Lecture 2 Flashcards
the outbreak of internal wars is commonly attributed to
poverty
two parties in the contest model
rebel group and a government
what does the contest model analyze
each side’s allocation of resources to production versus appropriation
in the contest model the odds of winning increase
with the relative effectiveness of weaponry in determining the victor
- the odds of winning increase with the relative effectiveness of that side’s fighting technology
what was grossman 1991’s departure from the contest model
a single ruler and many citizens, each of whom can either produce or predate
individual participation problem
armed group leaders must motivate citizens to soldier for their side
- participation in soldiering rises as the opportunity cost of fighting falls
civil war seems more likely when
state wealth is easily appropriated or divorced from the citizenry, as with some natural resource wealth and foreign aid flows
three drawbacks of the contest model
- insurrection is never fully deterred / preventable
- there is no decision to fight
- this is a prediction of ever present conflict
according to fearon, why could bargaining fail
- leaders may not always behave rationally
- leaders may be fully rational but not internalize the full cost of conflict because of political agency problems
- leaders might be rational and internalize costs, but find war unavoidable nonetheless
three elements of rational war
- asymmetric information
- commitment problems
- issue indivisibilities
asymmetric information
including private information about military strength, and the strategic incentive to misrepresent it to potential opponents
commitment problems
especially the inability of the parties to commit to deals in the absence of a third party enforcer
issue indivisibilities
some issues do not admit compromise
participation problem
use “selective incentives” to motivate participation, with material and pecuniary incentives
economic inequality provides
a possible motive for conflict to the extent that seizure of the state brings material gains to the victors
the blattman 2008 models the use of
coercion and pain in a principal agent setting to identify the conditions (and agent types) where it is optimal for armed group leaders to threaten pain instead of offering rewards
the formation of competing coalitions
the models assume that rebels and government groups exist and are actively engaged in combat
the models that explore the non-cooperative theory of endogenous coalitions explore
the distributional basis of group formation: they typically assume that group action is more efficient than individual action, providing citizens with an incentive to join forces
ethnic conflicts
ethnic nationalism is popularly viewed as the leading source of group cohesion and by extension intergroup conflict
primordialist arguments
stress the deep cultural, biological or psychological nature of ethnic divisions, whereby conflict is rooted in intense emotional reactions and feelings of mutual threa
modernist theories for ethnic conflicts
stress that ethnic conflict arises when groups excluded from social and political power begin to experience economic modernization
