On the Duration of Civil War

Abstract

This article explores empirically the duration of civil war. It relates the duration of civil war to two alternative models of conflict and culls testable hypotheses from the case study literature on civil war. Using a comprehensive dataset on large-scale violent civil conflicts covering the 1960-2000 period, a wide range of hypotheses are tested by means of hazard function regressions. The results show that the duration of conflict is systematically related both to structural conditions prevailing prior to conflict and to circumstances during conflict. The key structural characteristics that lengthen conflict are low per capita income, high inequality and a moderate degree of ethnic division. The key variable characteristics that shorten conflict are a decline in the prices of the primary commodities that the country exports and external military intervention on the side of the rebels. Furthermore, the results indicate that the chances of peace were much lower in the 1980s and 1990s than they had been previously. Three empirical explanations are suggested as different approaches to civil war: rebellion-as-investment, in which the critical incentive is the post-conflict payoff; rebellion-as-business, in which the critical incentive is the payoff during conflict; and rebellion-as-mistake, in which military optimism prevents the recognition of any mutually advantageous settlement. The article concludes that the empirical evidence is incompatible with the first of these approaches but consistent with the others.

The Logic of Political Violence

“…While high executive constraints are associated with sti¤er checks and balances on the government, this measure is intended to capture larger representativeness. 10 We de…ne it analogously to the core measure, namely as the result of having had a positive prevalence of parliamentary democracy before 1950, and a minimum prevalence of 60% in between 1950 and 2005.…”

Relative rebel strength and the onset and outcome of civil war mediation

“…Weak insurgencies are generally focused upon inflicting accumulated costs that undermine the level of popular support in the government, and force the state to the negotiating table (DeRouen & Sobek, 2004;Collier et al, 2004). Once within mediation weak insurgents have few additional chips to trade for commitment-enhancing concessions.…”

“…shown the relationship between weak rebel movements and increased conflict duration (Collier et al, 2004;Cunningham, Gleditsch & Salehyan, 2009). In keeping with the rebel strength argument, the long intractable conflicts involving small weak insurgencies seem responsible for the negative impact of duration.…”

Indivisibility, Fairness, Farsightedness and their Implications for Security

“…To deal with misperceptions first, the most obvious candidate that prevents peace in this category of explanations for civil war persistence is an overestimate of the probability of military victory, see Collier et al (2004) in this connection. The same authors also emphasize that the state of war may also be highly profitable for one or more of the belligerent groups.…”