L10 - civil war Flashcards
intro
before around 2016 the idea of civil war was unthinkable
shift in discourse: now we do think about it (specifically in the context of the US)
- why? cultural war, identity politicis
intro - a US civil war?
Barbara F. Walter: “No one wants to believe that their beloved democracy is in decline, or headed toward war but if you were an analyst in a foreign country looking at events in America — the same way you’d look at events in Ukraine or the Ivory Coast or Venezuela — you would go down a checklist, assessing each of the conditions that make civil war likely. And what you would find is that the United States, a democracy founded more than two centuries ago, has entered very dangerous territory.”
- book: how civil wars start
political instiability task force
= CIA sponsored academic research project
- examined every country EXCEPTthe US
- includes e.g. Walter
2 factors highly predictive of poitical instability and violence:
(trying to model civil war)
- anocracy = in between democracy and autocracy (elements of both)
- political parties mostly grouped around identity (race, ethnicity, religion) rather than ideology (e.g. conservative/liberal)
Walter: CIA not allowed to look into the US (bc not allowed to predict political future US), but since Tump admin 1 the US downgraded to be closer to anocracy (but this is controversial)
*list of around 38 indicators, original list was more than 70
early warning indicatos: e.g. gov making consessions to demonstartors, media becoming more critical of the gov, violence of riots targeted towards the gov (rther than be indiscriminate), coaltiion groups going against the gov, separatism becoming an issue, terrorism ocruring
- answer = yes = higher probability something bad is coming
who starts civil wars?
not the poor/oppressed
Walters: groups that are dominated by losing power are more likely to initiate civil war
(civil war version of power transition theory)
- southern slaveowners in the US
- sunnis in Iraq
- white males in US today?
!Walter’s study contradicts mainstream research
the right and wrong type of future war
mainstream security studies experts since 2014 have downgraded study of intra-state war = coincides with Western military shift away from counterinsurgency towards large-scale inter-state war/hybrid war
- shift from counterterrorrism, counterinsurgency, peacekeeping (early 2000s, 1990s) to focus on conventional war
contrast = some experts argue that the future of war will be about civil wars rather than inter-state or great power wars
-> need to invest in diff types of forces
-> esp since 2010s idea that we need to take civil wars more seriously
but what would such a war look like (US)
*1990s fear breakup Russia
Igor Panarin’s 1998 prediction for the US in 2010: predicted breakup into (Californian Republic, Atlantic America, Central North-American Republic, Texas Republic)
towards the end of Trump 1, maybe it wasn’t that far of as we thought
idea of such a breakup, is that what an actual future war would look like?
- full blown civil war similar to 1860s? red/blue states rather than north/south
- upheaval, riots, low-level violence similar to 1960s?
key questions (novelists have to ask):
- how will it begin
- what sort of fighting
- how will it end
- what novel features relative to other civil wars?
it couldn’t happen here….
that’s what everyone says until it does
many cases don’t go to outright civil war, e.g. massive protests Catalonia
- Belgium: will it fall apart in Flanders and Wallonia?
it seems highly unlikely, but why? what is holding the separatists back?
start substance
research boom the study of civil war
intra-state research boom (esp civil wars) after 1991 among peace researchers, historians, polsci, supporters of IOs, quantitative scholars
= vast majority of research on civil wars and intra–state conflict in general pretty much at end cold war
bc 4 converging trends
- collapse of USSR -> wars in former Yugoslavia (take up attention)
- (perceived) development failure in Africa -> generate wave of literature
- war studies: decline of interstate wars -> need something else to focus on
- 9/11 aftermath: chaos all around the world, esp in places like Syria
!attention mostly after 1991, but it goes wayy back
diff approaches to the study of civil wars
polsci vs historical approach
- used to be examined only on an invidual basis (e.g. study of Spanish civvil war, Russian civil war) = pre-end cold war
- unlike polsci: historical studies avoid cross-case comparison and theory building (to predict and prevent civil wars)
- historians focus on cases that are called civil wars rather than meeting a definition of civil war
- polsci prefer large comparison and HAVE A POST-1945 BIAS (=criticism from historians)
why study civil war?
kills a lot of people (not as much as interstate wars but still lots people) + create lots of damage and refugees
since 1945 average duration 4+ years (prior to 1945 average duration 1.5 years)
since 1945 civil wars resulted in deaths of 25+ million people + forced displacement of millions more + economic collapse etc.
UCDP/PRIO data = 1945-2011 total of 102 countries experienced civil wars
- Africa witnessed the most with 40 countries
- 102 countries = pretty much 1/2 experienced civil war => it is a common phenomenon
COW data: approx 80% of war onsets (new wars happening) are intra-state rather than inter-state
- great powers avoid inter-state wars with each other and intervene in civil wars of others
- some scholars: proliferation of ethnic or “new” wars
- others: interest in civil war necessitated bc they pose significant threat to peace and dev bc longer duration
pattern of civil war occurence / enduring cycle of violence = “THE CONFLICT TRAP”
- even when civil wars seem to end, they often resurface
majority civil wars = Africa, Middle East, Asia (still some in Europe, e.g. Ukraine “separatists” 2014 classified)
new wars?
book: Kaldor : new and old wars
Geopolitical equilibrium of the Cold War kept a lid on simmering tensions, especially ethnic ones, across the world
Collapse of USSR leads to a new anarchy in global politics with a resultant rise in the number of civil wars
- cold war -> lid went off and pandora’s box opened -> initially scholars though this was the wave of the future, that interstate wars could be forgotten as it would be chaos of civil wars we had to focus on
- But after initial increase after 1991, subsequent numbers do not support thesis of major trend
Idea that civil wars have changed in type:
New wars motivated by greed whereas old wars motivated by political or social grievances – other scholars argue that post-Cold War wars result of ethnic hatred
Kaldor shows that Bosnia and other conflicts were political conflicts, involving state power as well as various ‘private’ forces, in which ‘identity politics’ is a means by which political elites reproduce their power
According to Kaldor, this is part of a new political economy of war, in which a range of new militaries - the decaying remnants of state armies, para-military groups (often financed by governments), self-defence units, mercenaries and international troops - engage in new forms of violence.
- new poltican econ of war remnants of older militaries
- These include systematic murder of ‘others’, forcible population expulsion/ethnic ‘cleansing’
It is estimated that 80 per cent of victims in current wars are civilians; over 80 per cent were military in wars earlier this century
= important feature new wars: more civilian casualties
Hobbes and civil war
focus on breakdown of sovereign authority
lack of authority (aka anarchy) results in civil war
-> anarchy within a state results in civil war
elite actors, spurred by ambition, use ideological overtures to reshape ordinary individuals’ incentives to rebel
Behemoth: talks about English civil war, what was behind it
- Hobbes was a royalist
criticism = weak center does not mean there is anarchy everywhere: it is not anarchy but proliferation of authority
Quote behemoth core; why king doesn’t seem to be powerful
Money from parliament -> cant make army -> corrupt parliamentarians trying to convince the people the king is bad while actually they are causing the unrest
instability analysis
stages of instability, lines between concepts not exactly clear, didn’t really explain them much
- MASS DISCONTENT: editorials, petitions, rumors
- non-violent civil disobedience: strikes, marches, vigils, underground activities
- small violent acts of protest: defacing and damaging property
- violent disruptions of civil order: blocking roads, rails, airports, street demonstrations
- general rioting and looting: crimes against property
- organized insurrection: crimes against people and property-boming, kidnappings, act of terror
- INSURGENCY: from organized crime to conventional combat
- CIVIL WAR: conventional combat
- revolution or succession
definitions/terminology
no one commonly accepted definition of civil war!
-> affects how we analyze it: no common definition -> data is also not the same in classifications etc.
intra-state war and civil wars often used synonymously (while civil war is a type of intra-state war)
some scholars prefer term ‘internal war’
!civil wars can be internationalized (e.g. NATO intervention Libya 2011:
- conflict Qadaffi and gov -> NATO intervention -> NATO leaves -> full out civil war
in simplest terms, civil war is
violent conflict between a government and an organized rebel group
!although some scholars also include armed conflicts primarily between non-state actors within their study
- gov may stand aside as non-gov actors fight it out on the street
what is and isn’t civil war?
The definition of a civil war, and the analytical means of differentiating a civil war from other forms of large-scale violence, has been controversial (e.g. very similar to insurgency, rebellion)
!Anti-colonial and imperial wars do not count as civil wars (easier to classify in diff ways)
issue of threshold: A number of definitional thresholds and criteria have emerged to distinguish civil wars from other forms of large-scale violence such as riots, one-sided massacres, genocide, or criminal violence
- magnitude and scope of the violence
- the spatial context
- nature and identity of the protagonists
e.g. Rwanda = genocide rather than just civil war: nature/scope of violence was exponential compared to normal civil war
civil war - we know it when we see it: key characteristics
- The goal of armed entities in civil war is POWER
- The entities that participate in a civil war must be ORGANIZED
- The means by which these goals are accomplished is VIOLENCE
- The context in which a civil war takes place is the SOVEREIGN NATION STATE
- One of the participants is usually a GOVERNMENT
- but doesn’t have to be
“armed combat within the boundaries of a recognized sovereign unit between organized entities subject to a common authority at the outset of hostilities” (Stathis Kalyvas, 2006)
Organized violence/opposition: can’t just be chaos, few people rioting = has to be organized violence behind it
politicization of classifying something as civil war
“We haven’t agreed yet whether it’s a civil war or if it’s just a mess. No one can really agree on just what kind of troubles we’re having.”
language on Iraq - when is it a civil war?
major debate US about Iraq war: is it an insurgency or a full-blown civil war?
For political reason: for gov/Bush perspective need to see as insurgency bc then they can deal with it (have counterinsurgency doctrine, in civil war they can’t do anything about it)
But scholars thought it was more civil war, but still not entirely clear: many diff conflicts
slide:
“What do you call a situation where 3,000 citizens of a country kill each other every month through bombing, shooting and beheading? If the country is Iraq, it depends on who answers the question”
- US and Iraqi government leaders avoid term “civil war,” although President George W. Bush, Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld and several generals said Iraq was “close to,” “nearing” or “in danger of” civil war
- Rumsfeld: “Ido not believe they’re in a civil war today. There’s always been a potential for a civil war”
“The country suffers from at least four internal conflicts – a Shiite-Sunni civil war in the center, intra-Shiite conflicts in the south, a Sunni insurgency in the west and ethnic tensions between Arabs and Kurds in the north“
US Department of Defense’s Dictionary of Military and Associated Terms has no entry for civil war and the term is also not mentioned in counter-insurgency manual
COW typology intra-state wars
three general types:
- civil wars = gov vs non-state entity
- regional internal war = gov of regional sub-unit against a non-state entity
- intercommunal war = combat between/among two or more non-state entities within a state
civil wars subdivided into 2 tyes:
- control over central government
- disputes over local issues (= more separatist kind of civil war)
!only part he wants to raise about : it is for intrastate wars harder to define casualties than with interstate wars -> diff: is there good data collection
= has major impact on which civil wars and which not (bc classification)
more on the slide:
central gov = those forces that were at the start of the war in de facto control of the nation’s institutions, regardless of legality or illegality of their claim
for state to be considered a war participant minimum requirement = commit 1000 troops to the war OR suffer 100 battle-related deaths
since nonstate armed groups are generally smaller than states + have fewer resources, they can be considered war participant if they commit 100 armed personnel to the war or suffer 25 battle-related deeaths
Sambanis’ 10 criteria for something to be a civil war
Point to make (will come back to this with civil war in Angola): you can have more or less peaceful times and then it comes again
If they start and start over again…?? 12.23
- the conflict is in an independent state with a population of at least 500,000
- the parties are organized around political agendas
- the government takes part in the fighting
- the main insurgency is local – rebels can also operate outside the country but must have a physical presence in the country
- with some exceptions, in the start year there are at least 500 to 1,000 deaths
- the war maintains minimal levels of ongoing violence
- the weaker party must maintain an “effective resistance” as represented by at least 100 deaths inflicted
- peace treaties yielding at least a six-month peace spell indicate termination
- a military victory by the rebels associated with a new regime represents a termination
- a government victory followed by six months of peace also represents a termination
Key research findings: The economists view
Economists: associated with he thinks WB early 2000s looking at civi wars with eco mindset
Intrastate armed conflict is more likely to occur in poor, developing countries with weak state structures
- Key indicator = GDP below certain level (similar to earlier lecture (he mentioned the name, so maybe memorize)
- Goes against Walter argument that issue of civil war could occur in the US
In situations of weak states the presence of lootable natural resources and oil increase the likelihood of experiencing armed conflict
- African conflicts, e.g. blood diamonds issue,, oil
State weakness, especially those less able to cushion the impact of economic shocks
While ethnic heterogeneity is not in isolation associated with a higher risk of armed conflict, ethnic or group domination of politics and economic opportunities does increase the risk
Similarly, while absolute poverty – which affects a very significant proportion of the world, much of which does not experience armed conflict – may not in isolation be a reliable indication of conflict risk, inequalities across distinct identity groups and relative deprivation grievances are sources of armed conflict
other key research findings
Civil war can result from frustration if one group perceives an unfair advantage by another group in the political or economic realms
Situations of partial or weak democracy (anocracy) and political transition, particularly a movement towards democracy in volatile or divided societies, are also strongly correlated to conflict onset
The location of a society – especially if it has other vulnerability factors – in a region which has contiguous neighbors which are experiencing or have experienced armed conflict is also an armed conflict risk
= spillover effect where the conflicts take place
- e.g. Spillover effect of Iraq war into Syria: civil war Syria hard to imagine without the spillover effect of the Iraq war
- conflict region -> governing issues, eco chaos etc.
correlation not causation
Many other factors reflect a lower level of consensus, but are still regarded as being significant to the onset of armed conflict, especially in combination.
For example:
- The role of CLIMATE CHANGE and other forms of ENVIRONMENTAL DEGRADATION in the onset of collective violence is greatly contested, and yet it may contribute to other factors – such as internal migration and conflicts over resources – which heighten armed conflict risk
- Similarly, theories related to DEMOGRAPHIC FACTORS – for example, a rapidly burgeoning population, or a growing young male population – and also UNEMPLOYMENT are contested, and yet the availability of young unemployed men is certainly correlated with armed conflicts in some regions of the world
Climate not the main cause, but contributes: creates refugees and tension
Growing young male population + unemployment (+ place with lots of guns) -> increased likelihood civil war
weak/failing states argument
Weak or failing state institutions provide an environment in which armed conflict emerges
- Has many implications for the prevention of armed conflict in the developing world and policies aimed at building state capacity are now central to international development policy
- IOs 1990s/2000s: assuming idea of weak states leads to civil war has implications with policies they are doing to prevent civil wars
The right opportunity?
- Rebels will more likely take up arms when the perceived prospects for victory are enhanced by a weak state, the presence of terrain suitable for hiding, a stable revenue stream, and support from a local population
- Many places where civil wars could theoretically happy but they don’t: If they have no chance of success -> why bother taking arms, getting hurt => Some theory of success is necessary: state has to be weak enough
greed vs grievance explanation
greed-based explanations = focus on inviduals’ desire to maximize profit
grievance-based explanations = focus on conflict as response to socio-economic or political injustice
= massive` debate among scholars to debate why diff actors engage in civil war
the greed thesis
important scholar = Paul Collier (World Bank)
- Devised by people working in development economics
- Influential school of thought in early 2000s
- Examples: Liberia, Sierra Leone, Congo
- War over natural resources – generate revenue streams – i.e. organized crime but on much larger scale
- Characterized by disorganized fighting with gratuitous violence devoid of political content
War over natural resources: not ideology,, but from perspective or organized crime (want to control resources)
E.g. Colombia, various drug groups
ethnicity - ethnic civil wars
There are also ethnic civil wars
Not just from ethnicity A or B, has to do with eco status, representation in gov, access to power etc.
!not necessarily the only cause
Major factor present in Bosnia and most African conflicts
Ethnic conflict driven by differential access to power, access to resources, economic status
Diagram slides: collapse of central authority or cental authority becomes ethnically non-neutral -> security dilemma/spiral -> malignant elites in group A engage in ehtnic mobilization to dominate B or to achieve an ethnic ideal/pure state -> 2 options
- moderate elites in group A firmly punish thugs and counter hawkish elites ethnic mobilization -> shallow/fragile peace -> domestic reconciliation -> robust peace
- moderate elites unable/unwilling to punish thugs -> moderate elites become malignant or are replaced -> elites and mass in group B react with ethnic mobilization or retaliate excessively -> malignant elites A mobilzie masses -> (international intervention) -> ethnic war
4 key drivers ethnic war
emotion/fear/honor/hatred/anger
- fear (insecurity): collapse cental auhtority, hijacking of central authority from one group, withdrawal of colonial power etc.
- honor (resentment/grievance): ethnic solidarity, domination, redistributino policy, eco inequality
- hatred: earlier episodes of violent conflict
- anger: especially rage/fury: local brutaity, natural disasters that struck a group
tangible interests/greed: demand of equality and equal opportunity etc.
opportunity/feasibility (internal and external constrains)
- collapse of central authority, political instability etc
- same as weak state argument
capability/power:
- access to weaponry, military organizations and combat expierence from earlier conflict etc.
factors that increase/decrease risk of civil war
5
- geography
- pressence natural resources/narcotics -> higher risk - wealth
- the poorer the country the higher the risk - eco development
- rapid social-eco change may mobilize social groups for conflict by enhancing competition for scarce resources
- other hand: eco modernization and dev. should decrease inequalities within society and increase political stability
- debate whether eco modernization (esp end WW2 with new indepdent states + rising standard of iving): would it increase or decrease conflict? Could argue for both - social fractionalization:
- Ethnic, linguistic or religious differences may play an important role
- Political and economic tensions may contribute to ethnopolitical conflict in multi-ethnic societies
- Many civil wars in Africa – e.g. Sudan, Nigeria, Chad, Eritrea – have religious component
- All civil wars in Africa have been substantially ethnic - Domestic governance
- Democracies generally allow for peaceful negotiation, especially highly institutionalized democracies, and therefore less likely to experience civil war than other political regimes
- Regime type: if you move towards anocracy higher risk of civil war
internationalized civil wars
Issue = who is doing the bulk of the fighting:
- Intervener does not take over the bulk of coting = war remains classified as internationalized
- If intervener takes over bulk of the fighting -> diff classification
Intra-state wars are classified as “internationalized” when an outside state or states intervenes in the war
!many/most civil wars have international dimension: causes, dynamics, impacts (int’l refugee flow, human displacement + refugee camps can become fertile recruiting grounds)
= it spills across borders
The war remains classified as “internationalized” as long as the intervener does not take over the BULK OF THE FIGHTING from one of the initial parties
However if the intervener takes over the bulk of the fighting, the war ceases to be an intra-state war and is transformed into a war of a different classification:
- If the intervener comes in on the side of the government and then takes over the bulk of the fighting, the war is transformed into an EXTRA-STATE WAR
- If the intervener comes in on the side of the non-state entity and takes on the bulk of the fighting, the war is transformed into an INTER-STATE WAR
Conversely, wars can also be transformed into intra-state wars, for example when a state withdraws from an inter-state war
Angola civil war 1975-2002
- Begins with departure of Portuguese (insurgency when the Portuguese where still running it -> early 70s forced to leave bc too expensive to stay)
- Emerges as key Cold War battleground between pro-Communist(MPLA)/anti-Communist factions(UNITA)
- Cuban military intervention
- CIA /South African support
- Fighting continues on/off after Cold War
->fighting in civil war between diff factions with int’l help (Cuban military intervention in Africa, fairly substantial)
End cold war = fighting paused for a while, then again and continued etc.
= conflict goes up and down, diff actors involved at diff times
Didn’t meet 1million deaths threshold, but bloody nevertheless
int’l intervention - is the cure worse than the disease?
A key debate is whether international intervention can have a fundamental impact on the onset, duration, and termination of conflict
Peacekeeping and peacebuilding interventions are generally considered to be effective in helping to end civil wars and preventing recurrence
However, there are also debates over the effectiveness of the liberal peacebuilding model, and some suggest that rushing into elections before institutional capacity is addressed can be a harbinger of more violence
Military intervention aimed at supporting a protagonist or influencing the outcome of a conflict tends to increase the intensity of civil wars and increase their duration
More and more civil wars -> we’re not doing much right (eg. EU, UN interventions, peacekeeping/building)
Problem: peacekeepers often stay long time bc as soon as you take them out the violence goes back up again
termination or endless war?
Debates in this area have considered:
- Whether certain types of civil war – such as separatist conflict, communal and identity conflicts, or ideological insurgency – are more difficult to resolve
- When armed conflicts are ripe for resolution
- What types of actors are more likely to play a productive role in facilitating resolution
It is commonly argued that wars ending with military victory are less likely to recur
- In these terminations one side no longer exists as a fighting force
- Negotiated settlements are often unstable as peace agreements can go unimplemented or one side reneges
_
Sometimes new authority is established or separatist/rebel groups are defeated (don’t have to give up grievance, but incentive to take up arms gone)
Second point: e.g. in Congo ceasefire but no proper peace agreement, but no military victory so once a group rearms the violence starts up again
scholarly consensus?
YES: civil war afflicts poor countries (low GDP per capita important indicator)
- but is this purely post-1945?
- e.g. English civil war + American civil war = were seen as relatively wealthy -> proff not sure
NO: unclear about the role of ethnic competition, foreign intervention, natural resources
= grievances don’t always lead to armed conflict
Indicators interpreted differently depending on approach
- E.g. many multiethnic states not embroiled in civil war, many resource rich states are not afflicted by civil war, foreign interventions don’t necessarily spark a civil war
- Grievances related to – for example – human rights abuse and social deprivation afflict a significant proportion of the world’s countries, and yet armed conflict occurs only in a certain number of these, and only at certain times.
- Debate whether these factors are underlying or immediate causes
- These factors may be present in cases of civil war but need to be linked to some other condition
