Van de Vliert's target article offers a climato-economic explanation for variation in fundamental freedoms across countries. The crux of the theory is an interaction between climatic demands (CD) and monetary resources (MR), which on average accounted for 10% of the variance in different measures of freedom. Because the data are correlational, there is a possibility of other variables being confounded with the interaction or being causally linked to freedom. An important question for the theory is whether the CD * MR interaction is a manifestation of a larger dynamic between the resources that a human society possesses to meet challenges imposed by the environment, or is limited specifically to climactic demands and monetary resources. Here we consider the possibility of a larger dynamic by testing if easily exploitable natural resources and risk for natural disasters explain additional variance in freedom or show similar interactions as reported in the target article.
When a society discovers a valuable resource, such as oil or natural gas deposits, the discovery often proves a mixed blessing and may even be a curse (Ross Reference Ross1999). For example, Sachs and Warner (Reference Sachs and Warner2001) showed that countries with greater natural resource wealth tend to have slower economic growth. Gaidar (Reference Gaidar and Bouis2007) claims that an important factor in the collapse of the Soviet Union was the volatility in export income produced by an excessive reliance on oil exports. Ross (Reference Ross2006) points to a high incidence of civil war in resource-rich countries that may, in turn, result from a number of different causes. Hence, there is good reason to believe that freedom is not enhanced by a bonanza of natural resources.
We obtained a measure of Oil Exports (as the natural logarithm of oil export figures from the World Factbook (Central Intelligence Agency, 2010, Country Comparisons, Crude Oil – Exports), and setting log(0) equal to 0), for the 85 countries in Electronic Supplement 1. Using the measure of press freedom from Van de Vliert (Reference Van de Vliert2011a), regressions confirmed the main result reported in the target article: Effects of MR and the CD * MR interaction were significant (R
2
Total = .56). However, Oil Exports contributed significant additional variance (ΔR
2 = .10), such that, as anticipated, countries with higher oil exports had lower levels of press freedom. Oil Exports did not correlate significantly with either MR or the interaction, and their beta-weights in the regression were virtually unchanged. (Sachs & Warner, Reference Sachs and Warner2001, also report that resource curse is not explained by geographical variables.) When Oil Exports were substituted for MR, the main effects of CD and Oil Exports were significant (βCD = .30; βOil = −.25; R
2
Total = .16), but the interaction was not (ΔR
2 = .01). These results suggest that natural resources are not equivalent to monetary ones in terms of an interaction with CD on freedom, but that the “resource curse” represents a negative influence on freedom that explains about the same variance as the CD * MR interaction.
Resource curse resembles climatic demands in being an intuitively plausible explanation of at least moderate authoritarianism: a country that has abundant resources does not need to be efficiently or democratically organized; a society with an easy climate may be less concerned about political and press freedom. It is also easy to think of countries with abundant resources that have less freedom: The Middle East provides obvious examples. Yet, as Haber and Menaldo (Reference Haber and Menaldo2011) point out, one can also find counterexamples: Ecuador, Botswana, and Mexico have used their resources to democratize.
Natural disasters pose a significant challenge to the maintenance and sustainability of human society. Based on Van de Vliert's theory, one might expect that an increased risk for natural disasters would function similarly to climactic demands in terms of diverting resources from other needs, and that a similar interaction between risk for natural disasters and monetary resources on societal freedom would be observed. As a measure of natural disaster risk we used the Exposure index, a component of the United Nations WorldRiskIndex (United Nations University 2011), which measures the likelihood of natural hazards including earthquakes, storms, floods, droughts, and sea level rise. When the Exposure index (log transformed) was substituted for CD in regression analyses with the 85 countries, neither its main effect nor the interaction with MR was significant (ps > 0.26; ΔR
2 = .01), while MR continued to explain significant variance (R
2 = .47). The Exposure index also did not explain additional variance beyond the model with CD, MR, and CD * MR (ΔR
2 = .01).
The puzzle is why environmental challenges associated with climactic demands but not risk of natural disasters would influence societal freedom, moderated by monetary resources. Although natural disasters are relatively infrequent events (even for high-risk areas), in contrast with climatic challenges that recur year after year, adequate preparations for natural disasters must also be ongoing (e.g., earthquake building codes). From the perspective of Van de Vliert's theory, there appears to be no fundamental difference between climactic demands and natural hazards risk in that both require a diversion of resources, and so both should trigger the same psychological mechanisms described in the target article.
The climato-economic theory offers an intriguing new perspective on the complex factors that may shape the evolution of human societies to freedom or authoritarianism. Our results pose the following question for Van de Vliert: Why would the interaction be specific to climactic demands and monetary resources, and not other types of environmental challenges or natural resources? Of course, although a country may find new natural resources, it is not likely to discover a new climate. Van de Vliert does, commendably, indicate likely future changes in climate and the effect these are likely to have. However, it seems to us that an historical analysis could also be made. As climate has not changed markedly in the last hundred years or so, it should be possible to find rather similar patterns of the reliance on the monetary resources and climate demand interaction when one looks at past societies. Indeed, overall the model suggests that the pattern of freedom should be enduring except for the effect of monetary resource changes.
Van de Vliert's target article offers a climato-economic explanation for variation in fundamental freedoms across countries. The crux of the theory is an interaction between climatic demands (CD) and monetary resources (MR), which on average accounted for 10% of the variance in different measures of freedom. Because the data are correlational, there is a possibility of other variables being confounded with the interaction or being causally linked to freedom. An important question for the theory is whether the CD * MR interaction is a manifestation of a larger dynamic between the resources that a human society possesses to meet challenges imposed by the environment, or is limited specifically to climactic demands and monetary resources. Here we consider the possibility of a larger dynamic by testing if easily exploitable natural resources and risk for natural disasters explain additional variance in freedom or show similar interactions as reported in the target article.
When a society discovers a valuable resource, such as oil or natural gas deposits, the discovery often proves a mixed blessing and may even be a curse (Ross Reference Ross1999). For example, Sachs and Warner (Reference Sachs and Warner2001) showed that countries with greater natural resource wealth tend to have slower economic growth. Gaidar (Reference Gaidar and Bouis2007) claims that an important factor in the collapse of the Soviet Union was the volatility in export income produced by an excessive reliance on oil exports. Ross (Reference Ross2006) points to a high incidence of civil war in resource-rich countries that may, in turn, result from a number of different causes. Hence, there is good reason to believe that freedom is not enhanced by a bonanza of natural resources.
We obtained a measure of Oil Exports (as the natural logarithm of oil export figures from the World Factbook (Central Intelligence Agency, 2010, Country Comparisons, Crude Oil – Exports), and setting log(0) equal to 0), for the 85 countries in Electronic Supplement 1. Using the measure of press freedom from Van de Vliert (Reference Van de Vliert2011a), regressions confirmed the main result reported in the target article: Effects of MR and the CD * MR interaction were significant (R 2 Total = .56). However, Oil Exports contributed significant additional variance (ΔR 2 = .10), such that, as anticipated, countries with higher oil exports had lower levels of press freedom. Oil Exports did not correlate significantly with either MR or the interaction, and their beta-weights in the regression were virtually unchanged. (Sachs & Warner, Reference Sachs and Warner2001, also report that resource curse is not explained by geographical variables.) When Oil Exports were substituted for MR, the main effects of CD and Oil Exports were significant (βCD = .30; βOil = −.25; R 2 Total = .16), but the interaction was not (ΔR 2 = .01). These results suggest that natural resources are not equivalent to monetary ones in terms of an interaction with CD on freedom, but that the “resource curse” represents a negative influence on freedom that explains about the same variance as the CD * MR interaction.
Resource curse resembles climatic demands in being an intuitively plausible explanation of at least moderate authoritarianism: a country that has abundant resources does not need to be efficiently or democratically organized; a society with an easy climate may be less concerned about political and press freedom. It is also easy to think of countries with abundant resources that have less freedom: The Middle East provides obvious examples. Yet, as Haber and Menaldo (Reference Haber and Menaldo2011) point out, one can also find counterexamples: Ecuador, Botswana, and Mexico have used their resources to democratize.
Natural disasters pose a significant challenge to the maintenance and sustainability of human society. Based on Van de Vliert's theory, one might expect that an increased risk for natural disasters would function similarly to climactic demands in terms of diverting resources from other needs, and that a similar interaction between risk for natural disasters and monetary resources on societal freedom would be observed. As a measure of natural disaster risk we used the Exposure index, a component of the United Nations WorldRiskIndex (United Nations University 2011), which measures the likelihood of natural hazards including earthquakes, storms, floods, droughts, and sea level rise. When the Exposure index (log transformed) was substituted for CD in regression analyses with the 85 countries, neither its main effect nor the interaction with MR was significant (ps > 0.26; ΔR 2 = .01), while MR continued to explain significant variance (R 2 = .47). The Exposure index also did not explain additional variance beyond the model with CD, MR, and CD * MR (ΔR 2 = .01).
The puzzle is why environmental challenges associated with climactic demands but not risk of natural disasters would influence societal freedom, moderated by monetary resources. Although natural disasters are relatively infrequent events (even for high-risk areas), in contrast with climatic challenges that recur year after year, adequate preparations for natural disasters must also be ongoing (e.g., earthquake building codes). From the perspective of Van de Vliert's theory, there appears to be no fundamental difference between climactic demands and natural hazards risk in that both require a diversion of resources, and so both should trigger the same psychological mechanisms described in the target article.
The climato-economic theory offers an intriguing new perspective on the complex factors that may shape the evolution of human societies to freedom or authoritarianism. Our results pose the following question for Van de Vliert: Why would the interaction be specific to climactic demands and monetary resources, and not other types of environmental challenges or natural resources? Of course, although a country may find new natural resources, it is not likely to discover a new climate. Van de Vliert does, commendably, indicate likely future changes in climate and the effect these are likely to have. However, it seems to us that an historical analysis could also be made. As climate has not changed markedly in the last hundred years or so, it should be possible to find rather similar patterns of the reliance on the monetary resources and climate demand interaction when one looks at past societies. Indeed, overall the model suggests that the pattern of freedom should be enduring except for the effect of monetary resource changes.