Climate change, livelihoods and domestic violence in Indonesia.

Abstract This book chapter dicsusses the data, methodological strategies, and findings, and the final section concludes with a discussion of key policy implications and directions for future research regarding climate change, livelihoods, and domestic violence in Indonesia. This study argues that climate shocks in Indonesia elevate the incidence of domestic violence via their impact on agriculture and agrarian livelihoods. Those relying on agriculture as a primary income source in Indonesia-approximately 41% of the population=suffer when climatic stress diminishes earnings through job loss and reduced crop yields. The impact can reduce food security, especially for subsistence farmers, but also for the broader population when scarcity elevates local food prices. Food already consumes 70% of household budgets for half the population, with rice comprising the largest share-over 25% of total household expenditures for the poorest quintile. Thus, even minor reductions in yields or inflation in local rice markets can have dire effects. These impacts are anticipated to exacerbate social and psychological pressures-stress, anxiety, depression, trauma, substance abuse-commonly associated with domestic and intimate partner violence, which in turn should increase its incidence within affected regions. This study uses data from the Global SPEI database and the NVMS to model the relationship between climate change and domestic violence in Indonesia. It finds that positive and negative deviations from long-term climate averages, when occurring in December-the core month of the Indonesian rice-planting season-increase the incidence of domestic violence in the following year. This relationship likely reflects the negative impact of climate shocks on agricultural sectors and livelihoods, an outcome which aggravates the emotional and psychological preconditions for domestic violence and abuse, disproportionately diminishes women's bargaining power in the household, and reduces women's ability to escape abusive situations. These effects are especially prominent in areas with higher levels of poverty, further illustrating the economic dimension of the causal process.