Breaking patterns of conflict in Northern Ireland: new perspectives

Central to reaching peace and settlement in Northern Ireland was a sequence of British���Irish intergovernmental discussions and negotiations, dating from the beginning of the 1980s. British and Irish state cooperation and intervention has remained central to the stability of the settlement reached in 1998. The motives of state actors, however, have been unclear, and the role of the state in the political process has been the subject of some scholarly controversy. This paper looks at the types of evidence that can help to resolve such questions. It focuses on the value of elite interviews, arguing that they can constitute an important and irreplaceable body of evidence when used critically, but it also highlights the risks of excessive reliance on this type of source. It goes on to describe a major research project in University College Dublin whose aim was to record the experiences and interpretations of the actors who engaged in British���Irish negotiations over the last four decades. It discusses the resulting elite interviews and witness seminars and the methodological and ethical difficulties encountered. It describes how these were overcome, and outlines the conditions of confidentiality imposed.

Resolving conflict in bipolar societies: The fate of political settlements in Fiji and Northern Ireland

Ethnically divided societies that might be described as ���balanced bicommunal��� (where there are two communities, each of which comes close to representing half of the population) pose a particular challenge to conventional principles of collective decision-making, and commonly threaten political stability. This article analyses the experience of two such societies ��� Northern Ireland and Fiji ��� with a view to exploring whether there are common processes in the route by which political stability has been pursued. We assess the manner in which a distinctive relationship with Great Britain and its political culture has interacted with local conditions to produce a highly competitive, bipolar party system. This leads to consideration of the devices that have been adopted in an effort to bridge the gap between the communities: the Fiji constitution as amended in 1997, and Northern Ireland���s Good Friday Agreement of 1998. We focus, in particular, on the use of unusual (preferential voting) formulas for the election of parliamentarians and of an inclusive principle in the selection of ministers, and consider the contribution of these institutional devices to the attainment of political stability. We find that, in both cases, the intervention of forces from outside the political system had a decisive impact, though in very different ways. In addition to being underpinned by solid institutional design, for political settlements to work effectively, some minimal level of trust between rival elites is required.

Team Member���s Centrality, Cohesion, Conflict, and Performance in Multi-University Geographically Distributed Project Teams

This study examined team processes and outcomes among 12 multi-university distributed project teams from 11 universities during its early and late development stages over a 14-month project period. A longitudinal model of team interaction is presented and tested at the individual level to consider the extent to which both formal and informal network connections���measured as degree centrality���relate to changes in team members��� individual perceptions of cohesion and conflict in their teams, and their individual performance as a team member over time. The study showed a negative network centrality-cohesion relationship with significant temporal patterns, indicating that as team members perceive less degree centrality in distributed project teams, they report more team cohesion during the last four months of the project. We also found that changes in team cohesion from the first three months (i.e., early development stage) to the last four months (i.e., late development stage) of the project relate positively to changes in team member performance. Although degree centrality did not relate significantly to changes in team conflict over time, a strong inverse relationship was found between changes in team conflict and cohesion, suggesting that team conflict emphasizes a different but related aspect of how individuals view their experience with the team process. Changes in team conflict, however, did not relate to changes in team member performance. Ultimately, we showed that individuals, who are less central in the network and report higher levels of team cohesion, performed better in distributed teams over time.

Introduction: Home Fronts, Gender War and Conflict

Introduction to special edition of Womens History Review special edition on Gender War and Conflict

God and War: the Church of England and Armed Conflict in the Twentieth Century

Despite narratives of secularization, it appears that the British public persistently pay attention to clerical opinion and continually resort to popular expressions of religious faith, not least in time of war. From the throngs of men who gathered to hear the Bishop of London preach recruiting sermons during the First World War, to the attention paid to Archbishop Williams' words of conscience on Iraq, clerical rhetoric remains resonant. For the countless numbers who attended National Days of Prayer during the Second World War, and for the many who continue to find the Remembrance Day service a meaningful ritual, civil religious events provide a source of meaningful ceremony and a focus of national unity. War and religion have been linked throughout the twentieth century and this book explores these links: taking the perspective of the 'home front' rather than the battlefield. Exploring the views and accounts of Anglican clerics on the issue of warfare and international conflict across the century, the authors explore the church's stance on the causes, morality and conduct of warfare; issues of pacifism, obliteration bombing, nuclear possession and deterrence, retribution, forgiveness and reconciliation, and the spiritual opportunities presented by conflict. This book offers invaluable insights into how far the Church influenced public appraisal of war whilst illuminating the changing role of the Church across the twentieth century.

Building peace by supporting post-conflict electoral processes

Les ��lections post-conflit ou ��lections de sortie de crise organis��es sous l�����gide de la communaut�� internationale en vue de r��tablir la paix dans les pays sortant de violents conflits arm��s ont un bilan mixte caract��ris�� par le succ��s ou l�����chec selon les cas. Ce bilan mitig�� repr��sente le probl��me principal auquel cette recherche tente de r��pondre �� travers les questions suivantes : l���assistance ��lectorale ��trang��re est-elle efficace comme outil de r��tablissement de la paix dans les soci��t��s post-conflit? Qu���est ce qui d��termine le succ��s ou l�����chec des ��lections post-conflit �� contribuer efficacement au r��tablissement de la paix dans les soci��t��s d��chir��es par la guerre? Pour r��soudre cette probl��matique, cette th��se d��veloppe une th��orie de l���assistance ��lectorale en p��riode post-conflit centr��e sur les parties prenantes �� la fois du conflit arm�� et du processus ��lectoral. Cette th��orie affirme que l�����l��ment cl�� pour le succ��s des ��lections post-conflit dans le r��tablissement de la paix est le renforcement de la capacit�� de n��gociation des parties prenantes �� la fois dans le processus de paix et dans le processus ��lectoral post-conflit. Dans les situations post-conflit, une assistance ��lectorale qui se voudrait compl��te et efficace devra combiner �� la fois le processus ��lectoral et le processus de paix. L���assistance ��lectorale sera inefficace si elle se concentre uniquement sur les aspects techniques du processus ��lectoral visant �� garantir des ��lections libres, transparentes et ��quitables. Pour ��tre efficace, l���accent devra ��galement ��tre mis sur les facteurs suppl��mentaires qui peuvent emp��cher la r��currence de la guerre, tels que l���habilit�� des individus et des groupes �� n��gocier et �� faire des compromis sur les grandes questions qui peuvent menacer le processus de paix. De fait, m��me des ��lections transparentes comme celles de 1997 au Liberia salu��es par la communaut�� internationale n���avaient pas r��ussi �� ��tablir des conditions suffisantes pour ��viter la reprise des hostilit��s. C���est pourquoi, pour ��tre efficace, l���assistance ��lectorale dans les situations de post-conflit doit prendre une approche globale qui priorise l�����ducation civique, la sensibilisation sur les droits et responsabilit��s des citoyens dans une soci��t�� d��mocratique, le d��bat public sur les questions qui divisent, la participation politique, la formation au dialogue politique, et toute autre activit�� qui pourrait aider les diff��rentes parties �� renforcer leur capacit�� de n��gociation et de compromis. Une telle assistance ��lectorale fera une contribution �� la consolidation de la paix, m��me dans le contexte des ��lections imparfaites, comme celles qui se sont d��tenues en Sierra Leone en 2002 ou au Lib��ria en 2005. Bien que la litt��rature sur l���assistance ��lectorale n���ignore gu��re l���importance des parties prenantes aux processus ��lectoraux post-conflit (K. Kumar, 1998, 2005), elle a fortement mis l���accent sur les m��canismes institutionnels. En effet, la recherche acad��mique et professionnelle est abondante sur la r��forme des lois ��lectorales, la reforme constitutionnelle, et le d��veloppement des administrations ��lectorales tels que les commissions ��lectorales, ainsi que l���observation ��lectorale et autres m��canismes de pr��vention de la fraude ��lectorale, etc. (Carothers & Gloppen, 2007). En d���autres termes, les d��cideurs et les chercheurs ont attribu�� jusqu����� pr��sent plus d���importance �� la conception et au fonctionnement du cadre institutionnel et des proc��dures ��lectorales. Cette th��se affirme qu���il est d��sormais temps de prendre en compte les participants eux-m��mes au processus ��lectoral �� travers des types d���assistance ��lectorale qui favoriseraient leur capacit�� �� participer �� un d��bat pacifique et �� trouver des compromis aux questions litigieuses. Cette approche plus globale de l���assistance ��lectorale qui replace l�����lection post-conflit dans le contexte plus englobant du processus de paix a l���avantage de transformer le processus ��lectoral non pas seulement en une exp��rience d�����lection de dirigeants l��gitimes, mais aussi, et surtout, en un processus au cours duquel les participants apprennent �� r��gler leurs points de vue contradictoires �� travers le d��bat politique dans un cadre institutionnel avec des moyens l��gaux et l��gitimes. Car, si le cadre institutionnel ��lectoral est important, il reste que le r��sultat du processus ��lectoral d��pendra essentiellement de la volont�� des participants �� se conformer au cadre institutionnel et aux r��gles ��lectorales.

Conflict and Stability in the Neoliberal Era: Explaining Urban Unrest in Latin America

Thesis (Ph.D.)--University of Washington, 2016-08

Credible Commitments and Post-Conflict Refugee Return: A Statistical and Network Analysis

I examine determinants of refugee return after conflicts. I argue that institutional constraints placed on the executive provide a credible commitment that signals to refugees that the conditions required for durable return will be created. This results in increased return flows for refugees. Further, when credible commitments are stronger in the country of origin than in the country of asylum, the level of return increases. Finally, I find that specific commitments made to refugees in the peace agreement do not lead to increased return because they are not credible without institutional constraints. Using data on returnees that has only recently been made available, along with network analysis and an original coding of the provisions in refugee agreements, statistical results are found to support this theory. An examination of cases in Djibouti, Sierra Leone, and Liberia provides additional support for this argument.

Balancing Belligerents or Feeding the Beast: Transforming Conflict Traps

Since the end of the Cold War, recurring civil conflicts have been the dominant form of violent armed conflict in the world, accounting for 70% of conflicts active between 2000-2013. Duration and intensity of episodes within recurring conflicts in Africa exhibit four behaviors characteristic of archetypal dynamic system structures. The overarching questions asked in this study are whether these patterns are robustly correlated with fundamental concepts of resiliency in dynamic systems that scale from micro-to macro levels; are they consistent with theoretical risk factors and causal mechanisms; and what are the policy implications. Econometric analysis and dynamic systems modeling of 36 conflicts in Africa between 1989 -2014 are combined with process tracing in a case study of Somalia to evaluate correlations between state characteristics, peace operations and foreign aid on the likelihood of observed conflict patterns, test hypothesized causal mechanisms across scales, and develop policy recommendations for increasing human security while decreasing resiliency of belligerents. Findings are that observed conflict patterns scale from micro to macro levels; are strongly correlated with state characteristics that proxy a mix of cooperative (e.g., gender equality) and coercive (e.g., security forces) conflict-balancing mechanisms; and are weakly correlated with UN and regional peace operations and humanitarian aid. Interactions between peace operations and aid interventions that effect conflict persistence at micro levels are not seen in macro level analysis, due to interdependent, micro-level feedback mechanisms, sequencing, and lagged effects. This study finds that the dynamic system structures associated with observed conflict patterns contain tipping points between balancing mechanisms at the interface of micro-macro level interactions that are determined as much by factors related to how intervention policies are designed and implemented, as what they are. Policy implications are that reducing risk of conflict persistence requires that peace operations and aid interventions (1) simultaneously increase transparency, promote inclusivity (with emphasis on gender equality), and empower local civilian involvement in accountability measures at the local levels; (2) build bridges to horizontally and vertically integrate across levels; and (3) pave pathways towards conflict transformation mechanisms and justice that scale from the individual, to community, regional, and national levels.

Incomplete information games of conflict and collective action

My thesis consists of three essays that investigate strategic interactions between individuals engaging in risky collective action in uncertain environments. The first essay analyzes a broad class of incomplete information coordination games with a wide range of applications in economics and politics. The second essay draws from the general model developed in the first essay to study decisions by individuals of whether to engage in protest/revolution/coup/strike. The final essay explicitly integrates state response to the analysis. The first essay, Coordination Games with Strategic Delegation of Pivotality, exhaustively analyzes a class of binary action, two-player coordination games in which players receive stochastic payoffs only if both players take a ``stochastic-coordination action''. Players receive conditionally-independent noisy private signals about the normally distributed stochastic payoffs. With this structure, each player can exploit the information contained in the other player's action only when he takes the ���pivotalizing action���. This feature has two consequences: (1) When the fear of miscoordination is not too large, in order to utilize the other player's information, each player takes the ���pivotalizing action��� more often than he would based solely on his private information, and (2) best responses feature both strategic complementarities and strategic substitutes, implying that the game is not supermodular nor a typical global game. This class of games has applications in a wide range of economic and political phenomena, including war and peace, protest/revolution/coup/ strike, interest groups lobbying, international trade, and adoption of a new technology. My second essay, Collective Action with Uncertain Payoffs, studies the decision problem of citizens who must decide whether to submit to the status quo or mount a revolution. If they coordinate, they can overthrow the status quo. Otherwise, the status quo is preserved and participants in a failed revolution are punished. Citizens face two types of uncertainty. (a) non-strategic: they are uncertain about the relative payoffs of the status quo and revolution, (b) strategic: they are uncertain about each other's assessments of the relative payoff. I draw on the existing literature and historical evidence to argue that the uncertainty in the payoffs of status quo and revolution is intrinsic in politics. Several counter-intuitive findings emerge: (1) Better communication between citizens can lower the likelihood of revolution. In fact, when the punishment for failed protest is not too harsh and citizens' private knowledge is accurate, then further communication reduces incentives to revolt. (2) Increasing strategic uncertainty can increase the likelihood of revolution attempts, and even the likelihood of successful revolution. In particular, revolt may be more likely when citizens privately obtain information than when they receive information from a common media source. (3) Two dilemmas arise concerning the intensity and frequency of punishment (repression), and the frequency of protest. Punishment Dilemma 1: harsher punishments may increase the probability that punishment is materialized. That is, as the state increases the punishment for dissent, it might also have to punish more dissidents. It is only when the punishment is sufficiently harsh, that harsher punishment reduces the frequency of its application. Punishment Dilemma 1 leads to Punishment Dilemma 2: the frequencies of repression and protest can be positively or negatively correlated depending on the intensity of repression. My third essay, The Repression Puzzle, investigates the relationship between the intensity of grievances and the likelihood of repression. First, I make the observation that the occurrence of state repression is a puzzle. If repression is to succeed, dissidents should not rebel. If it is to fail, the state should concede in order to save the costs of unsuccessful repression. I then propose an explanation for the ���repression puzzle��� that hinges on information asymmetries between the state and dissidents about the costs of repression to the state, and hence the likelihood of its application by the state. I present a formal model that combines the insights of grievance-based and political process theories to investigate the consequences of this information asymmetry for the dissidents' contentious actions and for the relationship between the magnitude of grievances (formulated here as the extent of inequality) and the likelihood of repression. The main contribution of the paper is to show that this relationship is non-monotone. That is, as the magnitude of grievances increases, the likelihood of repression might decrease. I investigate the relationship between inequality and the likelihood of repression in all country-years from 1981 to 1999. To mitigate specification problem, I estimate the probability of repression using a generalized additive model with thin-plate splines (GAM-TPS). This technique allows for flexible relationship between inequality, the proxy for the costs of repression and revolutions (income per capita), and the likelihood of repression. The empirical evidence support my prediction that the relationship between the magnitude of grievances and the likelihood of repression is non-monotone.

INTELLECTUAL PROPERTY AND UNIVERSALITY OF READING: CONFLICT OF INTEREST?

It seeks to clarify the issue about the relationship between intellectual property and universality of reading, to understand if it exists or not a conflict of interest. From a synchronic axis crossing, historical, with a diachronic axis, of philosophical: is tracked to explain the deep forces that have shaped the problem arises here. It also explains the legal issue of copyright and property which is closely related to the issue treated here. From all this it follows that underlie the problem of intellectual property is the construction of the Western historical figure of subjectivity, which has led to the role of "author."��The author who is credited with authorship of a speech only (work) is a product of social discourse situation that historically has been obscured what has contributed the legal apparatus that protects copyright. What has led to the establishment of an antagonism to the universality of reading. In this paper therefore has not sought to respond to the problem but to make it clear to potential solutions.

Paths to peace: conflict management trajectories in militarized interstate disputes

When multiple third-parties (states, coalitions, and international organizations) intervene in the same conflict, do their efforts inform one another? Anecdotal evidence suggests such a possibility, but research to date has not attempted to model this interdependence directly. The current project breaks with that tradition. In particular, it proposes three competing explanations of how previous intervention efforts affect current intervention decisions: a cost model (and a variant on it, a limited commitments model), a learning model, and a random model. After using a series of Markov transition (regime-switching) models to evaluate conflict management behavior within militarized interstate disputes in the 1946-2001 period, this study concludes that third-party intervention efforts inform one another. More specifically, third-parties examine previous efforts and balance their desire to manage conflict with their need to minimize intervention costs (the cost and limited commitments models). As a result, third-parties intervene regularly using verbal pleas and mediation, but rely significantly less frequently on legal, administrative, or peace operations strategies. This empirical threshold to the intervention costs that third-parties are willing to bear has strong theoretical foundations and holds across different time periods and third-party actors. Furthermore, the analysis indicates that the first third-party to intervene in a conflict is most likely to use a strategy designed to help the disputants work toward a resolution of their dispute. After this initial intervention, the level of third-party involvement declines and often devolves into a series of verbal pleas for peace. Such findings cumulatively suggest that disputants hold the key to effective conflict management. If the disputants adopt and maintain an extreme bargaining position or fail to encourage third-parties to accept greater intervention costs, their dispute will receive little more than verbal pleas for negotiations and peace.