Rebel Punishment and the Strategic Escalation of Civil Conflicts

• In Event: Poster Session: Political Methodology

Abstract

Why do some intrastate disputes escalate to conflict or war while others do not? In this paper, I argue that one reason is that would-be rebels face punishments for backing down from demands (similar to how audience costs operate in interstate disputes). I test this theory using recently released data on the outcomes of non-violent disputes and newly-developed tools for identifying audience costs that accounts for the strategic escalation from peace to dispute to conflict. I find that, on average, prospective rebels face large costs for backing down. In roughly half of all the observations raising these punishments for backing down decreases the likelihood that a potential rebel group initiates a dispute, while in the remaining observations it increases the likelihood of a civil dispute. In all observations however, an increase in the punishments faced by rebels results in a decrease in the likelihood that a government resists a threat. Overall, this suggests that the existence of these punishments strengthens a would-be rebel group's bargaining position and factors that raise these punishments may be detrimental to civil peace.

Author

• Casey Crisman-Cox, Texas A&M University