Abstract
BackgroundWarring groups that compete to dominate a civilian population confront contending behavioral options: target civilians or battle the enemy. We aimed to describe degrees to which combatant groups concentrated lethal behavior into intentionally targeting civilians as opposed to engaging in battle with opponents in contemporary armed conflict.Methodology/Principal FindingsWe identified all 226 formally organized state and non-state groups (i.e. actors) that engaged in lethal armed conflict during 2002–2007: 43 state and 183 non-state. We summed civilians killed by an actor's intentional targeting with civilians and combatants killed in battles in which the actor was involved for total fatalities associated with each actor, indicating overall scale of armed conflict. We used a Civilian Targeting Index (CTI), defined as the proportion of total fatalities caused by intentional targeting of civilians, to measure the concentration of lethal behavior into civilian targeting. We report actor-specific findings and four significant trends: 1.) 61% of all 226 actors (95% CI 55% to 67%) refrained from targeting civilians. 2.) Logistic regression showed actors were more likely to have targeted civilians if conflict duration was three or more years rather than one year. 3.) In the 88 actors that targeted civilians, multiple regressions showed an inverse correlation between CTI values and the total number of fatalities. Conflict duration of three or more years was associated with lower CTI values than conflict duration of one year. 4.) When conflict scale and duration were accounted for, state and non-state actors did not differ. We describe civilian targeting by actors in prolonged conflict. We discuss comparable patterns found in nature and interdisciplinary research.Conclusions/SignificanceMost warring groups in 2002–2007 did not target civilians. Warring groups that targeted civilians in small-scale, brief conflict concentrated more lethal behavior into targeting civilians, and less into battles, than groups in larger-scale, longer conflict.
Highlights
Warring groups that compete to dominate the territory of a civilian population face contending behavioral options: target the population or battle the enemy
In terms of global social norms formalized in laws of war, which are international humanitarian laws and customary standards that delineate the proper treatment of civilians in armed conflict [24,30], the best possible Civilian Targeting Index (CTI) value is 0 and the worst possible CTI value is 100
Our study shows the degree to which specific, formally organized actors in armed conflict concentrated their lethal behavior into intentionally targeting civilians as opposed to engaging in battles during 2002–2007
Summary
Warring groups that compete to dominate the territory of a civilian population face contending behavioral options: target the population or battle the enemy. In the case of civilian targeting, we consider the dynamics of warring groups and the civilian population to be potentially comparable to the dynamics of competing parasitic bacteria and the parasitized host organism or population as described in a number of recent studies [14,15,16,17,18,19]. Warring groups can be considered analogous to competing parasitic bacteria in that both can focus their limited resources either on attacking the competitor or on attacking the host or civilian population. Warring groups that compete to dominate a civilian population confront contending behavioral options: target civilians or battle the enemy. We aimed to describe degrees to which combatant groups concentrated lethal behavior into intentionally targeting civilians as opposed to engaging in battle with opponents in contemporary armed conflict
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