TY  - JOUR
AU  - Spolaore, Enrico
AU  - Wacziarg, Romain
TI  - War and Relatedness
JF  - National Bureau of Economic Research Working Paper Series
VL  - No. 15095
PY  - 2009
Y2  - June 2009
DO  - 10.3386/w15095
UR  - http://www.nber.org/papers/w15095
L1  - http://www.nber.org/papers/w15095.pdf
N1  - Author contact info:
Enrico Spolaore
Department of Economics
Tufts University
Braker Hall
8 Upper Campus Road
Medford, MA 02155
Tel: 617/627-4068
Fax: 617/627-3917
E-Mail: enrico.spolaore@tufts.edu

Romain Wacziarg
Anderson School of Management at UCLA
C-510 Entrepreneurs Hall
110 Westwood Plaza
Los Angeles, CA 90095-1481
Tel: 310 825 4507
E-Mail: wacziarg@anderson.ucla.edu
AB  - We develop a theory of interstate conflict in which the degree of genealogical relatedness between populations has a positive effect on their conflict propensities because more closely related populations, on average, tend to interact more and develop more disputes over sets of common issues. We examine the empirical relationship between the occurrence of interstate conflicts and the degree of relatedness between countries, showing that populations that are genetically closer are more prone to go to war with each other, even after controlling for a wide set of measures of geographic distance and other factors that affect conflict, including measures of trade and democracy.
ER  -