Divided We Fall: Ethnic Cleavages, Movement Cohesion, and the Risk of Escalation to Civil War in Non-Violent Uprisings

ABSTRACT Why do some non-violent uprisings escalate into armed violence while others do not? We suggest that horizontal polarisation contributes to the escalation of non-violent campaigns. We examine the effect of ethnic cleavages between the campaign and its opponent and movement cohesion as explanatory factors for escalation into civil war and non-state violence. Statistical analysis of all major non-violent campaigns (1970–2014) shows that non-violent conflicts with ethnic cleavages have a higher risk of escalating into armed violence in particular, when the conflict takes place over governmental aims. The results also indicate that movement cohesion alleviates the risk of armed escalation.