What Makes DDR Programs Successful? Introducing the DDR-18 Dataset (1980-2018)

• In Event: Poster Session: Comparative Politics II & State Politics and Policy
  In Poster Session: Poster Session: Comparative Politics II

Abstract

Determining the criteria that have contributed to the success or failure of a Disarmament, Demobilization, and Reintegration (DDR) program has led to the publication of countless documents on lessons learned, new pathways, and revised theories. The large number of DDR reports is justified, considering the high value that a successful program would yield: DDR is the largest intervention in nearly all of the United Nations’ (UN) ongoing large-scale peacekeeping missions tasked with restoring social capital and promoting long-term peace. Evaluations of the effectiveness and relevance of DDR programs have suffered from methodological dilemmas – the shortage of baseline data has made researchers resort to qualitative or limited, localized quantitative evidence of success or failure in individual dimensions of each program. There is no consensus so far on when we can call a DDR program a success and which factors are associated with successful programs. Does DDR succeed more often in countries with a higher GDP or a higher Polity score? Does success in DDR depend on a higher budget for the program? Do national programs succeed more often than programs led by the UN? Are integrated groups more successfully demobilized than fragmented ones? Do DDR programs succeed more often when governments implement peace deals or when rebel groups form a political party? We simply do not know the answer to these questions for lack of data on all DDR programs worldwide.

To facilitate more rigorous research on determinants of success or failure in DDR programs, this paper presents and describes DDR-18, a new global dataset of all DDR programs, starting in 1980 and ending in 2018. Sixty-two programs are identified and presented as counting process data with yearly time-varying covariates and discontinuous risk intervals. Among others, the DDR-18 includes the following variables: duration of the program; actors involved; targeted groups; type of rebel group at the time of the peace process and its ethnic base; whether it transformed to a political party; whether the party has ethnic support; number of ex-combatants; demobilization period; state compliance with the peace accord; cost and funding of the program, and its evaluation. I provide an overview of the main features of the data.

Security-focused interpretations of post-conflict peace are often criticized for confining DDR success to negative peace – non-recurrence of armed conflict – and underplaying the economic, political, and social objectives of the programs. While DDR success requires more than the guns falling silent, a program is instantly deemed a failure if the rebel group rearms within five years of DDR commencement. Failure in DDR on the national level often results from rebel leaders’ decision to revert back to armed conflict. On the subnational level, however, failure is determined by individual decisions to form new armed groups or join existing ones. I take failure in DDR on the national level to be a relapse to armed conflict by the group(s) involved in DDR within five years from the start of the program.

State compliance with peace accord terms and the promised role in the DDR program plays a substantial role in determining a demobilized group’s decision to rearm. Nevertheless, it is hard to find cases of successful DDR implementation in which the state has complied fully with the terms of the peace agreement. On the national level, DDR programs are evaluated one-sidedly as the return to violence by rebels. Resumption of state-directed violent activity against the group marks a failed peace deal but not a failed DDR. Yet the return to violence by the state for any reason creates incentives for the rebels to rearm as well. Thus, successful DDR depends in part on the state’s decision to uphold the terms of the peace agreement. Although selective, my overview of peace agreement implementation demonstrates how DDR success or failure associates with the extent to which governments implement peace agreements after civil conflicts.

Author

• Sally Sharif, Graduate Center, City University of New York