Intervenors with Interests and Power

This article presents a framework for understanding the roles that interested and powerful intervenors play in resolving disputes. Called an intervention role grid, this framework can be used to analyze the dispute resolution functions that third parties can perform. It may also be used to shed light on the difficult choices that confront intervenors with interests and power. The article uses case material from five recent international conflicts to illustrate how the intervention role grid works.     

Lincoln's Gamble: Fear of Intervention and the Onset of the American Civil War

Few studies consider how civil war onset can be influenced by third parties and by the belligerents’ perceptions of third party actions. I show that the American Civil War, a war largely ignored by civil war scholars, sheds insights into how anticipation of third party intervention influences the decision-making process within the target state and how the possibility of third party intervention can influence the onset and escalation of civil war. The American Civil War is an especially interesting case for exploring the role of third parties in civil war initiation since, unlike most cases considered by the existing civil war literature, the American Civil War is an instance of nonintervention: the third parties (the European powers in this case) mattered despite staying out of the conflict. Specifically, I argue that fear of foreign recognition (particularly by the British) played an underappreciated (if not the decisive) role in the earliest stages of the American Civil War by influencing Lincoln's decision to authorize the first major battle of the war at Manassas Junction, Virginia.     

Killing Time: The World Politics of Civil War Duration, 1820–1992

Policymakers often trumpet the potential for third parties to stop the killing associated with civil wars, yet third parties as strategic actors also have incentives to encourage longer civil wars. We argue that in order to assess the influence of third parties on civil war duration, it is necessary to consider the interdependent nature of third party interventions as they are distributed across the set of civil war combatants. We also argue that it is important to consider the geopolitical context in which civil wars occur, rather than focusing solely on characteristics internal to these conflicts. To test our hypotheses about the impact of third parties and geopolitical factors on civil war duration, we rely on event history analysis and a sample of 152 civil wars for the period 1820–1992. We find empirical support for the idea that extremely long civil wars correspond to the equitable distribution of third party interventions—stalemates prolong wars. The analysis also indicates that separatist civil wars and ongoing civil wars in states proximate to the civil war state result in civil wars of longer duration. Finally, we find that when third parties raise the stakes of the conflict by engaging in the use of militarized force against the civil war state, the duration of these conflicts is reduced. In general, our analysis underscores the importance of modeling the interdependent and dynamic aspects of third party intervention as well as the world politics of civil wars when forecasting their duration and formulating policy.     

Determinants of Third Parties' Intervention and Alignment Choices in Ongoing Conflicts, 1946–2001

The decision to intervene in ongoing conflicts is one of the most difficult foreign policy choices states often face. Yet, studies of third parties' joining behavior have been rare and limited in several respects. First, they have explored only a subset of all interventions—military interventions. Second, they have concentrated on security-based determinants of intervention—power and alliance considerations—while underplaying other possible motivations behind the decision to intervene. Third, they have explored intervention and alignment choices as separate issues. This paper proposes a model of joining behavior that includes both security considerations and homophilous network ties as determinants of third parties' intervention and alignment choices. The model is tested on military and nonmilitary interventions data from Corbetta and Dixon (2005) for the 1946–2001 period. The results from a boolean logit estimation indicate that (1) the intervention decision is the result of both security-driven, pragmatic considerations and homophily between joiners and disputants; and (2) opposition to a party in a conflict is as important as a third party's social proximity to the side being supported.     

Violence and the breakdown of the political settlement: an uncertain future for Bangladesh?

Abstract

We explore the dynamics of the elite political settlement in Bangladesh after the democratic transition in 1991 and its impact on the elite interactions in the arena of competitive electoral democracy. We trace the history of how a political settlement around regime succession developed in the mid-1990s, and then experienced difficulties in multiple stages, and finally broke down in 2011. Violence was instrumentally used, by the ruling elites and the main opposition party, to influence the processes of negotiations around the succession of power. We argue that ‘partyarchy’—where political parties exert informal control of the party through formal processes and institutions—and dynastic rule prevent the political elites from reaching a stable settlement around regime succession. We also show how the changes to the rules of the game around regime succession have led to a qualitative shift in the extent and nature of violence in the political domain, and explore why democratic consolidation remains elusive.     

论中美关系中的第三方因素

中美关系中的第三方因素对两国关系的稳定与发展有着特殊的影响,在相互依存度日益紧密和双方力量此消彼长的背景下,两国如何应对双边关系中的"第三者",不但直接影响到中美关系,也影响到"第三者"本身及亚太地区的稳定与和平.两国是否要利用"第三者"而去抗衡或打压对方则是问题的另一方面.从2009年11月奥巴马访问亚洲后的情况看,美国已明显地调整了对华外交政策,由认为两国应该"同舟共济"来"共同管理"世界(G2)到如今利用两国关系中的第三方因素,如在"天安"舰事件、钓鱼岛、南中国海等问题上来牵制中国,表明美国的亚太政策回归到了"均势"理论与实践.本文分析第三方因素的存在,追溯其历史演进,指出任何想利用第三方因素来获取本国利益最大化的政策.既不合时宜,也会危及自身.     

International Mediation and Social Networks: The Importance of Indirect Ties

This study extends the previous literature on actors' incentives in conflict management by examining how direct and indirect links between fighting parties influence the prospects for mediation onset from a social network perspective. The paper argues, contrary to existing research, that direct links, i.e., bilateral ties between warring parties, do not notably increase the likelihood of mediation. Rather, indirect links, i.e., ties that connect two states via one or more than one third party to each other, are more likely to determine whether a conflict sees mediation. Although direct links can indicate mutual interests, shared preferences, and decreased uncertainty between the warring parties, these ties either lose importance or become cut off when states enter a conflict. By contrast, indirect ties create a social network that involves outside parties in the dispute process, and indirect ties increase the exchange of information between belligerents and potential mediators and the chances that third parties will have a vital interest in intervention. My empirical analysis using conflict and social network data in 1946–1995 provides strong support for the theory.     

When Settlement and Resolution Are in Conflict: Searching for a Mideast Peace Dividend

Using a contemporary case involving Palestinians and Israelis working on business ventures following the 1993 Oslo Peace Accords, the author focuses on the differences between conflict resolution and conflict settlement. In situations of deep-rooted conflict, settlement and resolution are often the same thing; attitude change among individuals is required to attain either goal. The Petty and Cacioppo Model (1986) specifies that attitude change results from central routes or peripheral routes. The author reflects on the model's predictive elements in the business venture case and its useful implications for other conflicts.     

Democratic consolidation and convergence in Southern Europe: The Italian case

In the analysis of democratic consolidation(s) in Southern Europe the emphasis has been on three main factors: the relevance of institutional rules, the scope and activities of parties (and party elites), and the establishment of certain relationships between institutions, parties and interests, connected to the size of the public sector of the economy. From the varied combinations of these factors different consolidations result: an elite‐based consolidation (Spain), a party‐based one (Italy), a state‐based one (Greece), and also a mixed party‐state model (Portugal). Our analysis also suggests the emergence of different types of democratic regime, mainly characterized by (i) either a ‘chancellor’ democracy or a parliamentary arrangement; (ii) either a pivotal or a secondary role for parties; and (iii) either a large or small public economic sector.

Recently the economic crisis, the resulting problems, and discontent arising from other causes, have brought about change in these democracies. The main transformations include the weakening of parties vis‐à‐vis other actors, the shrinking of both the public economic sector and the welfare institutions and, as a result, the prospect of greater autonomy for civil society. Thus, partially new regimes emerge, while the analysis also suggests the possibility of building a new typology of democratic regimes. Alongside the process of democratic consolidation in Southern Europe, there has also been an accompanying trend towards convergence: in the direction of majoritarianism, confirmed by the most recent national elections.     

Priming Issues,Party Visibility,and Party Evaluations: The Impact on Vote Switching

Voter volatility has become a hallmark of Western democracies in the past three decades. At the same time short-term factors—such as the media’s coverage of issues, parties, and candidates during an election campaign—have become more important for voters’ decisions. While previous research did look at how campaign news in general affects electoral volatility in general, it has omitted to explicitly test the mechanisms underlying these effects. Building on theories of agenda setting, (affective) priming, and issue ownership, the current study aims to explain why certain news aspects lead voters to switch their vote choice. We theorize it is the visibility of a party, the evaluation of a party, and the attention for issues owned by a party that primes voters to switch to a certain party. We use national panel survey data (N = 765) and link this to an extensive content analysis of campaign news on television and in newspapers in the run up to the 2012 Dutch national elections. The results show that issue news leads to vote change in the direction of the party that owns the issue. Even stronger is the effect of party visibility on vote switching. Our results, however, find the strongest support for the effect of party evaluations on vote change: More favorable news about a party increases switching to that party.     

Grief reactions and effective negotiation

Conclusion In the event of death, society has in place a wide range of rituals and supports designed to help mourners deal with their grief. It may be that assigning blame and seeking legal recourse has become a significant ritual for those who have sustained other types of losses and, in some situations, loss through death as well. However, unlike societal death rituals, which guide the mourners, no guidelines exist to help negotiators address the impact of grief on their clients. Thus, in this article, insights gleaned from studies of grief, loss, and separation have been examined in an effort to develop an awareness of the impact of grief reactions on the parties to negotiation.Grief reactions—ranging from denial, bargaining, anger, depression, and guilt to acceptance—serve a useful purpose for those who have sustained grievous losses. Consequently, a better understanding of grief factors may be advantageous to negotiators and, more importantly, to their clients. Such considerations may help challenge perceptions of other parties that may otherwise be prejudicial to one's client (as in the Lindy Chamberlain case) and assist negotiators in trying to anticipate, and thus protect their clients from, grief-related reactions of other parties. In the large number of cases where negotiation and settlement discussions are not only critical but also decisive, grief theory may provide negotiators with better insight into client, and other party, interests and may help them to formulate advice and intervention strategies that take the impact of various grief reactions into account. Nancy Lewis Buck is an attorney and social worker, currently completing a doctoral dissertation at Yale Law School. Her mailing address is 9 Surrey St., Cambridge, Mass. 02138.     

The Guatemalan National Revolutionary unit: the long collapse

ABSTRACT

The Guatemalan National Revolutionary Unit (URNG) fought one of the longest and bloodiest civil wars in recent Latin American history. In 1996, the URNG and the Government of Guatemala signed a Firm and Lasting Agreement ending the country’s civil war and initiating the URNG’s post-war life as a political party. After finishing third in its initial electoral competition, the URNG has since been unable to capture more than 4% of the vote, on its own or in coalition, leaving it a minor political party. What explains the poor electoral performance of the URNG as a political party? Based upon fieldwork, elite interviews, and analysis of electoral data, I argue that the URNG’s minor party performance was caused by both organizational and institutional factors.     

Democracy and mediation in territorial civil wars in Southeast Asia and the South Pacific

The awarding of the 2008 Nobel Peace Prize to former President Martti Ahtisaari, Finland, cites his involvement in the settlement of the Aceh conflict. This at the same time highlights the lack of such efforts in the regions of Southeast Asia and the South Pacific. While internal conflicts throughout the world often tend to be resilient to conflict management initiatives, conflicts in the Asia-Pacific region have proven to be particularly difficult to resolve. Internal conflicts in Southeast Asia and the Pacific often concern territorial issue, for instance, East Timor and ethnically based conflicts in Myanmar. This is also true for conflicts in the South Pacific, notably in Bougainville (Papua New Guinea) and New Caledonia (France). Territorial conflicts last longer, are more difficult to manage, and generally produce more adverse consequences than those over other issues such as ideology, government, and national power. Further, conflicts in this region appear to be of low priority for third parties, with comparatively few interventions from third parties. The strong central governments seem to be a factor in preventing mediation-based solution to such conflicts. Nevertheless, there are reasons to be optimistic. Third party mediation, democratization, and the recent success in Aceh provide promise for the future, and the recent Nobel Prize confirms this.     

Third-Party Intervention in Ethno-Religious Conflict: Role Theory,Pakistan, and War in Kashmir, 1965

ABSTRACT

Third-party intervention in ethno-religious conflict is an old phenomenon, although scholarly attention with a general range of application is generally new and uncommon. This study with attempt, through a systematic review of religion and other factors that can impact upon foreign policy role performance, to explain Pakistan's intervention in Kashmir, which led to full-scale war in 1965.

The article unfolds in six sections. The first provides an overview of thirf-party intervention in ethno-religious conflict. The second section introduces systemism a framework that brings together unit- and system-level factors. The theory of role analysis in foreign policy and its usefulness in explaining third-party, ethno-religious intervention is covered in the third section. Section four brings together systemism and role theory and eleborates linkages, with an emphasis on religion and other salient factors from the literature on foreign policy and intenational conflict. The fifth section presents the case study of Pakistan's intervention in India in 1965. Section six sums up the findings from the case study and offers a few observations about the contemporary situation in Kashmir.     

Pre-Settlement Settlement (PreSS): A Simple Technique for Initiating Complex Negotiations

Pre-setttement settlement, or PreSS, is a negotiation technique that precedes and potentially facilitates a final settlement. A PreSS is distinguished by three characteristics. It is: formal (being a binding agreement), initial (being the first step of a longer process), and partial (covering only a subset of issues). PreSS provides a conceptual umbrella for several existing concepts in the negotiation literature. The what, when, and why of PreSS are delineated and examples of pre-settlement settlement are provided.     

Liberation movements and stalled democratic transitions: reproducing power in Rwanda and South Africa through productive liminality

The lack of convergence towards liberal democracy in some African countries reflects neither a permanent state of political aberration, nor necessarily a prolonged transitional phase through which countries pass once the “right” conditions are met. Examining the cases of two ruling parties, the Rwandan Patriotic Front (RPF) and the African National Congress in South Africa, we develop the concept of productive liminality to explain countries suspended (potentially indefinitely) in a status “betwixt and between” mass violence, authoritarianism, and democracy. On the one hand, their societies are in a liminal status wherein a transition to democracy and socio-economic “revolution” remains forestalled; on the other hand, this liminality is instrumentalized to justify the party’s extraordinary mandate characterized by: (a) an idea of an incomplete project of liberation that the party alone is mandated to fulfil through an authoritarian social contract, and (b) the claim that this unfulfilled revolution is continuously under threat by a coterie of malevolent forces, which the party alone is mandated to identify and appropriately sanction.     

How the Media Shape Perceptions of Right-Wing Populist Leaders

It is often argued that right-wing populist party leaders are dependent on the media for their public image, which in turn is key for their electoral success. This study tests this assumption by comparing the effects of the media coverage of 2 Dutch right-wing populist leaders with the effects of the coverage of leaders of established parties, in a real-life setting, by tracking campaign developments in the Dutch 2006 national election campaign. We combine panel survey data (n?=?401) with repeated measurements of the party leaders' public images with a systematic content analysis of 17 media outlets (with a total of 1,001 stories), on the basis of the media consumption of individual respondents. Our results show significant effects of the content of media coverage on the public image of political leaders. However, only in 1 case (out of 10) is there a significant difference between right-wing populist party leaders and leaders of other parties in the strength of media effects. It thus seems that leaders of right-wing populist parties are just as dependent upon the media as leaders of other parties. The findings are discussed in the light of extant research on right-wing populist parties and media populism.     

International Relations Theory and Minimum Deterrence

ABSTRACT

India’s government under Narendra Modi represents a return to single party rule. This paper investigates whether and why single party governments in India differ in their extremity of foreign policies from coalition governments. It particularly focuses on how different forms of government influence the saliency, contestation, and enactment of national conceptions about India’s global role. First, I situate India within the academic debate regarding coalitional governments and foreign policy. I suggest that one reason why India challenges scholars‘ assumption is the missing link between partisan conceptions of India’s global role and their institutional representation. Second, I propose a role theoretical approach and argue that the process of self-identification, consisting of ego and anticipated alter expectations, conditions a state’s role set and extreme foreign policy. It is hypothesized that the nature of contestation of national role conceptions varies between factions and fractions because of the nature of India’s party system, as well as the relative significance of external others for India’s identity. Third, I examine instances of role-taking in the field of nuclearization and Sino-Indian relations. Findings suggest that contested role conceptions during single-party rule caused more extreme variances in international role-taking, while coalition governments proved to induce more complementary role-taking processes.     

Third-Party Intermediaries and Negotiated Settlements, 1946–2000

Past studies regarding the success and/or failure of conflict management activities have brought about a wide range of results. In this paper we attempt to gain more definitive conclusions about effectiveness by accomplishing two tasks. First, using a basic theoretical framework we identify expectations of efficacy as they relate to differences between states, coalitions, and IGOs. Second, we also examine the utility of different conflict management techniques in an effort to place in greater perspective the effectiveness of mediation, the most utilized technique of third party intermediaries. Using a new dataset on third-party intermediary behavior in militarized disputes from 1946 to 2000, we find that while all conflict managers are useful in assisting belligerents in reaching a negotiated settlement, IGOs are the most effective. Additionally, while mediation is an effective technique to produce settlements, military intermediary actions, such as peacekeeping, are much more useful.