Pub Date : 2023-11-08DOI: 10.1177/00223433231183992
Belén González, Richard Traunmüller
Sexual violence is a prevalent feature of war with severe physical, psychological, and social consequences for survivors. Yet we have a limited understanding of how survivors relate to their political environment after the conflict ends. We analyze individual-level survey data on postwar Sri Lanka to assess whether wartime sexual victimization relates to political activism. Connecting unobtrusive measures from a list experiment to individual survivors’ political action, we show that personal experience of sexual violence increases political participation. This effect is substantial in size, holds for institutionalized and non-institutionalized forms of political action, and is robust to unobserved confounding or sample selection bias. Causal mediation analyses suggest that survivors of wartime sexual violence mobilize politically through their involvement in civic networks. The findings stress the relevance of survivors’ agency and contribute to a better understanding of wartime sexual violence, the role of civil society in post-conflict politics, and of humanitarian policy.
{"title":"The political consequences of wartime sexual violence: Evidence from a list experiment","authors":"Belén González, Richard Traunmüller","doi":"10.1177/00223433231183992","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1177/00223433231183992","url":null,"abstract":"Sexual violence is a prevalent feature of war with severe physical, psychological, and social consequences for survivors. Yet we have a limited understanding of how survivors relate to their political environment after the conflict ends. We analyze individual-level survey data on postwar Sri Lanka to assess whether wartime sexual victimization relates to political activism. Connecting unobtrusive measures from a list experiment to individual survivors’ political action, we show that personal experience of sexual violence increases political participation. This effect is substantial in size, holds for institutionalized and non-institutionalized forms of political action, and is robust to unobserved confounding or sample selection bias. Causal mediation analyses suggest that survivors of wartime sexual violence mobilize politically through their involvement in civic networks. The findings stress the relevance of survivors’ agency and contribute to a better understanding of wartime sexual violence, the role of civil society in post-conflict politics, and of humanitarian policy.","PeriodicalId":48324,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Peace Research","volume":"56 7","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2023-11-08","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"135430092","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2023-11-08DOI: 10.1177/00223433231196608
Austin M Mitchell
Multiparty elections can reduce the likelihood of conflict and help dictators secure their rule, but when does a dictator create electoral institutions? Existing research finds that one of the major reasons regimes introduce multiparty elections is to gain information about opposition demands. This article builds on that argument to explain that a regime’s finances determine whether or not it is able to benefit from creating electoral institutions. Dictators use the revenue of the regime to invest in different means of deterring opposition rebellion. A regime’s first priority is to build repressive capacity, after which it invests in public spending to buy the support of its winning coalition. Regimes only benefit from multiparty elections when they have sufficient revenue to fund repressive capacity but lack the finances to also buy regime security through massive public spending. Low-revenue regimes cannot benefit from elections and high-revenue regimes do not need elections to help secure their rule. I test the implications of the argument for regime spending and the creation of multiparty electoral institutions using a global sample of dictatorships between 1972 and 2014. The results of the hypothesis tests indicate that as revenue increases regimes decrease their shares of spending on repressive capacity but increase shares of spending on the public. The results also indicate the probability that a regime introduces elections rises as revenue increases from a low level, but the probability declines as revenue increases from a high level. The study builds upon the literature for how regime resources and state capacity influence authoritarian strategies of political survival. The findings for spending patterns are consistent with recent research on late modern regimes, and the results for the emergence of electoral institutions are consistent with research that finds dictators must have sufficient resources to survive holding elections.
{"title":"Fiscal conditions for multiparty elections in dictatorships","authors":"Austin M Mitchell","doi":"10.1177/00223433231196608","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1177/00223433231196608","url":null,"abstract":"Multiparty elections can reduce the likelihood of conflict and help dictators secure their rule, but when does a dictator create electoral institutions? Existing research finds that one of the major reasons regimes introduce multiparty elections is to gain information about opposition demands. This article builds on that argument to explain that a regime’s finances determine whether or not it is able to benefit from creating electoral institutions. Dictators use the revenue of the regime to invest in different means of deterring opposition rebellion. A regime’s first priority is to build repressive capacity, after which it invests in public spending to buy the support of its winning coalition. Regimes only benefit from multiparty elections when they have sufficient revenue to fund repressive capacity but lack the finances to also buy regime security through massive public spending. Low-revenue regimes cannot benefit from elections and high-revenue regimes do not need elections to help secure their rule. I test the implications of the argument for regime spending and the creation of multiparty electoral institutions using a global sample of dictatorships between 1972 and 2014. The results of the hypothesis tests indicate that as revenue increases regimes decrease their shares of spending on repressive capacity but increase shares of spending on the public. The results also indicate the probability that a regime introduces elections rises as revenue increases from a low level, but the probability declines as revenue increases from a high level. The study builds upon the literature for how regime resources and state capacity influence authoritarian strategies of political survival. The findings for spending patterns are consistent with recent research on late modern regimes, and the results for the emergence of electoral institutions are consistent with research that finds dictators must have sufficient resources to survive holding elections.","PeriodicalId":48324,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Peace Research","volume":"143 5‐6","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2023-11-08","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"135392766","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2023-11-08DOI: 10.1177/00223433231200922
Jaroslaw Kantorowicz, Elena Kantorowicz-Reznichenko, Gerdien de Vries
In democratic societies, governments cannot act in isolation from public opinion. This is especially true regarding terrorism, where public perception is the instrument targeted by terrorists to achieve their political goals. Nevertheless, governments must also be able to resist public pressure and preserve individual rights. All this suggests that researching public perception of terrorist attacks is crucial. We make an important contribution in this direction by measuring the importance the public assigns to various attributes of terrorist attacks. Using novel methodology (conjoint experiment) and survey data from the UK and The Netherlands (N = 6,315), we find that people are concerned with attacks by immigrants (in the Netherlands), and by individuals acting as part of a terror cell, and with jihadist motivation. Furthermore, past experience with specific terrorist tactics drive preference to address such attacks more than others. In both countries people strongly focus on the severity of attacks, and under-weigh probabilities. The terror attack in the Netherlands in 2019 provided an opportunity to examine perception right after an actual attack. Also there we have found that people’s concerns are driven by experience with specific attacks. A better understanding of terrorism perception can inform policymakers about the gap between optimal strategies to combat terrorism and the expectations of the public.
{"title":"Public perception of terrorism attacks: A conjoint experiment","authors":"Jaroslaw Kantorowicz, Elena Kantorowicz-Reznichenko, Gerdien de Vries","doi":"10.1177/00223433231200922","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1177/00223433231200922","url":null,"abstract":"In democratic societies, governments cannot act in isolation from public opinion. This is especially true regarding terrorism, where public perception is the instrument targeted by terrorists to achieve their political goals. Nevertheless, governments must also be able to resist public pressure and preserve individual rights. All this suggests that researching public perception of terrorist attacks is crucial. We make an important contribution in this direction by measuring the importance the public assigns to various attributes of terrorist attacks. Using novel methodology (conjoint experiment) and survey data from the UK and The Netherlands (N = 6,315), we find that people are concerned with attacks by immigrants (in the Netherlands), and by individuals acting as part of a terror cell, and with jihadist motivation. Furthermore, past experience with specific terrorist tactics drive preference to address such attacks more than others. In both countries people strongly focus on the severity of attacks, and under-weigh probabilities. The terror attack in the Netherlands in 2019 provided an opportunity to examine perception right after an actual attack. Also there we have found that people’s concerns are driven by experience with specific attacks. A better understanding of terrorism perception can inform policymakers about the gap between optimal strategies to combat terrorism and the expectations of the public.","PeriodicalId":48324,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Peace Research","volume":"1 3","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2023-11-08","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"135393305","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2023-11-03DOI: 10.1177/00223433231198132
Ayal Feinberg, Idean Salehyan
Why do states use violence to repress dissent? When do opposition groups escalate conflict by employing violent tactics? We argue that not all opposition groups are created alike, and that understanding who is involved in protest is important for event outcomes. Because of their age and social status, student protesters are more likely to adopt confrontational behaviors, even when engaged in nominally peaceful protest. As such, students are more likely to be seen as threats by security forces tasked with responding to social unrest. Although frequently unplanned, spontaneous interactions between dissidents and regime forces can lead to an escalatory spiral. As such, we expect that student protests are more likely to escalate to violence than protests by other actors, and that security forces are more likely to use repression against students. This relationship will be especially pronounced when youth unemployment is high, leading to heightened grievances and fewer social constraints. Using event data combined with actor information on protest dynamics across seven countries in Africa and Latin America from 1990 to 2016, we find that although student groups are not more likely to engage in riots at the outset, when they do protest, violent interactions with police are more likely. Moreover, youth unemployment significantly increases the potential for violence.
{"title":"Student protest, violent interactions, and state repression","authors":"Ayal Feinberg, Idean Salehyan","doi":"10.1177/00223433231198132","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1177/00223433231198132","url":null,"abstract":"Why do states use violence to repress dissent? When do opposition groups escalate conflict by employing violent tactics? We argue that not all opposition groups are created alike, and that understanding who is involved in protest is important for event outcomes. Because of their age and social status, student protesters are more likely to adopt confrontational behaviors, even when engaged in nominally peaceful protest. As such, students are more likely to be seen as threats by security forces tasked with responding to social unrest. Although frequently unplanned, spontaneous interactions between dissidents and regime forces can lead to an escalatory spiral. As such, we expect that student protests are more likely to escalate to violence than protests by other actors, and that security forces are more likely to use repression against students. This relationship will be especially pronounced when youth unemployment is high, leading to heightened grievances and fewer social constraints. Using event data combined with actor information on protest dynamics across seven countries in Africa and Latin America from 1990 to 2016, we find that although student groups are not more likely to engage in riots at the outset, when they do protest, violent interactions with police are more likely. Moreover, youth unemployment significantly increases the potential for violence.","PeriodicalId":48324,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Peace Research","volume":"26 11","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2023-11-03","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"135868588","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2023-10-26DOI: 10.1177/00223433231196610
Kelly Matush, David A Lake
Militarized state-building interventions (MSIs) must fulfill two often conflicting goals. At the time of withdrawal the intervenor must leave in place a state able to survive on its own and govern its territory. States only intervene in other states, however, when they aspire to change the policy of the target in ways they prefer. In attempting to balance these objectives, the intervenor ‘pulls’ policy in its preferred direction by supporting a less popular leader at the cost of leaving behind a state that is no more likely to survive over time than its peers. We test our theory and find evidence for this trade-off by examining all MSIs by great powers and IOs in failed states from 1956 to 2006. Consistent with the theory, we find that MSIs do not on average have any significant effect on state survival. We also find that MSIs that move the target state’s policy closer to that of the external power have a negative effect on survival, but interventions that do not result in a change in policy do not. This argument and finding temper the optimism of much of the contemporary literature on international interventions. Potential intervenors face a stark trade-off. If they draw the policy of the failed state towards their own preferences, then that state will be more likely to fail again in the future.
{"title":"Militarized state-building interventions and the survival of fragile states","authors":"Kelly Matush, David A Lake","doi":"10.1177/00223433231196610","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1177/00223433231196610","url":null,"abstract":"Militarized state-building interventions (MSIs) must fulfill two often conflicting goals. At the time of withdrawal the intervenor must leave in place a state able to survive on its own and govern its territory. States only intervene in other states, however, when they aspire to change the policy of the target in ways they prefer. In attempting to balance these objectives, the intervenor ‘pulls’ policy in its preferred direction by supporting a less popular leader at the cost of leaving behind a state that is no more likely to survive over time than its peers. We test our theory and find evidence for this trade-off by examining all MSIs by great powers and IOs in failed states from 1956 to 2006. Consistent with the theory, we find that MSIs do not on average have any significant effect on state survival. We also find that MSIs that move the target state’s policy closer to that of the external power have a negative effect on survival, but interventions that do not result in a change in policy do not. This argument and finding temper the optimism of much of the contemporary literature on international interventions. Potential intervenors face a stark trade-off. If they draw the policy of the failed state towards their own preferences, then that state will be more likely to fail again in the future.","PeriodicalId":48324,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Peace Research","volume":"46 6","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2023-10-26","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"136382083","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2023-09-27DOI: 10.1177/00223433231186452
Espen Geelmuyden Rød, Håvard Hegre, Maxine Leis
Protest is a low-intensity form of political conflict that can precipitate intrastate armed conflict. Data on protests should therefore be informative in systems that provide early warnings of armed conflict. However, since most protests do not escalate to armed conflict, we first need theory to inform our prediction models. We identify three theoretical explanations relating to protest-repression dynamics, political institutions and economic development as the basis for our models. Based on theory, we operationalize nine models and leverage the political Violence Early Warning System (ViEWS) to generate subnational forecasts for intrastate armed conflict in Africa. Results show that protest data substantially improves conflict incidence and onset predictions compared to baseline models that account for conflict history. Moreover, the results underline the centrality of theory for conflict forecasting: our theoretically informed protest models outperform naive models that treat all protests equally.
{"title":"Predicting armed conflict using protest data","authors":"Espen Geelmuyden Rød, Håvard Hegre, Maxine Leis","doi":"10.1177/00223433231186452","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1177/00223433231186452","url":null,"abstract":"Protest is a low-intensity form of political conflict that can precipitate intrastate armed conflict. Data on protests should therefore be informative in systems that provide early warnings of armed conflict. However, since most protests do not escalate to armed conflict, we first need theory to inform our prediction models. We identify three theoretical explanations relating to protest-repression dynamics, political institutions and economic development as the basis for our models. Based on theory, we operationalize nine models and leverage the political Violence Early Warning System (ViEWS) to generate subnational forecasts for intrastate armed conflict in Africa. Results show that protest data substantially improves conflict incidence and onset predictions compared to baseline models that account for conflict history. Moreover, the results underline the centrality of theory for conflict forecasting: our theoretically informed protest models outperform naive models that treat all protests equally.","PeriodicalId":48324,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Peace Research","volume":"86 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2023-09-27","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"135536948","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2023-09-27DOI: 10.1177/00223433231168182
Heather Tasker, Katie van der Werf, Annie Bunting, Susan A Bartels
The Democratic Republic of Congo hosts the longest-running and largest United Nations peacekeeping mission in history. The United Nations also has reckoned with sexual exploitation and abuse in its own ranks and, in 2003, recognized its importance with a Bulletin which became known as the ‘zero tolerance policy’. Policymakers and researchers have paid little sustained attention, however, to children fathered by peacekeepers. In this article, we share the results of our mixed-methods SenseMaker® research with community members who interact with peacekeeping personnel and interviews with 58 women who are raising children fathered by peacekeepers. Despite the United Nations policies in place, most women did not report children fathered by peacekeepers and did not receive systematic support. The analysis reveals a large gap between the aspirations of the ‘zero tolerance policy’ and its operationalization in the Democratic Republic of Congo. We uncovered deep poverty and insecurity as both driving and resulting from women’s sexual encounters with peacekeepers, with support needs largely unmet. We argue that there is a lack of enforcement of the United Nations policies, jurisdictional complexity and inaccessible justice, as well as significant gaps between the United Nations’ approach to investigating and supporting children fathered by peacekeepers and the expectations of mothers, resulting in worsened life conditions for mothers and their children.
{"title":"‘Those MONUSCO agents left while we were still pregnant’: Accountability and support for peacekeeper-fathered children in the DRC","authors":"Heather Tasker, Katie van der Werf, Annie Bunting, Susan A Bartels","doi":"10.1177/00223433231168182","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1177/00223433231168182","url":null,"abstract":"The Democratic Republic of Congo hosts the longest-running and largest United Nations peacekeeping mission in history. The United Nations also has reckoned with sexual exploitation and abuse in its own ranks and, in 2003, recognized its importance with a Bulletin which became known as the ‘zero tolerance policy’. Policymakers and researchers have paid little sustained attention, however, to children fathered by peacekeepers. In this article, we share the results of our mixed-methods SenseMaker® research with community members who interact with peacekeeping personnel and interviews with 58 women who are raising children fathered by peacekeepers. Despite the United Nations policies in place, most women did not report children fathered by peacekeepers and did not receive systematic support. The analysis reveals a large gap between the aspirations of the ‘zero tolerance policy’ and its operationalization in the Democratic Republic of Congo. We uncovered deep poverty and insecurity as both driving and resulting from women’s sexual encounters with peacekeepers, with support needs largely unmet. We argue that there is a lack of enforcement of the United Nations policies, jurisdictional complexity and inaccessible justice, as well as significant gaps between the United Nations’ approach to investigating and supporting children fathered by peacekeepers and the expectations of mothers, resulting in worsened life conditions for mothers and their children.","PeriodicalId":48324,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Peace Research","volume":"69 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2023-09-27","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"135537404","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2023-09-25DOI: 10.1177/00223433231180928
Ryan Brutger, Tim Marple
This article theorizes and tests how different types of interstate conflict across borders affect trade between disputing parties and trade diversion with third parties. Building on theories of borders as institutions, we differentiate the effects of two types of international disputes – border disputes and escalated militarized disputes – and draw on 60 years of trade and conflict data to test the effects of these disputes on bilateral and third-party trade flows. We find that border disputes and militarized disputes each depress trade flows between the disputing countries. However, legal border disputes are associated with increased trade diversion with non-disputing countries, which may fully offset the forgone bilateral trade, whereas militarized disputes have the opposite effect. These results show that actors engaged in trade can offset bilateral trade losses from a border dispute by expanding trade with third parties not involved in the dispute, but the same cannot be said of offsetting the losses from militarized disputes. The fact that border disputes and militarized disputes have opposite effects on trade diversion highlights the importance of examining both the type of dispute and the type of trade flows that are affected when studying conflict and trade and evaluating the potentially pacifying incentives of international trade.
{"title":"Butterfly effects in global trade: International borders, disputes, and trade disruption and diversion","authors":"Ryan Brutger, Tim Marple","doi":"10.1177/00223433231180928","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1177/00223433231180928","url":null,"abstract":"This article theorizes and tests how different types of interstate conflict across borders affect trade between disputing parties and trade diversion with third parties. Building on theories of borders as institutions, we differentiate the effects of two types of international disputes – border disputes and escalated militarized disputes – and draw on 60 years of trade and conflict data to test the effects of these disputes on bilateral and third-party trade flows. We find that border disputes and militarized disputes each depress trade flows between the disputing countries. However, legal border disputes are associated with increased trade diversion with non-disputing countries, which may fully offset the forgone bilateral trade, whereas militarized disputes have the opposite effect. These results show that actors engaged in trade can offset bilateral trade losses from a border dispute by expanding trade with third parties not involved in the dispute, but the same cannot be said of offsetting the losses from militarized disputes. The fact that border disputes and militarized disputes have opposite effects on trade diversion highlights the importance of examining both the type of dispute and the type of trade flows that are affected when studying conflict and trade and evaluating the potentially pacifying incentives of international trade.","PeriodicalId":48324,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Peace Research","volume":"36 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2023-09-25","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"135816851","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2023-09-25DOI: 10.1177/00223433231168189
Natalia Garbiras-Díaz, Miguel García-Sánchez, Aila M Matanock
Civil conflicts typically end with negotiated settlements, but many settlements fail, often during the implementation stage when average citizens have increasing influence. Citizens sometimes evaluate peace agreements by voting on referendums or the negotiating leaders, and, almost always, they decide whether to cooperate. Yet, despite their role, we do not know much about how citizens form attitudes toward peace agreements. In this article, we assess how citizens form attitudes toward settlements, specifically the policy provisions that emerge from them, which are central in shaping the post-conflict context. These are complex policy changes, involving deeply factionalized actors, and the citizens evaluating them are often focused on rebuilding their lives. We therefore theorize that citizens use stark cues from political elites with whom they have affinity to form their attitudes. We test our theory using survey experiments in Colombia. We find that citizens rely on political elites’ cues to decide their stance on the settlement’s provisions. These cues appear to supply easily-accessible information that respondents use over other information. In contrast to work positing that peace agreements are exceptional and weary citizens are stabilizing forces, our results suggest that even these decisions are politics as usual, where divisions among political elites drive the outcome.
{"title":"Political elite cues and attitude formation in post-conflict contexts","authors":"Natalia Garbiras-Díaz, Miguel García-Sánchez, Aila M Matanock","doi":"10.1177/00223433231168189","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1177/00223433231168189","url":null,"abstract":"Civil conflicts typically end with negotiated settlements, but many settlements fail, often during the implementation stage when average citizens have increasing influence. Citizens sometimes evaluate peace agreements by voting on referendums or the negotiating leaders, and, almost always, they decide whether to cooperate. Yet, despite their role, we do not know much about how citizens form attitudes toward peace agreements. In this article, we assess how citizens form attitudes toward settlements, specifically the policy provisions that emerge from them, which are central in shaping the post-conflict context. These are complex policy changes, involving deeply factionalized actors, and the citizens evaluating them are often focused on rebuilding their lives. We therefore theorize that citizens use stark cues from political elites with whom they have affinity to form their attitudes. We test our theory using survey experiments in Colombia. We find that citizens rely on political elites’ cues to decide their stance on the settlement’s provisions. These cues appear to supply easily-accessible information that respondents use over other information. In contrast to work positing that peace agreements are exceptional and weary citizens are stabilizing forces, our results suggest that even these decisions are politics as usual, where divisions among political elites drive the outcome.","PeriodicalId":48324,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Peace Research","volume":"128 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2023-09-25","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"135864181","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2023-09-20DOI: 10.1177/00223433231186448
Stefano Costalli, Jessica Di Salvatore, Andrea Ruggeri
Do UN missions reduce forced displacement? Facing insecure environments, civilians are left with three choices: staying; moving to a safer community; or moving outside their country. Their aspiration and ability to move depend on individual characteristics and macro-level factors, such as the social, economic and political context in which these people live. Research shows that UN missions can impact and reset the macro-level context altered by war, especially in the security and economic domain. However, we lack empirical evidence on whether this impact helps UN peacekeeping tackle forced displacement and returns. This article offers the first global analysis of whether and how UN missions can shape aggregate population movements during civil wars. We combine data on outflows and returns of refugees and internally displaced people (IDPs) with data on distinct UN missions’ features that we expect to affect population movements, namely the size of their contingents and their mandated tasks. Using matched samples, we find that the unfolding of the outflows and inflows processes are affected by different features of UN missions. Sizeable deployments decrease IDPs flows and encourage their return; refugee outflows, on the other hand, may increase in presence of UN missions. Furthermore, missions with displacement-related mandates are associated with decreasing IDP flows overall, but only encourage refugees’ returns.
{"title":"Do UN peace operations help forcibly displaced people?","authors":"Stefano Costalli, Jessica Di Salvatore, Andrea Ruggeri","doi":"10.1177/00223433231186448","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1177/00223433231186448","url":null,"abstract":"Do UN missions reduce forced displacement? Facing insecure environments, civilians are left with three choices: staying; moving to a safer community; or moving outside their country. Their aspiration and ability to move depend on individual characteristics and macro-level factors, such as the social, economic and political context in which these people live. Research shows that UN missions can impact and reset the macro-level context altered by war, especially in the security and economic domain. However, we lack empirical evidence on whether this impact helps UN peacekeeping tackle forced displacement and returns. This article offers the first global analysis of whether and how UN missions can shape aggregate population movements during civil wars. We combine data on outflows and returns of refugees and internally displaced people (IDPs) with data on distinct UN missions’ features that we expect to affect population movements, namely the size of their contingents and their mandated tasks. Using matched samples, we find that the unfolding of the outflows and inflows processes are affected by different features of UN missions. Sizeable deployments decrease IDPs flows and encourage their return; refugee outflows, on the other hand, may increase in presence of UN missions. Furthermore, missions with displacement-related mandates are associated with decreasing IDP flows overall, but only encourage refugees’ returns.","PeriodicalId":48324,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Peace Research","volume":"27 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2023-09-20","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"136314294","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}