SLIDE 1
Causes of Insurgency
Class Two (August 6)
SLIDE 2 Review: Definition of insurgency
- Armed uprising against government.
○ Can lead to civil war ○ Varies in scope and effectiveness ○ Insurgents are anti-government fighters ○ Civil wars are conflicts between governments and internal challengers
- Today: Evaluate explanations of why
insurgencies begin.
SLIDE 3 Insurgency present throughout history.
tactics used by weaker forces to defeat stronger, usually
- ccupying forces.
- Ex: American
Revolution, Anti- Colonial conflicts
SLIDE 4
Civil wars have become longer and deadlier recently
SLIDE 5 Adverse consequences
- Economic losses.
- Refugee flows.
- Famine
- Regional and global
effect of all three
SLIDE 6
There are many insurgencies around the world today
SLIDE 7 Why do people organize to fight the government?
- There are three major explanations:
○ Grievances ○ Greed ○ Opportunity
- Each is flawed and each has merit.
- We look at two cases after the break:
○ South Sudan and Syria.
SLIDE 8 Grievances
- Advanced by Gurr (1970) and
Horowitz (1985).
- Failure to fulfill expected
needs leads to aggression.
○ Relative deprivation. ○ Horizontal inequality.
SLIDE 9 Relative Deprivation
worse off than
○ Can be political or economic.
group is deprived
SLIDE 10 Horizontal Inequality
along multiple dimensions.
some dimensions, could affect change from within.
Group A: wealthier, language dominant, politically dominant Group B: poorer, no language rights, no representation.
SLIDE 11 Modernization
Skocpol.
winners and losers along class lines.
middle class and aristocracy, working class and peasants, etc.
SLIDE 12
What are some issues with the grievance explanation?
SLIDE 13 Greed
profit (Grossman 1990, 1995)
- Grievances are used
- pportunistically to shore
up popular support.
SLIDE 14 Collier and Hoeffler (2004) test greed
- vs. grievance
- Theory? Is there one?
- Dependent variable?
- Operationalization?
○ Greed? ○ Grievances?
- Do the variables they use actually measure
greed or grievance?
SLIDE 15 Results support greed hypothesis
- Primary commodity exports lead to more
conflict (sorta…)
○ As does lower GDP per capita, lower male secondary schooling and short term economic growth.
- What are some problems with these
findings?
SLIDE 16 Opportunity (Fearon and Laitin 2003)
ethnic diversity lead to civil war.
make insurgency more likely...make insurgency more likely.
SLIDE 17 Opportunity (Fearon and Laitin 2003)
ethnic diversity lead to civil war.
make insurgency more likely...make insurgency more likely.
SLIDE 18
Test vs. competing explanations
Measures: Ethnic Diversity? Grievances? Insurgency? Do the measures actually measure opportunity? What are their results?
SLIDE 19
Is opportunity a valuable contribution to understanding conflict? Does it disprove the grievance argument?
SLIDE 20 Return of Grievances
- More recent work shows support for
grievance argument.
- Politically excluded groups, economically
unequal groups are more likely to rebel.
- The “Why?” is still not clear.
SLIDE 21
What explanation makes most sense to you? Why?
Break up into groups, talk it over!
SLIDE 22
Cases
Part II
SLIDE 23
South Sudan: Background
SLIDE 24
History of United Sudan
SLIDE 25 History of United Sudan
- Civil war between the North and South from
independence.
○ Arab North dominated Christian and Animist South. ○ South revolted over distribution of oil revenues.
- Second Civil War Starts in 1983
○ SPLA led by John Garang, Salva Kiir and Riek Machar.
SLIDE 26
SPLA split and war within war
SLIDE 27 SPLA split and war within war
- SPLA splits in dispute over control of the
movement between Dinka Garang and Kiir and Nuer Machar.
- Sparks war between rebel groups in 1990s.
- Creates devastating famine in South Sudan.
○ Hundreds of thousands die.
SLIDE 28 What happened in the 2000s?
- Machar and Garang settle differences
- Peace accord signed in 2005.
- Garang dies, replaced by Kiir.
- Referendum for independence passes in
2011.
- South Sudan gains independence and
control of 70% of Sudan’s oil fields.
SLIDE 29 What happened in 2013?
- Oil money disappears.
- Kiir removes Machar and
Nuer opponents from cabinet.
plotting coup and forced to flee Juba in December.
SLIDE 30 How does the war start?
Dinka and Nuer. Latter join Machar.
○ Nuer White Army mobilizes.
producing regions.
broken.
SLIDE 31 Discussion: Which explanation do you think best explains the outbreak
- f the South Sudanese Civil War? Is
there room for each of the three explanations?
SLIDE 32
Syria: Background
SLIDE 33 Colonial History
minorities.
separate country.
SLIDE 34 Post-Colonial History
Failed Union with Egypt.
Alawite Ba’athist takes power in 1970.
Brotherhood in 1970s.
SLIDE 35 Bashar Al-Assad’s Rule
Hafez al-Assad’s death in 2000.
political reformer.
reforms.
SLIDE 36 Arab Spring and Civil War
World, protest break
2011.
the government.
Syrian Army forms.
SLIDE 37 Sectarian Conflict
- While initially secular, rebellion
draws recruits from Sunni Arab and Turkmen communities.
- Alawites, Christians and Druze
stay loyal to the government.
- Sunni Kurds form quasi-state in
the north.
SLIDE 38
Which explanation do you think best explains the outbreak of the Syrian Civil War? Is there room for each of the three explanations?
SLIDE 39
Re-evaluation: which of the three explanations explains insurgency best?
Are there other explanations that could fill in some gaps?
