UN Sanctions on Rebel Groups and Persistence of Civil Wars

• In Event: Graduate Student Research Lightning Round: Social Movements, Conflict, Coalitions

Abstract

Why external actors impose sanctions on rebel groups is crucial to understanding the effectiveness of economic coercion on conflict resolution. Existing research about the effect of economic sanctions on civil war dynamics focuses on state-targeted economic sanctions. However, rebel groups have recently been sanctioned more than states in civil wars. Yet, we still have a limited understanding of what determines sanctions' effectiveness in the civil war. I argue that the effect of international sanctions, particularly the UN, on conflict duration is contingent upon the depriving role of sanctions on rebel governance. Once UN sanctions specifically target rebel groups with governance, they weaken the rebel's overall capacity and prevent insurgents from sustaining their power over people, depriving the group and reducing conflict duration. Through Cox regression using time-series cross-sectional data covering all civil wars fought between 1975 and 2019, this paper shows that when UN sanctions focus on reducing rebels' power to govern and control, wars last shorter than those the UN has not targeted.

Author

• Merve Keskin, University of Pittsburgh