Ballots, Bullets, and Trees: Election Timing and Violence Against Environmentalists

When is environmental activism most dangerous? We argue that elections create windows of strategic restraint driven by international reputational concerns. Environmental defenders threaten agricultural rents, making them targets for violence by landowners, firms, and criminal networks operating with political protection. However, elections concentrate foreign media attention. Political elites respond by temporarily withdrawing protection from violent actors, particularly in countries dependent on agricultural exports to demanding markets like the European Union. Analyzing global patterns of environmental defender killings, we demonstrate that violence systematically decreases during election periods, with effects concentrated in countries with high agricultural export dependence. We also show that this pattern is strongest for regular, scheduled elections, and that international media attention spikes during elections. Our findings reveal how international economic integration creates cyclical rather than sustained protection for vulnerable activists, which highlights both the power and limits of transnational accountability mechanisms.