Abstract

Organizations often set high demands for the release of hostages in civil war. Despite a purported restraint on state concessions to hostage-takers, exchanges between militants and national governments for the release of hostages have reached unprecedented levels in recent years. It is unknown, however, when states concede to insurgents for the release of hostage victims. Given substantial costs associated with granting concessions, I argue that governments only concede for the release of hostages where the victim is likely to attract attention, compelling states to intervene. This occurs when the hostage is a high-profile victim. I test the theory with original and granular data on the Philippines (1975–2018). The data document hostage-takings and concessions between six insurgent groups and the government. The analysis provides robust support for the theory. The findings unveil important insights for policy and research.

Abstract

The recruitment and use of child soldiers by militant groups and state governments remains a persistent feature in armed conflict. However, with few exceptions, scholars have traditionally treated child soldiers as a homogenous group – often neglecting the diverse demographic profiles of children and failing to recognize the unique experiences that different children might have once part of an armed group. Recent work has sought to rectify these misperceptions, demonstrating that both boys and girls are recruited by militant groups and are used in diverse ways. The inherent assumption that boys fight and girls serve exclusively in non-combatant support roles and are often the sole victims of conflict related sexual violence (CRSV) is disconnected from reality. Our work, and others, shows that patterns of child soldier recruitment and CRSV are not so binary. Instead, the relationship between child soldier recruitment and CRSV is complex, with both genders being victims and perpetrators of such violence under varying circumstances. This chapter explores these relationships.

Abstract

A large literature has argued that domestic competition increases a militant organization's use and severity of terrorism to differentiate their "brand" and "outbid" other organizations. However, most empirical analyses infer such competition from the quantity of groups present in a geographic area. This approach neglects specific group relationships, such as cooperation, rhetorical or violent rivalry, or peaceful coexistence. We introduce a behavioral measure of group competition and argue that variation in the quality, rather than the quantity, of competition affects the violence profile of militant groups in unexpected ways. Violent competition, where militants attack one another, imposes significant constraints on group resources and increases groups' dependence on civilian support, which exacerbates the costs of a popular backlash against brutality. Moreover, violent competition effectively substitutes for crowding out rivals via outbidding. As competition becomes extreme, we posit that groups increasingly opt for a strategy of terrorist restraint and reduce the share of high-profile attacks on soft civilian targets. We test this argument at the macro and micro levels with cross-national data on 290 organizations in civil war (1970–2018) and granular data on the subnational targeting strategy of the Islamic State in Syria (2013–2018). Both analyses provide robust support for our argument. The findings shed light on the strategic limitations of outbidding and provide important insights for research and policy.

Abstract

Hostage-taking is often portrayed as non-lethal violence. Upon the receipt of demands, victims are expected to be released alive. Despite this, large evidence points to egregious forms of hostage killing in civil war. Why, then, do some organizations kill hostages? I argue organizations execute hostages as part of a punitive governance strategy in their areas of operation. Hostage-taking and killing can be used as a corrective action to exercise control over the population. Victims accused of acts that undermine the rebel regime are more likely to be killed than those taken for other purposes. I test the theory in the case of the Islamic State in Iraq with novel and granular data on violence in the thirty-one districts the organization governed between 2013 and 2018. The findings unveil important insights for policy and research.

Abstract

Why do insurgents resort to kidnapping in civil war? What explains variation in the selection and intensity of the tactic over time and space? Despite an increase in the use of kidnapping over time, existing research has yet to develop an explanation that explains spatiotemporal variation and extends beyond financial motivations. I argue the decision to kidnap hostages is shaped by insurgents' behavioral interactions in the conflict environment. It occurs under two conditions: to generate support and reinstate bargaining capacity when organizations suffer military losses on the battlefield and to enforce loyalties and display strength when organizations face violent competition from other non-state actors. The observable implications of the theory are tested at the macro- and micro levels. At the macro-level, I conduct a quantitative cross-group analysis on over 200 organizations involved in an armed intrastate conflict (1989–2018). At the micro level, I consider the kidnapping strategy of the Taliban in Afghanistan over time and space (2010–2018). Taken together, the analyses provide robust support for the theory.

Abstract

While some militant groups consistently target civilians, others only resort to violence in specific locations and points in time. Existing research typically treats civilian targeting as a static feature of conflict systems at either the country or group level. This offers little explanation for variation in the patterns of violence across time and space. I develop an explanation for why militant groups target civilians at specific places and times based on how groups are likely to respond to local political and security conditions. I argue that violence against civilians serves as a function of response for militant groups – violence depends on both the control of territory and subnational competition from other non-state actors. The likelihood of civilian targeting is higher in locations where groups control territory and face competition, as groups seek to display dominance and punish defectors. The likelihood of civilian targeting is high in locations where groups face competition. However, this violence is unlikely to be as high as where groups also control territory, accounting for the need to reach out to civilians for support. The analysis of georeferenced event data on civilian targeting by militant groups across sub-Saharan Africa (1997–2013) and an illustrative case study on Boko Haram in Nigeria and Cameroon find robust support for my argument.

Abstract

Why do some rebel groups perpetrate sexual violence in armed conflict while others do not? A growing literature explores factors impacting the occurrence of conflict-related sexual violence (CRSV). We contribute to this literature, arguing that the composition of rebel groups can provide insight into patterns of sexual violence. We contend rebel groups that use child soldiers, and especially those that rely heavily on coercive child recruitment practices, are more prone to engage in wartime sexual violence than groups who do not recruit minors. While children are rarely the ideal soldier, they have become a crucial resource for many rebel groups. Yet, their recruitment can impact internal group dynamics. Sexual violence can serve as a tool for conditioning children to violence, intragroup cohesion-building, and an instrument for combatting defection. We test this argument with data on 245 rebel groups active in armed conflicts between 1989 and 2011. We supplement the quantitative analyses with an illustrative case study on the Revolutionary United Front in Sierra Leone. Our results suggest groups that recruit child soldiers are more likely to inflict CRSV. This effect is magnified when children are recruited forcibly.

Abstract

How do armed groups respond to economic shocks that reduce the profitability of their primary activities? Drawing on economic theories of the firm, we argue that armed groups behave as profit-maximizing organizations that substitute across tactical options when resource shocks alter relative returns. When commodity price crashes reduce returns to theft-based tactics, groups reallocate toward revenue streams with higher relative profitability. We test this argument using the 2014 oil price crash as a natural experiment. Gulf of Guinea pirates historically targeted oil tankers to steal crude and sell it on black markets, but the crash reduced oil theft profitability while ransom payments for crew hostages remained stable. Using panel local projections with two-way fixed effects across global piracy basins, we find that a ten-dollar fall in oil prices increases the share of hostage-taking incidents in the Gulf of Guinea by approximately nine percentage points within three to four months, a 35 per cent increase relative to the sample mean. Mechanism estimates confirm this substitution. Kidnap-for-ransom incident counts rise while non-hostage attacks and tanker-specific targeting both decline. Instrumenting oil price changes with structural supply shocks yields directionally consistent medium-run estimates. These findings demonstrate that armed groups adapt their tactics in response to shifting economic incentives much as firms reallocate production in response to demand shocks.

Abstract

Why do some forms of repression make violent resistance appear morally acceptable while others do not? Classic theories hold that coercion either deters dissent or radicalizes it, but rarely specify the thresholds at which different repertoires of resistance acquire moral legitimacy or whether those thresholds differ across repertoires. We develop a moral economy theory of resistance, suggesting repression breaches the moral contract between state and society in ways that license violence earlier than they legitimize non-violent protest. We test the argument with a preregistered vignette experiment (N = 2,176) in Morocco and Tunisia, randomizing the severity of repression against a targeted minority group and measuring the moral acceptability of violent and non-violent resistance as parallel outcomes. Even mild, legalistic repression—surveillance, bureaucratic obstruction, hostile rhetoric—increases the moral acceptability of violent resistance, while non-violent resistance gains legitimacy only under extreme repression. Respondents ground the permissibility of violence in the state's repression itself, while grounding non-violence in cultural expression regardless of severity. Repression thus reprices resistance repertoires asymmetrically, challenging both linear radicalization accounts and proportionality models of legitimate counter-violence.

Abstract

International organizations increasingly engage customary authorities to deliver justice in weak states, premised on the belief that working through traditional institutions produces more legitimate outcomes than bypassing them. But this strategy confronts a fundamental tension: the same institutions celebrated for local legitimacy often reproduce entrenched gender hierarchies. Through a randomized controlled trial in South Central Somalia, we evaluate whether mixed-gender deliberation on women's access to customary justice empowers marginalized groups or reinforces existing exclusions. We find evidence of what we call the inclusion dilemma. Clan elders, facing competitive pressures from legal pluralism and international conditionality, express more progressive attitudes toward women following the intervention—but without redistributing adjudicative authority. Religious elders, insulated from these pressures, show no response. Most consequentially, women withdraw from customary institutions rather than becoming more engaged. Session transcripts reveal that symbolic accommodation by male authorities produces disillusionment among the women it was meant to empower. Our findings challenge assumptions about inclusion-based reforms and offer insights for institutional change in hierarchical settings.

Abstract

How do civil wars end? This article argues that rebel compliance with international humanitarian law (IHL) shapes not whether wars end but how. Drawing on the bargaining model of war, we theorize compliance as a wartime bargaining strategy operating through three mechanisms: costly signalling of organizational discipline, improvement of rebels' outside options through third-party engagement, and strategic wartime institutionalization. Each makes an armed group a counterparty a government can transact with, so each bears most directly on whether negotiations, once begun, are converted into a signed agreement. We test the argument utilizing a mixed-method design. A survival analysis of 313 rebel group–conflict spells, with commitment coded as a time-varying covariate from dated documents, shows that groups that publicly commit to IHL sign peace agreements at roughly four times the rate of groups that do not. Among conflicts that reach negotiations, committed groups convert those negotiations into agreements at roughly three times the rate. We pair these estimates with illustrative case studies of the FARC (Colombia), NDFP (Philippines), and SPLM/A (South Sudan), which trace each mechanism through groups' documentary records. The findings suggest that humanitarian compliance, by transforming rebels into disciplined and internationally legible political actors, makes negotiated settlement reachable.

Abstract

Millions in vulnerable regions have been displaced by and remain especially at risk to climate change, prompting calls to increase their inclusion in global mitigation efforts. Yet we know exceedingly little about displaced persons' knowledge of climate change or how they prioritize it relative to other threats. We conduct four experimental studies and a three-wave panel survey with internally displaced persons residing across 90 settlements in South Central Somalia, a region marked by significant conflict, environmental crisis, and mass displacement. We find in survey experiments and a randomized controlled trial that information can increase knowledge of climate change and its link to displacement but fails to raise climate prioritization, even when conveyed simply, socially reinforced, or delivered publicly. In contrast, a natural experiment reveals that exposure to an extreme flooding event during our study sharply increases climate change prioritization in its immediate aftermath; however, effects decay quickly and individuals' concerns swiftly shift back to more urgent needs such as health and survival. Our findings indicate that increased knowledge and exposure to climate change alone are unlikely to mobilize frontline communities and suggest that climate inclusion efforts must address basic livelihood insecurities to produce durable engagement.

Abstract

Air pollution kills over a million people in Africa each year, yet almost nothing is known about what African publics understand about it. We conduct representative surveys with nearly 5,000 residents in Kampala and Nairobi, with embedded informational experiments. Baseline knowledge is low: over 90 percent of respondents have never heard of the Air Quality Index, most underestimate local mortality from air pollution, and few recognize biomass cooking, the largest source of health burden in this setting, as a source of pollution. A short informational video raises knowledge and concern in both cities. Prioritization and support of pollution mitigation policies increase only in Kampala; behavioural intentions are unchanged; few effects persist after six months. Weekly SMS alerts reporting real-time air quality do not shift outcomes, largely because most recipients do not recall receiving them. Information closes a knowledge gap and raises concern, but neither converts into demand for action.

Abstract

Natural disasters are rising in frequency and severity, but we know remarkably little about how they affect the cognitive capacities of those most exposed. In the weeks following the 2023 El Niño flooding disaster in Kismayo, Somalia, we conducted a survey of internally displaced persons across 141 settlements. Because enumerator teams visited settlements sequentially based on logistics rather than flood exposure, the number of days elapsed since the flood at interview varied quasi-randomly across respondents. We exploit this variation to estimate how post-disaster exposure duration shapes cognitive reflection. Respondents surveyed in the final weeks of our enumeration window score 0.66 points below the pre-flood mean on a validated cognitive reflection index, marking a 26% decline. Cognitive impairment is not transient. A recovery trough emerges at approximately seven weeks post-flood, only after which scores begin to improve. These findings reveal a troubling paradox at the heart of disaster response. The period in which humanitarian organizations conduct needs assessments, obtain informed consent, and engage communities in complex decisions is precisely the period in which those communities' capacity for deliberative reasoning is most severely compromised.

Project Summary

Armed conflict and forced displacement threaten access to essential healthcare, yet we know relatively little about how insecurity disrupts the continuity of treatment for chronic conditions or which institutional arrangements can mitigate these disruptions. This project examines how political violence and displacement affect HIV treatment continuity in Uganda through four interconnected studies. Study 1 combines nationwide facility-level HIV treatment records with geocoded conflict data to estimate the effects of armed violence on treatment delivery and outcomes, including viral suppression. Study 2 uses original surveys, treatment histories, qualitative interviews, and a proposed survey experiment among refugees in Kyangwali to identify the mechanisms through which displacement interrupts care, distinguishing between supply-side constraints and barriers to patient access. Study 3 proposes a randomized field intervention evaluating whether flexible healthcare arrangements, such as decentralized medication distribution, portable medical records, and extended prescription refills, improve treatment retention among displaced populations. Study 4 examines whether health facilities with more adaptable service-delivery models demonstrate greater resilience to conflict-related shocks, using longitudinal administrative data and comparative institutional analysis. Together, these studies investigate how violence undermines healthcare provision, why displaced populations experience treatment interruptions, and whether institutional flexibility can sustain essential services during crises. The project contributes to research on political violence, forced displacement, public service delivery, and health-system resilience, while generating evidence to inform healthcare interventions in conflict-affected settings.

Abstract

The public acceptance of former enemy collaborators by local communities is crucial for preventing violent extremism. Few studies experimentally examine such acceptance, particularly from a gendered perspective in active conflict zones. We address this gap by centering the diversity of the defector population, highlighting how gendered experiences of entry into and exit from armed groups affect opportunities for peacebuilding. We argue that both gender and age are important determinants of public acceptance, and that the narratives through which women are perceived—especially as wives—shape reintegration outcomes. We test these expectations with a vignette experiment involving 880 respondents across 81 communities in seven cities in South Central Somalia. We find that respondents are more willing to accept female and child defectors, with acceptance particularly high for those wedded to al-Shabaab fighters. These findings underscore the gendered and intersectional dynamics at play in reintegration and reconciliation processes, particularly in conservative Muslim societies, and suggest that the identities and social scripts attached to former enemy collaborators are central to understanding public attitudes toward peacebuilding in conflict-affected societies.

Abstract

How does rebel occupation shape recovery after war? Existing scholarship shows that institutionalized rebel governance can generate social order during wartime. We argue that the predictability of rebel rule matters even after fighting ends. When rebel authority is stable, civilians develop routines, coping strategies, and cooperation networks that sustain livelihoods into peacetime. Longer occupations tend to produce this predictability. Short occupations disrupt without permitting adaptation, and extreme violence destroys the foundations on which adaptation depends. We test the argument in Iraq, where the Islamic State held territory for periods ranging from months to years. Combining satellite measures of agricultural productivity with matrix completion methods, focus group discussions, and survey data, we show that long-occupied, low-violence areas recover fastest. Recovery is concentrated in rain-fed staples, whose constraints are social. Irrigation-dependent crops, which require rebuilding destroyed infrastructure, show no rebound. Even coercive rebel rule leaves adaptive legacies that should inform reconstruction policy.

Abstract

The return of citizens who joined extremist organizations, such as the Islamic State, poses one of the most complex contemporary governance challenges. But we know little about how affected societies judge which former extremists deserve a second chance, and whether those judgments are fixed. We test the hypothesis that a simple perspective-taking intervention can shift support for repatriation and reconciliation, even in highly sensitive and salient settings. Drawing on harmonized survey experiments in three countries across the Middle East and North Africa, we show that perspective-taking modestly but consistently increases willingness to repatriate and forgive former extremists, strengthens support for their social and civic reintegration, and reduces preferences for harsh punishment. In a conjoint experiment, perspective-taking attenuates moral penalties associated with voluntary participation in extremist violence, while leaving most other evaluative criteria unchanged. Together, these findings demonstrate that public attitudes toward former extremists are not immutable.