  We examine whether harvest-time transitory shifts in employment and income
lead to changes in political violence and social unrest in rice-producing
croplands of Southeast Asia. Using monthly data from 2010 to 2023 on over
86,000 incidents covering 376 one-degree cells across eight Southeast Asian
countries, we estimate a general increase in political violence and a decrease
in social unrest in croplands with rice production during the harvest season
relative to the rest of the crop year. In a finding that is least sensitive to
alternative model specifications and data subsetting, we estimate a nine
percent increase in violence against civilians in locations with considerable
rice production compared to other parts of the region during the harvest
season, relative to the rest of the year. We show that the harvest-time changes
in conflict are most evident in rural cells with rainfed agriculture. Using
location-specific annual variation in growing season rainfall, we then show
that the harvest-time increase in violence against civilians occurs in
presumably good harvest years, whereas increase in battles between actors of
political violence follows growing seasons with scarce rainfall. The
harvest-time decrease in social unrest, protests in particular, occurs after
presumably bad harvest years. These findings contribute to research on the
agroclimatic and economic roots of conflict and offer insights to policymakers
by suggesting the spatiotemporal concentration of conflict as well as diverging
effects by forms of conflict at harvest time in the rice-producing regions of
Southeast Asia.
