Third-party regime type and civil war duration

Abstract

Does the regime type of a foreign intervener influence the duration of civil wars? Existing research has shown that third-party support affects the outcome of a conflict. Moreover, studies show that the type of support offered to conflict actors can determine how a war ends. While this research has offered significant implications on conflict dynamics, extant works have overlooked the importance of characteristics of foreign supporters and how their attributes can impact conflict outcomes. Focusing on foreign troop support and quantities, this article examines the relationship between the regime type of a foreign supporter and the outcome of an armed conflict. We argue that regime type of an external troop sponsor can influence war duration based on two dynamics: selection effects and signaling effects. Specifically, troop assistance provided to warring parties by democracies decreases the length of civil wars and increases the likelihood for a one-sided victory for the supported faction. The empirical findings for all intrastate conflicts during the period 1975–2012 provide evidence for our claims that the regime type of an external intervener influences the outcome of a conflict.

Committed sponsors: external support overtness and civilian targeting in civil wars

“…I also controlled for the fact that a group is supported by Democratic Supporters , using sponsors’ Polity Scores (Marshall and Gurr, 2020). 27 While the sponsors’ political regime can influence the overtness of the support—established democracies with robust institutional control over foreign policy are required to be more transparent about their actions abroad than non-democracies (Norrevik and Sarwari, 2021)—liberal democracies will likely be willing to monitor rebel behaviors more strictly than illiberal political regimes (Salehyan et al, 2014). I also controlled for the sponsors’ Reliance on Foreign Aid (Edgell, 2017).…”

Forever wars: Divided government and the termination of interventions in support of civil war governments

“…Linebarger et al (2020) examine the duration of pro-government interventions, concluding that they are likely to be terminated if the third-party state is subjected to terrorist attacks originating from within the civil conflict state. Finally democratic interventions result in shorter duration conflicts (Norrevik and Sarwari, 2021).…”