Civil War Duration Research Articles

Blocking resolution: How external states can prolong civil wars

What explains the effect of external intervention on the duration of civil war? The literature on intervention has made some progress in addressing this question, but it has been hindered by an assumption that states intervene in civil wars either to help one side win or to facilitate negotiations. Often, however, external states become involved in civil war to pursue an agenda which is separate from the goals of the internal combatants. When states intervene in this fashion, they make wars more difficult to resolve for two reasons. First, doing so introduces another actor that must approve any settlement to end the war. Second, external states generally have less incentive to negotiate than internal actors because they bear lower costs of fighting and they can anticipate gaining less benefit from negotiation than domestic insurgents. Through Cox regressions using data on the goals of all interventions in civil wars since World War II, this article shows that when states intervene with an independent agenda, they make wars substantially longer. The effect of independent interventions is much larger than that of external interventions generally, suggesting that the established finding that external interventions prolong civil war is driven by a subset of cases where states have intervened in conflicts to pursue independent goals.

Bringing Back the State: The Role of Government in Civil Conflict

Intra-state Conflict, Governments and Security: Dilemmas of Deterrence and Assurance. Edited by Stephen M. Saideman, Marie-Joelle Zahar. London and New York: Routledge, 2008. 252 pp., $140 hardcover (ISBN-13: 978-0-415-46050-7). Much of the current literature on civil conflicts assigns little agency to state governments. The most popular debate surrounding the onset of civil war, Greed versus Grievance, focuses almost exclusively on rebel motivations. Either rebels are spurred to violent action due to economic or cultural grievances such as income inequality (Besancon 2005), land inequality (Muller and Seligson 1987), demographic concerns (Urdal 2005), or discrimination based on cultural characteristics (Ellingsen 2000), or rebel leaders are motivated by the riches to be gained by capturing the state for avaricious purposes (Collier and Hoeffler 2004) or to finance the rebellion (Ross 2004; Regan and Norton 2005). Indeed, the most common explanation for the role of the state in facilitating civil conflict is state weakness (Fearon and Laitin 2003) or state failure (Bates 2008), statuses implying a lack of state action. Even Walter's (2006) study of the strategic use of information uses as motivation the rebels’ desire to learn what type of government they face before staging a rebellion, not why a government is resolved against or permissive in granting concessions in the first place. The literature on civil war duration, prosecution, and resolution similarly neglects the role of the state in favor of rebel motivations to extend or inability to conclude the war (Fearon 2004; Cunningham 2006), selectively or indiscriminately kill civilians (Kalyvas 2006; Weinstein 2007), or spoil the peace (Stedman 1997; Kydd and Walter 2002). Indeed, Cunningham's (2006) adoption of the popular veto player framework to explain civil war duration treats the government as a single veto …

It Takes Two

Theories of conflict emphasize dyadic interaction, yet existing empirical studies of civil war focus largely on state attributes and pay little attention to nonstate antagonists. We recast civil war in a dyadic perspective, and consider how nonstate actor attributes and their relationship to the state influence conflict dynamics. We argue that strong rebels, who pose a military challenge to the government, are likely to lead to short wars and concessions. Conflicts where rebels seem weak can become prolonged if rebels can operate in the periphery so as to defy a government victory yet are not strong enough to extract concessions. Conflicts should be shorter when potential insurgents can rely on alternative political means to violence. We examine these hypotheses in a dyadic analysis of civil war duration and outcomes, using new data on nonstate actors and conflict attributes, finding support for many of our conjectures.

Foliage and fighting: Forest resources and the onset, duration, and location of civil war

Forests can provide refuge, funds, and food for combatants in civil war. Insurgents may also use forested regions to hide from government troops and the government may choose to ignore them if they remain in remote forested regions. Case studies of Burma, Cambodia, and other countries show that forest resources have served to fuel armed conflict. Several scholars and NGOs have portrayed this as a world-wide problem, but there are hardly any relevant statistical studies. This article first develops theoretically the different mechanisms relating forest resources to conflict. It then looks at the empirical relationship for the onset and duration of conflict at the country level and finds very little support for a general and direct relationship. At this level, it would appear that many have generalized too hastily from the case studies. The analysis then moves to the disaggregated level and looks at the duration of conflict when forest resources are available in the conflict zone. Again, no general relationship is found. We find that a shorter distance to the coast tends to make the conflicts in forested conflict zones longer. On the other hand many of the significant results we find are driven by one or two cases. While several generalizations from case studies seem overly ambitious, a more careful modeling of the mechanisms revealed by the cases finds some support in the statistical study.

Veto Players and Civil War Duration

Civil wars show a remarkable variation in how long they last. Some end within days; others continue for decades. What explains the extreme intractability of some wars while others are resolved quickly? This article argues that conflicts with multiple actors who must approve a settlement (veto players) are longer because there are fewer acceptable agreements, information asymmetries are more acute, and shifting alliances and incentives to hold out make negotiation more difficult. This veto player approach to explaining variation in civil war duration is tested using a new dataset containing monthly data on all parties to each civil war begun since World War II. The statistical analysis shows a strong correlation between the number of veto players and the duration of civil war.

Expectations, Rivalries, and Civil War Duration

What role have states involved in a rivalry with another state played in shaping the dynamics of their rival's civil wars? How can the existence of an interstate rival affect rebel calculations whether to continue fighting or stop the violence and negotiate? And to what extent does rival intervention differ in its impact on civil war duration from interventions by other actors? This paper argues that the existence of an interstate rival can prolong conflict even when actual aid has not been granted. The mere expectation of assistance from a rival, whether in the form of military intervention or provision of funds, can deter rebels from seeking settlement and motivate fighting at least for some time until resources are depleted. We estimate conditions under which interstate rivals are most likely to intervene in civil wars. We then argue that conditions conducive to rival intervention serve as a base upon which rebels form their expectations of forthcoming aid. We use predicted probabilities from the probit and the multinomial logit model to calculate expectations of rival intervention. Finally, using duration analysis we show that expectations of rival intervention can substantially prolong civil wars especially in a transparent society.

Resources and the Information Problem in Rebel Recruitment

How does the resource base of a rebel group impact its membership, structure, and behavior? While scholars, analysts, and policy makers increasingly link natural resources to the onset and duration of civil war, this article explores how resource endowments shape the character and conduct of rebel groups. This article identifies a rebel “resource curse” much like the one that undermines state institutions in resource-rich environments. While the presence of economic endowments makes it possible for leaders to recruit on the basis of short-term rewards, these groups are flooded with opportunistic joiners who exhibit little commitment to the long-term goals of the organization. In resource-poor environments, leaders attract new recruits by drawing on social ties to make credible promises about the private rewards that will come with victory. Opportunistic joiners stay away from these movements, leaving a pool of activist recruits willing to invest their time and energy in the hope of reaping large gains in the future.

Accounting for scale: Measuring geography in quantitative studies of civil war

Abstract The empirical evidence from studies linking geographic factors like terrain and natural resources to civil war is generally weak and not robust to varying samples or coding procedures. We argue that these investigations suffer from a major weakness: although most civil wars are geographically limited to small parts of the host countries, the analyses rely almost exclusively on country-level data. We demonstrate how Geographical Information Systems (GIS) can be used to generate precise measures of space-varying factors at the scale of the conflict. A comparison of several relevant variables measured both at the scale of the country and the conflict demonstrates that country statistics are poor approximations of the conflict zones. An analysis of duration of civil war further shows that certain findings are indeed dependent upon the scale of measurement. We conclude by discussing how GIS and spatial analysis may be applied in future research to increase our understanding of location, duration, and risk of armed civil conflict.

On the Duration of Civil War

This article explores empirically the duration of civil war. It relates the duration of civil war to two alternative models of conflict and culls testable hypotheses from the case study literature on civil war. Using a comprehensive dataset on large-scale violent civil conflicts covering the 1960-2000 period, a wide range of hypotheses are tested by means of hazard function regressions. The results show that the duration of conflict is systematically related both to structural conditions prevailing prior to conflict and to circumstances during conflict. The key structural characteristics that lengthen conflict are low per capita income, high inequality and a moderate degree of ethnic division. The key variable characteristics that shorten conflict are a decline in the prices of the primary commodities that the country exports and external military intervention on the side of the rebels. Furthermore, the results indicate that the chances of peace were much lower in the 1980s and 1990s than they had been previously. Three empirical explanations are suggested as different approaches to civil war: rebellion-as-investment, in which the critical incentive is the post-conflict payoff; rebellion-as-business, in which the critical incentive is the payoff during conflict; and rebellion-as-mistake, in which military optimism prevents the recognition of any mutually advantageous settlement. The article concludes that the empirical evidence is incompatible with the first of these approaches but consistent with the others.

The Duration and Termination of Civil War

An important key to reducing the suffering due to civil war is to shorten conflicts. The marked decrease in the incidence of conflicts in the 1990s was mostly due to a high number of conflict terminations, not to a decrease in the number of new wars. The articles in this special issue treat theoretically and empirically the determinants of civil war onset, duration, and termination, with particular emphasis on duration and termination. This introduction gives an overview of the articles in the special issue and discusses a few central topics covered by the different contributions: rebel group motivations, the importance of financing, military factors, misperception, and commitment problems. Finally, the article sums up some policy recommendations that may be derived from the articles in the issue.

The Dynamics of Civil War Duration and Outcome

Civil wars have several outcomes: government victory, rebel victory, truce, or treaty. This analysis models state capacity as a theoretical starting point to underpin hypotheses on duration and outcome. To test these hypotheses, multinomial logit and competing risk survival analysis are utilized. These methods allow for the examination of each outcome and its respective duration dynamics. Logit tells us what shapes the probability of each outcome, and hazard analysis identifies the factors that determine the time to each outcome. The models examine the years 1944 to 1997 and find that state capacity is involved in outcome and duration in at least two important ways. An effective state bureaucracy undermines the rebels, but a strong government army does not necessarily enhance the government cause. UN intervention decreases the probability of both government and rebel victory, while increasing the likelihood of a treaty or truce. In addition, rebels have a decreased probability of winning ethnic wars. Forest cover hinders rebels and treaties, while mountain cover tends to help rebels. African wars are harder for governments to win. African wars and ethnic wars are longer.

Oil and the political economy of conflict in Colombia and beyond: a linkages approach

Empirical studies have found a strong positive association between dependence on petroleum exports and the incidence and duration of civil war, yet these analyses remain largely bounded within a national level of analysis. Our case study of Colombia suggests that the international and transnational dimensions of oil, in particular the role of foreign direct investment and the centrality of global geopolitics, have an important influence on resource conflict. Processes of conflict generated by local productive activities pose perceived and real threats to supply, generating new security arrangements that reshape the material and discursive strategies of local and transnational actors. The linkages and interactions between local, national and transnational actors are therefore crucial to understanding the relationship between oil and conflict.

Killing Time: The World Politics of Civil War Duration, 1820-1992

Policymakers often trumpet the potential for third parties to stop the killing associated with civil wars, yet third parties as strategic actors also have incentives to encourage longer civil wars. We argue that in order to assess the influence of third parties on civil war duration, it is necessary to consider the interdependent nature of third party interventions as they are distributed across the set of civil war combatants. We also argue that it is important to consider the geopolitical context in which civil wars occur, rather than focusing solely on characteristics internal to these conflicts. To test our hypotheses about the impact of third parties and geopolitical factors on civil war duration, we rely on event history analysis and a sample of 152 civil wars for the period 1820–1992. We find empirical support for the idea that extremely long civil wars correspond to the equitable distribution of third party interventions—stalemates prolong wars. The analysis also indicates that separatist civil wars and ongoing civil wars in states proximate to the civil war state result in civil wars of longer duration. Finally, we find that when third parties raise the stakes of the conflict by engaging in the use of militarized force against the civil war state, the duration of these conflicts is reduced. In general, our analysis underscores the importance of modeling the interdependent and dynamic aspects of third party intervention as well as the world politics of civil wars when forecasting their duration and formulating policy.