Do Rebels Experience Audience Costs?

• In Event: Poster Session: International Political Economy II & Conflict Processes I
  In Poster Session: Poster Session: Conflict Processes I

Abstract

The availability of new data on civil disputes that do not escalate to conflict raises a host of questions, but perhaps chief among them is: why do some disputes escalate to conflict or war while others do not? In this paper, I propose that would-be rebels face the same types of audience costs as state-leaders, and as such face the same kinds of constraints. I test this theory using new data on the outcomes of non-violent disputes and newly-developed tools for the structural modeling crisis-signaling interactions. I find that rebels indeed face substantial audience costs for backing down from demands and that non-monotonic relationships exist between these costs and the probability of internal unrest. These rebel audience costs are particularly pronounced in democratic states, which often lead democratic leaders to give into would-be rebels rather than risk conflict. These results provide new insight into both why intrastate disputes begin and why only some escalate to conflict.

Author

• Casey Crisman-Cox, Texas A&M University