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Abstract
What factors contribute to the victimization of civilians during civil war? Drawing on research from various disciplines, we argue that increasing competition within a civil conflict system brought on by the entrance of new factions contributes to an increase in civilian targeting by existing rebel groups. Specifically, we argue that existing groups are more likely to target civilians immediately upon the entrance of new rivals due to the perceived threat to control over resources and because the arrival of new groups diminishes the gains existing groups expect from either victory or successful conflict bargaining. We further argue that violence against civilians increases during periods in which rival factions engage in direct, violent conflict with one another. Our analysis diverges from existing studies by arguing and demonstrating that fluctuations in competition rather than the simple presence of competing groups produce spikes in civilian targeting by nonstate actors. We evaluate and find support for our argument using monthly data for African conflicts between 1989 and 2010.
Keywords
civil war, civilian victimization, competition, rebel factions
Contemporary civil conflicts1 are best characterized as complex systems in which a variety of nonstate actors (NSAs) engage in a violent competition with one another and the state over political outcomes. The range of NSAs present in civil conflicts commonly includes paramilitary groups, local militias, foreign fighters, and various allied or rival rebel factions. The diverse characteristics, ideologies, and preferences of these myriad actors influence their conflict strategies, behaviors, and, ultimately, conflict outcomes. The humanitarian disaster in Syria is an example. Syria currently hosts a number of competing insurgent groups, including the largely secular Free Syrian Army, local Islamist factions such as the Syrian Islamic Liberation Front and the Syrian Islamist Front, Al-Qaeda-linked groups like Jabhat al Nusra, and many smaller factions (Sowell 2013). Although similarly oriented in seeking to unseat Bashar al-Assad's government, these groups commonly compete with one another, using violence to control territory, resources, and civilian support (Morris, Warrick, and Mekhennet 2013). Hezbollah's entry in support of the Assad regime further complicates the war, pitting Islamist organizations against each other (Muir 2013).
Despite the complexity of civil conflicts, rebellions have traditionally been studied through a dyadic lens in which a single, unitary rebel group challenges the state. While...