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The Logic of Kidnapping in Civil War: Evidence from Colombia

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  22 March 2022

DANIELLE GILBERT Open the ORCID record for DANIELLE GILBERT [Opens in a new window]
DANIELLE GILBERT*
Affiliation:
United States Air Force Academy, United States
*
Danielle Gilbert, Assistant Professor, Department of Military and Strategic Studies, United States Air Force Academy, United States, [email protected].
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Abstract

Why do some armed groups kidnap for ransom? Despite a dramatic spike in kidnappings by political groups over the last several decades, there are scant existing explanations for why groups use this tool of coercion. Leveraging evidence from extensive interviews with former combatants from Colombia’s civil war, including the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC) and National Liberation Army (ELN), as well as military and security personnel, I show that ransom kidnapping is used to enforce groups’ protection rackets, their main source of funding. Kidnapping is both the most lucrative way to punish tax evasion and an effective means of deterring future shirking. Thus, groups that tax local populations are more likely to kidnap; groups relying on external or voluntary forms of funding are less likely to take hostages. This article explains when we should see kidnapping in armed conflict, describing an underexplored way that selective violence bolsters insurgency.

Type
Research Article
Information
American Political Science Review , Volume 116 , Issue 4 , November 2022 , pp. 1226 - 1241
Copyright
© The Author(s), 2022. Published by Cambridge University Press on behalf of the American Political Science Association

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