Above: Personal photo from a primary school in the Kurdish region of Iraq, 2019
Personal photo taken outside a primary school in Akre, Kurdish Autonomous Region (KRG) in Iraq, March 2019
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My overarching research interests fall at the nexus of civil war, contentious politics and state-building. My main research project looks at how groups use violent and non-violent strategies to challenge governmental authority and legitimacy. Specifically, I am interested in understanding the effect institutions that mimic state behavior, or quasi-state institutions, have on rebels' interaction with the government, as well as with the civilian population.
My current book project, Institutions of the Weak: Rebel Institutional Strategy and the Prospects of Peace after Civil War, uses the Rebel Quasi-State Institutions (Rebel QSI) dataset, which I collected. It covers 235 rebel groups involved in civil war around the world, and codes annually for the presence of 25 institutions between 1945 and 2012. These quasi-state institutions include social service provision like education, healthcare, infrastructure, aid, and constituency service. Political and economic institutions include establishing parallel governments, holding elections for civilians to elect governing officials, attempting to or actually joining international organizations, and signing economic treaties and taxation. The beginning of the book describes the variation of rebel institutions, both in type and over time. Contrary to a priori assumptions many have made about rebels' institutions used to govern, I show that controlling territory, civilian relations, taxation systems, active warfare and rebel strength are not prerequisite to the creation or the existence of rebel institutions. |
Secessionists, communist and religious groups all value institutions because these types of groups each, in their own way, use institutions to legitimize their cause and gain support. Rebels with elite (military or otherwise) access and groups that rely on a pre-existing ethnic identity, however, do not require the same legitimization. They can pull from an already well-defined power base. Communist and religious groups, however, often need to redefine social boundaries to increase their popular support and legitimize their armed struggle. While secessionist groups may have a pre-existing “national” identity, they are engaged in a state-building project that requires acceptance internationally. Secessionist rebel groups, then, require quasi-state institutions for international support, as well as continued domestic support. Conditional on valuing institutions, rebel groups exhibit different patterns of institutional development over time because certain institutions are more valuable for different types of groups. Over time, however, all groups who value institutions, conditional on their ability to afford and effectively manage them, will seek to develop extensive political and service provision institutions.
The book concludes with a discussion regarding the effect that rebel institutions have on the prospects of conflicts ending through a peace agreement. Rebel quasi-state institutions have the potential to greatly ben- efit rebels who choose to invest in them. Unlike military equipment, however, rebel institutions take longer to reap the benefits. Quasi-state institutions multiply the strength of the weaker rebels. However, despite the scholarly acceptance that increasing rebel strength relative to the government makes negotiated settlements more likely, quasi-state institutions actually disincentivizes rebels from signing a final agreement. As rebels expect future gains from quasi-state institutions, they attempt to strategically stall in hopes of obtaining a better deal in the future after quasi-state institutions pay their dividends. This means that while media- tion and ceasefires may be more common with institution-providing rebels, conflicts are less likely to end through a peace agreement.
The book concludes with a discussion regarding the effect that rebel institutions have on the prospects of conflicts ending through a peace agreement. Rebel quasi-state institutions have the potential to greatly ben- efit rebels who choose to invest in them. Unlike military equipment, however, rebel institutions take longer to reap the benefits. Quasi-state institutions multiply the strength of the weaker rebels. However, despite the scholarly acceptance that increasing rebel strength relative to the government makes negotiated settlements more likely, quasi-state institutions actually disincentivizes rebels from signing a final agreement. As rebels expect future gains from quasi-state institutions, they attempt to strategically stall in hopes of obtaining a better deal in the future after quasi-state institutions pay their dividends. This means that while media- tion and ceasefires may be more common with institution-providing rebels, conflicts are less likely to end through a peace agreement.
