The wars and rebellions that punctuated China鈥檚 ancient dynasties have inspired epic books and films. Now it seems the course of the nation鈥檚 history may have been influenced by a rather more mundane force: the weather.
China鈥檚 archives track the lives of the country鈥檚 clans over the last millennium in voluminous detail. This inspired David Zhang at the University of Hong Kong and his colleagues to scour the documents for links between conflict and climate. They found that periods of cold weather preceded 12 of the 15 major bouts of warfare they studied.
The link makes sense, they say, since cold weather would have prompted food shortages in what was then an overwhelmingly agrarian society. Peasant uprisings would follow, destabilising governments and inviting invasions from neighbouring regions (Human Ecology, ).
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Zhang is not the first to suggest a link between climate and conflict. Previous studies have suggested that periods of drought increase the likelihood of civil war, for example. But many conflict researchers are cautious about making this connection, arguing that other factors, such as the strength of a country鈥檚 democracy, play a more important role in determining the onset of war.
Halvard Buhaug, a conflict-studies expert at the International Peace Research Institute in Oslo, Norway, says he would like to see evidence for a similar link in other parts of the world.
