Highways to Hell are Paved with Good Intentions : Road Building and Violence in Iraq

Infrastructure development programs, and specifically road building aid programs, have long been implemented alongside military interventions in conflict-affected countries. A common aim of these programs has been to reduce violence through increased economic development. This paper examines the effects of road-building programs on violence in Iraq from 2003 to 2016, using an instrumental variable (IV) approach. Across the period, we find that 9 extra kilometres of paved roads built in a district relative to the national average leads 2.1 more attacks. We explore a dual mechanism and find that newly constructed roads are both targets and facilitators of insurgency. In contrast, we find no evidence that investment in the road network reduces violence through improved economic conditions. In other words, the negative effects of political and military road-building efforts, outweigh the wished-for economic effects