Bob. 2011 (August 10). “Police Face Mobile Network Spreading its Angry Message.” Financial Times. http://search.proquest.com/docview/882342765?accountid=10598 (Accessed May 29, 2012).Google Scholar
Shirky, Clay. 2008. Here Comes Everybody: The Power of Organizing Without Organizations. London, UK: Allen Lane, Penguin Group.Google Scholar
Siebert, Stefan, Döll, Petra, Hoogeveen, Jippe, Frenken, J-M, Frenken, Karen, and Feick, Sebastian. 2007. “Development and Validation of the Global Map of Irrigation Areas.” Hydrology and Earth System Sciences 9 (5): 535–47.Google Scholar
Stroher, Tiffany. 2007. “Cell Phone Use by Insurgents in Iraq.” Working Paper. Urban Warfare Analysis Center.Google Scholar
Sundberg, Ralph, Lindgren, Mathilda, and Padskocimaite, Ausra. 2011. UCDP GED Codebook version 1.0-2011. Codebook. Department of Peace and Conflict Research, Uppsala University. http://ucdp.uu.se/ged/data/ucdp_ged_v.1.0-codebook.pdf (Accessed January 20, 2012).Google Scholar
The Economist 2012. “Business this Week.” The Economist. http://www.economist.com/node/21538210 (Accessed March 24, 2012).Google Scholar
The World Bank 2011. The World Development Report 2011: Conflict, Security, and Development Washington, DC: The World Bank Group.Google Scholar
Tollefsen, Andrea Forø, Strand, Havard, and Buhaug, Halvard. 2012. “PRIO-GRID: A Unified Spatial Data Structure.” Journal of Peace Research 49 (2): 363–74.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Tomz, Mike, King, Gary, and Zeng, Langche. 2003. “ReLogit: Rare Events Logistic Regression.” Journal of Statistical Software 8 (2): 246–47.Google Scholar
UNEP-WCMC World Conservation Monitoring Centre. 2002. Mountain Watch 2002. http://www.unep-wcmc.org/mountains/mountain_watch/pdfs/WholeReport.pdf (Accessed September 15, 2012).Google Scholar
Ward, Michael D., and Gleditsch, Kristian Skrede. 2002. “Location, Location, Location: An MCMC Approach to Modeling the Spatial Context of War.” Political Analysis 10 (3): 244–60.Google Scholar
Warren, T. Camber. 2013. “Not by the Sword Alone: Soft Power, Mass Media, and the Production of State Sovereignty.” International Organization. Forthcoming.Google Scholar
Weidmann, Nils B. 2009. “Geography as Motivation and Opportunity: Group Concentration and Ethnic Conflict.” Journal of Conflict Resolution 53 (4): 526–43.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Weidmann, Nils B., Rød, Jan Ketil, and Cederman, Lars-Erik. 2010. “Representing Ethnic Groups in Space: A New Dataset.” Journal of Peace Research 47 (4): 491–99.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Weidmann, Nils B., and Ward, Michael D.. 2010. “Predicting Conflict in Space and Time.” Journal of Conflict Resolution 54 (6): 883–901.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Weinstein, Jeremy M. 2007. Inside Rebellion: The Politics of Insurgent Violence. New York: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Wood, Elisabeth J. 2003. Insurgent Collective Action and Civil War in El Salvador. New York: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Wucherpfennig, Julian, Metternich, Nils W., Cederman, Lars-Erik, and Gleditsch, Kristian Skrede. 2012. “Ethnicity, the State, and the Duration of Civil War.” World Politics 64 (1): 79–115.Google Scholar
Wucherpfennig, Julian, Weidmann, Nils B., Girardin, Luc, Cederman, Lars-Erik, and Wimmer, Andreas. 2011. “Politically Relevant Ethnic Groups Across Space and Time: Introducing the GeoEPR Dataset.” Conflict Management and Peace Science 10 (10): 1–15.Google Scholar
Yanagizawa-Drott, David. 2012. “Propaganda and Conflict: Theory and Evidence From the Rwandan Genocide.” Working Paper.Google Scholar
Supplementary material: PDF

PIERSKALLA and HOLLENBACH

Appendix

Download PIERSKALLA and HOLLENBACH(PDF)
PDF 2.7 MB
Submit a response

Comments

No Comments have been published for this article.