Who Wants Peace? Predicting Civilian Preferences in Conflict Negotiations

Efforts to end civil wars via negotiations often generate sharp divisions in public opinion. A large, quantitative literature has found evidence for numerous variables serving as potential drivers of public support of and opposition to conflict negotiations. Yet the formation of policy preferences is a complex process, and while many factors might make small contributions to an individual’s conflict termination preferences, we lack a sense of which factors matter most or how to adjudicate among competing explanations. In this article, we leverage a large amount of nationally representative survey data from Colombia (2004–2015) and use machine learning tools to systematically explore which variables are the strongest predictors of public support for negotiations with Fuerzas Armadas Revolucionarias de Colombia (FARC). We find that certain aspects of conflict exposure, individual values bearing on justice and punishment, and belief in the efficacy of the state are among the strongest predictors of negotiation preferences, while many conventionally important variables in the literature have little predictive power. The results have implications for scholars seeking to understand broad drivers of (dis)satisfaction with negotiations and shed light on the polarising Colombian peace process.