Conflict negotiations and rebel leader selection
| Date | 01 September 2019 |
| Published date | 01 September 2019 |
| Author | Kathleen Gallagher Cunningham,Katherine Sawyer |
| DOI | 10.1177/0022343319829689 |
| Subject Matter | Regular Articles |
Regular Articles
Conflict negotiations and rebel
leader selection
Kathleen Gallagher Cunningham
Department of Government and Politics, University of Maryland & Peace Research Institute Oslo (PRIO)
Katherine Sawyer
Department of Political Science, Stony Brook University
Abstract
The international community often calls for negotiations in civil wars. Yet, we have limited understanding of when
and why specific rebels enter into negotiations. The emergence of a new leader in a rebel group can provide an
opportunity for the state seeking to end war, but this is conditional on how leaders take power. Rebel leaders who
come to power through a local selection process (such as an election) provide information to the state about the likely
cohesion of the rebel group. This affects state perceptions of the viability of a rebel group as a bargaining partner in
civil war negotiations. Using original data on rebel leaders in civil wars, we show that new leaders coming to power
through a local selection process are more likely to get to the negotiating table than leaders coming to power in other
ways. We find that the election of a rebel group leader has a particularly strong and positive effect on the chance of
getting to the table. Rebel leaders that founded their own group or brought together disparate rebels to create a single
group are less likely to get to the negotiating table. This article advances our understanding of conflict dynamics by
offering a novel argument of rebel leader ascension and its impact on conflict bargaining and has critical implications
for parties external to the conflict interested in conflict resolution. External actors seeking to facilitate lasting peace
may benefit from observing patterns of rebel leadership.
Keywords
civil war, conflict resolution, rebel leaders
As the Syrian civil war enters its seventh year, the inter-
national community continues to call for a negotiated
settlement to the conflict. The question of who will be at
the table in any process designed to end the war is a
critical one. The Syrian opposition is incredibly fragmen-
ted and international actors have diverging preferences
about who should participate in negotiations.
1
Despite
the critical role that getting to the table plays in the
negotiated settlement of civil conflicts, only recently has
scholarly attention begun to turn to the question of
which rebels get negotiated with in the first place
(particularly in the extensive quantitative literature on
civil war).
2
In addition to the normative significance often placed
on the process of negotiation, this choice is important
because which rebels sit at the table has substantial impli-
cations for post-conflict politics. Rebels that participate
in negotiations are poised to reap key benefits that
Corresponding author:
kgcunnin@umd.edu
1
The United Nations has repeatedly called on the international
community to aid negotiations. The USA has supported the Syrian
National Coalition’s participation. Iran has espoused various
positions, stating that only Syrians should be present.
2
Notable exceptions include Bapat’s (2005) formal model and
Walter (2002). Recent works include Findley (2013), Thomas
(2014), Kaplow (2016), and Heger & Jung (2017), which all
include aspects of negotiations.
Journal of Peace Research
2019, Vol. 56(5) 619–634
ªThe Author(s) 2019
Article reuse guidelines:
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DOI: 10.1177/0022343319829689
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emerge in postwar politics. The vast majority of negoti-
ated settlements include provisions for political power-
sharing among former combatants: approximately 80%
of settled civil wars from 1945 to 1998 included an
explicit division of political authority (Hoddie &
Hartzell, 2005). Postwar regimes also divide up positions
in the security sector, as well as territorial autonomy –
both of which are negotiated over at the war’s end.
3
The
process of negotiations can also impact conflict dynamics
in substantial ways (Nilsson, 2008), including sparking
the splintering of a rebel group.
Which rebel groups enter into negotiations and when?
Increasingly, we have come to understand that ‘rebel’
actors are not homogenous but have key differences in
their recruitment and retention practices (Gates, 2002;
Cohen, 2013), resources (Weinstein, 2006), links to civi-
lians (Staniland, 2014), the degree to which they enter
into conventional politics (Cunningham, Gleditsch &
Salehyan, 2009), and whether they provide public goods
(Mampilly, 2011). While we often acknowledge the role
that individual leaders might play in conflict dynamics
(Stedman, 1991), little attention has been paid to rebel
leadership as a political process of coming to power that
has consequences for conflict negotiations. This is in con-
trast to work on interstate conflict, where leader selection
processes underpin key theories of conflict initiation and
resolution (Doyle & Sambanis, 2006; Goemans, Gle-
ditsch & Chiozza, 2009; Weeks, 2014; Horowitz,
McDermott & Stam, 2005; Croco, 2011).
We argue that the way rebel leaders come to power
influences the incentives states have to invite rebels to the
table.
4
We identify different paths to power, differentiat-
ing between those that are based on a local selection pro-
cess (such as elections, selection by rebel officers, or
inheriting power) and those that reflect orientation
toward other actors (such as founding a group, splitting
from an existing group, the merger of multiple groups, or
via a third party). These different processes of taking
power provide key information to states about whether
the conflict is ‘ripe’ for negotiations. Zartman suggests
that assessing the right conditions for negotiation is per-
ceptual by nature; actors must work to ‘identify the
objective and subjective elements’ that create such con-
ditions (1989, 2008: 24). Leadership ascension within a
rebel group through a local selection process can provide
a strong signal of rebel cohesion to the state.
Election of a rebel leader most strongly demonstrates
this group cohesion. This occurs whether voting is done
by civilians (such as for Meles Zenawi of the Ethiopian
People’s Revolutionary Democratic Front) or by rebel
group members (such as the election of Abdul Rahman
Ghassemlou by the third Congress of the Democratic
Party of Iranian Kurdistan). Competition over leadership
is a natural point for splintering of a rebel group, as
multiple individuals work to fill a vacuum of power. The
continued integrity of the group through an electoral
selection process shows the group is likely to be relatively
cohesive and supportive of the new leader.
5
Information
conveyed about the leader’s support within the group
and, consequently, about rebel group cohesion, clarify
how likely it is that the rebel group will be able to follow
through on a peace deal and makes the potential for
conflict settlement less ambiguous for the state. In short,
the electoral selection of a rebel leader can decrease
uncertainty about the likely success of a settlement.
We hypothesize that states are more likely to negotiate
with rebel leaders that come to power through local selec-
tion processesas opposed to those that gainpower in other
ways. These leaders demonstrate the greatest potential as
successfulbargaining partners tothe state because the rebel
group appearsmore cohesive. We evaluate thisexpectation
usingnew data on the way rebel leaderscame to power in all
civil wars from 1989 to 2011. We find that, while leader-
ship changewithin a rebel group alone doesnot necessarily
lead to negotiations, instances of rebel leaders coming to
power through local selection processes (and electoral pro-
cesses in particular) increase thelikelihood of getting to the
negotiatingtable. The argument and findingsin this article
have implications for our understanding of the role of rebel
leadersin civil war and the conditionsunder which wars are
amenable to negotiation.
Negotiations in civil war
Negotiations to resolve civil wars are heavily favored by
the international community but are not costless to states
or international facilitators.
6
When states negotiate with
3
Jarstad & Nilsson (2008) identify provis ions related to political
power, the military, and territorial autonomy in 83 settlements
from 1989 to 2004. See Toft (2010) on post-conflict military
integration.
4
Much of our discussion centers on leader change (which has been
identified as a critical point for conflict resolution). However, the
emergence of a new rebel group constitutes a change from the
state’s perspective as well, in that there is a new leader to engage with.
5
See Christia (2012) and Staniland (2012) on fragmenting of rebel
movements.
6
Governments at times refuse to negotiate with groups for a variety
of stated reasons such as connections to external supporters (as with
UNITA in Angola), the rebel occupation of territory (as with M23 in
620 journal of PEACE RESEARCH 56(5)
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