Peace treaties’ environmental provisions and conflict recurrence

A fundamental idea in the environmental peacebuilding literature is that environmental cooperation can serve as a catalyst for broader collaboration and, in turn, reduce the risk of renewed conflict. While this claim has long been asserted, only a few empirical studies have examined it in cross-country and comparative analyses. This article adds to these works by providing a comprehensive quantitative analysis of conflict recurrence data and provisions for environmental cooperation in over 1,000 peace treaties since the end of the Cold War. The central finding is that environmental clauses in such agreements are associated with a significantly lower risk of conflict recurrence. This result not only provides systematic empirical evidence supporting the environmental peacebuilding thesis but also demonstrates that environmental cooperation is not merely a symbolic gesture. Rather, it plays a vital, substantive role in establishing sustainable post-conflict stability and durable resolution.