Cash aid to households reduces insurgency threats, Stanford research shows

Stanford researcher Joseph Felter found that direct cash assistance to households in the Philippines decreased insurgent-led conflicts and weakened their influence in those villages. How people receive aid in countries wracked by civil wars can have a major impact on both the level of insurgent violence and insurgents' influence in those communities, new Stanford research shows. In the case of the Philippines, the study found that the type of aid provided by the government and how it is administered can be a major factor in reducing insurgent violence against civilians and government security forces. "Visibility in aid matters," said Joseph Felter , a senior research scholar at Stanford's Center for International Security and Cooperation, who co-authored the study. "The higher profile the aid is, the more the insurgents are likely to anticipate its ability to undermine their position relative to the government and take actions to sabotage it. When money is wired to the bank account of a family household, insurgents are less likely to know about it and are constrained in their capacity to respond." Since the end of World War II, more than half of all countries in the world have experienced civil strife - wars within their own borders - leading to the deaths of more than 16 million people, as well as lower levels of economic growth than in more stable countries, according to Felter and his colleagues. As a result, the global community has provided significant financial aid through the years to countries facing insurgency and civil wars. Still, the question remains: what is the best form of aid, and how should it be delivered to better reduce the violence associated with civil conflicts?