Hostname: page-component-78c5997874-mlc7c Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-03T01:59:51.108Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

The Rebels’ Credibility Dilemma

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  04 August 2016

Jakana L. Thomas ,
William Reed  and
Scott Wolford
Get access

Abstract

This article examines why rebel groups make large demands of governments that are inconsistent with their fighting capacity, especially when such demands are almost always rejected. We show that making large demands, even if ultimately rejected by the government, makes sense for rebels who face a credibility dilemma. Such a dilemma is most likely to arise when militarily weak rebel groups face governments of uncertain strength and can commit to fight credibly only when they believe the government is also weak. This results in a counterintuitive set of strategic incentives for weak rebels, who choose their demands to ensure that they are rejected even when the government is weak. Thus, to make their threat to fight credible, weak rebels make large demands that, when rejected, result in inefficient fighting. Since most civil wars are characterized by weak rebels bargaining with much stronger governments, it is important to understand how this particular feature of civil war shapes intrawar negotiations between the rebels and the government. We develop a model of bargaining between a government and rebel group and evaluate its implications using historical data on civil conflict in Africa from 1989 to 2010. The results suggest that the tendency for the government to be significantly stronger than rebels induces rebel groups to make unrealistically large demands.

Type
Research Article
Information
International Organization , Volume 70 , Issue 3 , Summer 2016 , pp. 477 - 511
Copyright
Copyright © The IO Foundation 2016 

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Balcells, Laia, and Kalyvas, Stathis N.. 2014. Does Warfare Matter? Severity, Duration, and Outcomes of Civil Wars. Journal of Conflict Resolution 58 (8):1390–1418.Google Scholar
Banks, Jeffrey D. 1990. Equilibrium Behavior in Crisis Bargaining Games. American Journal of Political Science 34 (3):599–614.Google Scholar
Bapat, Navin A. 2005. Insurgency and the Opening of Peace Processes. Journal of Peace Research 42 (6):699–717.Google Scholar
Buhaug, Halvard. 2006. Relative Capability and Rebel Objective in Civil War. Journal of Peace Research 43 (6):691–708.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Buhaug, Halvard, Gates, Scott, and Lujala, Päivi. 2009. Geography, Rebel Capability, and the Duration of Civil Conflict. Journal of Conflict Resolution 53 (4):544–569.Google Scholar
Butler, Christopher, and Gates, Scott. 2009. Asymmetry, Parity, and (Civil) War: Can International Theories of Power Help Us Understand Civil War? International Interactions 35 (3):330–340.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Che, Yeon-Koo, and Gale, Ian. 2000. Difference-Form Contests and the Robustness of All-Pay Auctions. Games and Economic Behavior 30 (1):22–43.Google Scholar
Cho, In-Koo, and Kreps, David M.. 1987. Signaling Games and Stable Equilibria. Quarterly Journal of Economics 102 (2):179–221.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Collier, Paul, and Hoeffler, Anke. 2002. On the Incidence of Civil War in Africa. Journal of Conflict Resolution 46 (1):13–28.Google Scholar
Craft, Cassady, and Smaldone, Joseph P.. 2002. The Arms Trade and the Incidence of Political Violence in Sub-Saharan Africa, 1967–97. Journal of Peace Research 39 (6):693–710.Google Scholar
Crocker, Chester A., Hampson, Fen Osler, and Aall, Pamela R.. 2007. Leashing the Dogs of War: Conflict Management in a Divided World. Washington, DC: US Institute of Peace.Google Scholar
Cunningham, David, Gleditsch, Kristian Skrede, and Salehyan, Idean. 2009. It Takes Two: A Dyadic Analysis of Civil War Duration and Outcome. Journal of Conflict Resolution 53 (4):570–597.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Cunningham, David E. 2011. Barriers to Peace in Civil War. New York: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Fearon, James D. 1994. Domestic Political Audiences and the Escalation of International Disputes. American Political Science Review 577–592.Google Scholar
Fearon, James D. 1995. Rationalist Explanations for War. International Organization 49 (3):379–414.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Fearon, James D. 1997. Signaling Foreign Policy Interests: Tying Hands versus Sinking Costs. Journal of Conflict Resolution 41 (1):68–90.Google Scholar
Fearon, James D. 2013. Fighting Rather than Bargaining. Unpublished manuscript, Stanford University.Google Scholar
Fey, Mark, and Ramsay, Kristopher W.. 2009. Mechanism Design Goes to War: Peaceful Outcomes with Independent and Correlated Types. Review of Economic Design 13 (3):233–250.Google Scholar
Fey, Mark, and Ramsay, Kristopher W.. 2011. Uncertainty and Incentives in Crisis Bargaining: Game-Free Analysis of International Conflict. American Journal of Political Science 55 (1):149–169.Google Scholar
Filson, Darren, and Werner, Suzanne. 2002. A Bargaining Model of War and Peace: Anticipating the Onset, Duration, and Outcome of War. American Journal of Political Science 46 (4):819–838.Google Scholar
Fjelde, Hanne, and Nilsson, Desirée. 2012. Rebels against Rebels: Explaining Violence between Rebel Groups. Journal of Conflict Resolution 56 (4):604–628.Google Scholar
Geddes, Barbara, Wright, Joseph, and Frantz, Erica. 2014. Autocratic Breakdown and Regime Transitions: A New Data Set. Perspectives on Politics 12 (2):313–331.Google Scholar
Harbom, Lotta, Melander, Erik, and Wallensteen, Peter. 2008. Dyadic Dimensions of Armed Conflict, 1946–2007. Journal of Peace Research 45 (5):697–710.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hirshleifer, Jack. 1991. The Paradox of Power. Economics and Politics 3 (3):177–200.Google Scholar
Hultman, Lisa. 2007. Battle Losses and Rebel Violence: Raising the Costs for Fighting. Terrorism and Political Violence 19 (2):205–222.Google Scholar
Human Security Centre. 2005. Human Security Report 2005: War and Peace in the Twenty-first Century. New York: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Human Security Centre. 2010. Human Security Report 2009/2010: The Causes of Peace and the Shrinking Costs of War. New York: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Hyde, Susan D., and Marinov, Nikolay. 2012. Which Elections Can Be Lost? Political Analysis 20 (2):191–210.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Jenne, Erin. 2004. A Bargaining Theory of Minority Demands: Explaining the Dog that Did Not Bite in 1990s Yugoslavia. International Studies Quarterly 48 (4):729–754.Google Scholar
Jenne, Erin. 2007. Ethnic Bargaining: The Paradox of Minority Empowerment. Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press.Google Scholar
Jenne, Erin, Saideman, Stephen, and Lowe, Will. 2007. Separatism as a Bargaining Posture: The Role of Leverage in Minority Radicalization. Journal of Peace Research 44 (5):539–558.Google Scholar
Jia, Hao, Skaperdas, Stergios, and Vaidya, Samarth. 2013. Contest Functions: Theoretical Foundations and Issues in Estimation. International Journal of Industrial Organization 31 (3):211–222.Google Scholar
Kalyvas, Stathis N., and Balcells, Laia. 2010. International System and Technologies of Rebellion: How the End of the Cold War Shaped Internal Conflict. American Political Science Review 104 (3):415–429.Google Scholar
King, Gary. 1989. Event Count Models for International Relations: Generalizations and Applications. International Studies Quarterly 33 (2):123–147.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Marshall, Monty G., Jaggers, Keith, and Gurr, Ted Robert. 2002. Polity IV Project. Center for International Development and Conflict Management at the University of Maryland College Park. Available at: <http://www.systemicpeace.org/polityproject.html>.Google Scholar
Mattes, Michaela, Leeds, Brett Ashley, and Carroll, Royce. 2015. Leadership Turnover and Foreign Policy Change: Societal Interests, Domestic Institutions, and Voting in the United Nations. International Studies Quarterly 59 (2):280–290.Google Scholar
Nilsson, Desirée. 2010. Turning Weakness into Strength: Military Capabilities, Multiple Rebel Groups and Negotiated Settlements. Conflict Management and Peace Science 27 (3):253–271.Google Scholar
Porter, Elisabeth J., Robinson, Gillian, Smyth, Marie, Schnabel, Albrecht, and Osaghae, Eghosa, eds. 2005. Researching Conflict in Africa: Insights and Experiences. New York: United Nations University Press.Google Scholar
Powell, Robert. 1999. In the Shadow of Power. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press.Google Scholar
Powell, Robert. 2004. Bargaining and Learning While Fighting. American Journal of Political Science 48 (2):344–61.Google Scholar
Rothchild, Donald S. 1997. Managing Ethnic Conflict in Africa: Pressures and Incentives for Cooperation. Washington, DC: Brookings Institution Press.Google Scholar
Salehyan, Idean, Hendrix, Cullen S., Hamner, Jesse, Case, Christina, Linebarger, Christopher, Stull, Emily, and Williams, Jennifer. 2012. Social Conflict in Africa: A New Database. International Interactions 38 (4):503–511.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Slantchev, Branislav. 2005. Military Coercion in Interstate Crises. American Political Science Review 99 (4):533–547.Google Scholar
Stockholm International Peace Research Institute. 1999. SIPRI Yearbook 1999: World Armaments and Disarmament. Oxford, UK: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Thomas, Jakana. 2014. Rewarding Bad Behavior: How Governments Respond to Terrorism in Civil War. American Journal of Political Science 58 (4):804–818.Google Scholar
Walter, Barbara F. 2004. Does Conflict Beget Conflict? Explaining Recurring Civil War. Journal of Peace Research 41 (3):371–388.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Walter, Barbara F. 2006. Building Reputation: Why Governments Fight Some Separatists but Not Others. American Journal of Political Science 50 (2):313–330.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Walter, Barbara F. 2009. Bargaining Failures and Civil War. Annual Review of Political Science 12:243–261.Google Scholar
Williams, Paul D. 2007. Thinking About Security in Africa. International Affairs 83 (6):1021–1038.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Wolford, Scott, Reiter, Dan, and Carrubba, Clifford J.. 2011. Information, Commitment, and War. Journal of Conflict Resolution 55 (4):556–579.Google Scholar
Supplementary material: PDF

Thomas supplementary material

Online Appendix

Download Thomas supplementary material(PDF)
PDF 153.1 KB