Effect of external interventions in conflicts Ricardo Sousa - ricardorps2000@yahoo.com

Armed conflicts in 2012 Hello. Good Morning, My name is Ricardo Sousa and I am a PhD researcher at ISS in Holland. The picture that we are looking at is an identification of all the countries that had an armed conflict, the same as civil war, in 2012. We can see that all regions of the world have armed conflict, but Africa and Asia are the ones with more civil wars in 2012. Now, for instances, the case of the civil war in Syria that we are all aware of. There is debate in public opinion and in the international community of what is the best way to deal with this conflict. And one of the most distinguishable options are the choice between a military or diplomatic strategy. The recent decision that was taken at the UN SC was to reinforce the diplomatic initiatives. My research focus exactly on this dynamic, which is: What is the effect that different types of external interventions have on conflict, and specifically on the conflict intensity of these civil wars. The intensity measured as the number of battle deaths in a month.

Conflict 1989-2010 – Africa If we then zoom in to Africa we can see the regions that had more conflict since the end of the cold war are: North Africa, The Horn of Africa Countries in the Great Lakes Region Western Africa in Liberia, Sierra Leone, Cote Ivoire Angola and Mozambique CW Fortunately Southern Africa as avoided the conflict in this period.

Conflict 1989-2010 – Africa Peace operations in 2010 Now if we overimposes to the conflicts the multilateral interventions by UN and non UN that were active in 2010 we have this picture. We can see several missions throughout the regions that I have just mentioned. Now, both Africa and Asia have the most number of civil wars, but it is in Africa where the majority of external interventions are made by the international community, and this was the reason to choose Africa as the region of analysis. What I did was a dataset of external interventions in civil wars for the period from 1989 up to 2010 for Africa to see the statistically significant effect that these interventions have on conflict intensity.

Effect of external interventions in Africa’s conflicts Diplomatic, Economic, Military, UN and non-UN missions Effect of external interventions in Africa’s conflicts between 1989 and 2010 and their legitimacy I look into four types of interventions. Military, Economic, Diplomatic, UN and non-UN missions, which includes the peacekeeping missions. And my results are

External Interventions Effect on Conflict Intensity Legality United Nations Charter

External Interventions Effect on Conflict Intensity Legality United Nations Charter Diplomacy Decreases conflict intensity after 12 months OK That diplomatic interventions decrease conflict intensity, but the effect only occur 12 months after the intervention. This is partially expected. If the parties start to negotiate a political solution one would expect that the military option would loose momentum. This is what is happening but not immediatelly and only some time after the negotiations have been started. The conclusion is that diplomacy works but it needs time to work.

External Interventions Effect on Conflict Intensity Legality United Nations Charter Diplomacy Decreases conflict intensity after 12 months OK Military Increases conflict intensity Exceptions to UN SC primacy on African Union and United Nations policy Military interventions increase conflict intensity. This is an expected finding. If there is a civil war and the parties are being supported by outside parties with militarily it is natural that the parties have more capacity to fight and therefore leading to more battle deaths. The other two types of interventions dont have so interesting significant results so I am not referring to them. These are the two most important result. And my finding is that the African Union and UN have policy exceptions to this primacy. Meaning that a military intervention could start without UN SC approval. So the research ends with a question: What type of legal system on military interventions are we developing worldwide and in Africa? (The example of the war in Iraq, which was initiated without UN SC approval)