Why Is There So Much Conflict in the Middle East?

TLDR

The Middle East is among the world’s most conflict‑prone regions, raising questions about its underlying causes. The authors employ the Collier‑Hoeffler civil‑war model as the analytical framework. Applying the model to the Middle East shows that economic development, growth, and longer periods of peace reduce conflict risk, ethnic dominance is significant, regime type matters, while Islamic identity, oil dependence, and social fractionalization are not, confirming that the region conforms to the general civil‑war theory without requiring a special “Middle Eastern exceptionalism” narrative.

Abstract

The Middle East is one of the most conflict-prone regions—butwhy? The Collier-Hoeffler model of civil war provides the starting point for our analysis. In an application to Africa, Collier and Hoeffler found poverty to be the most significant predictor of conflict. For conflict in the Middle East, a more complex picture emerges. Consistent with Collier and Hoeffler, the authors find that economic development and economic growth, in addition to longer periods of peace, generally decrease the likelihood of conflict. They also find that ethnic dominance is significant, while social fractionalization is not. Contrary to Collier and Hoeffler, they find that regime type matters. Variables for the Middle East region, Islamic countries, and oil dependence are not significant. Conflict in the Middle East is quite well explained by a general theory of civilwar, and there is no need to invoke a pattern of “Middle Eastern exceptionalism.”