[go: up one dir, main page]
IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/osf/socarx/38r2h.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Rebel Financing and the commitment problem in civil conflict: An Application to Northern Ireland

Author

Listed:
  • Jennings, Colin
  • Sanchez-Pages, Santiago
Abstract
Why is a peace agreement acceptable at some point in time but not earlier? We argue that the commitment problem combined with the nature of rebel Financing can help explain this. Crucial to our argument is that the composition of financing between donations and self-generated funds through organised crime and local governance determine the size of anticipated shifts in the future power of rebel groups. When donations are the main source of funds, shifts in rebel strength will more likely be large and be preempted through conflict by the state. When rebels obtain mainly self-generated funds, shifts in power will more likely be small and allow for peace. We apply this theory to the Northern Ireland conflict and analyse why the 1998 Belfast Agreement was credible, but the very similar failed Sunningdale Agreement in 1973 was not. Our paper contributes to the literature on the boundary between political violence and organised crime.

Suggested Citation

  • Jennings, Colin & Sanchez-Pages, Santiago, 2024. "Rebel Financing and the commitment problem in civil conflict: An Application to Northern Ireland," SocArXiv 38r2h, Center for Open Science.
    • Handle: RePEc:osf:socarx:38r2h
    DOI: 10.31219/osf.io/38r2h
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://osf.io/download/662113fa716cb70380a4568e/
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.31219/osf.io/38r2h?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    Other versions of this item:

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Fearon, James D., 1995. "Rationalist explanations for war," International Organization, Cambridge University Press, vol. 49(3), pages 379-414, July.
    2. Horowitz, Donald L., 2002. "Explaining the Northern Ireland Agreement: The Sources of an Unlikely Constitutional Consensus," British Journal of Political Science, Cambridge University Press, vol. 32(2), pages 193-220, April.
    3. Colin C. Jennings, 1998. "An Economistic Interpretation of the Northern Ireland Conflict," Scottish Journal of Political Economy, Scottish Economic Society, vol. 45(3), pages 294-308, August.
    4. Paul Collier & Anke Hoeffler, 2000. "Greed and Grievance in Civil War," CSAE Working Paper Series 2000-18, Centre for the Study of African Economies, University of Oxford.
    5. Powell, Robert, 2006. "War as a Commitment Problem," International Organization, Cambridge University Press, vol. 60(1), pages 169-203, January.
    6. W.A. Tupman, 1998. "Where Has All the Money Gone? The IRA as a Profit‐making Concern," Journal of Money Laundering Control, Emerald Group Publishing Limited, vol. 1(4), pages 303-311, February.
    7. Stergios Skaperdas, 2001. "The political economy of organized crime: providing protection when the state does not," Economics of Governance, Springer, vol. 2(3), pages 173-202, November.
    8. Niall Ó Dochartaigh, 2015. "The Longest Negotiation: British Policy, IRA Strategy and the Making of the Northern Ireland Peace Settlement," Political Studies, Political Studies Association, vol. 63(1), pages 202-220, March.
    9. Paul Collier & Anke Hoeffler, 2004. "Greed and grievance in civil war," Oxford Economic Papers, Oxford University Press, vol. 56(4), pages 563-595, October.
    10. Debs, Alexandre & Monteiro, Nuno P., 2014. "Known Unknowns: Power Shifts, Uncertainty, and War," International Organization, Cambridge University Press, vol. 68(1), pages 1-31, January.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Stergios Skaperdas, 2008. "An economic approach to analyzing civil wars," Economics of Governance, Springer, vol. 9(1), pages 25-44, January.
    2. Gries, Thomas & Haake, Claus-Jochen, 2016. "An Economic Theory of 'Destabilization War' '- Compromise for Peace versus Conventional, Guerilla, or Terrorist Warfare," VfS Annual Conference 2016 (Augsburg): Demographic Change 145617, Verein für Socialpolitik / German Economic Association.
    3. Thomas Gries & Claus-Jochen Haake, 2016. "An Economic Theory of 'Destabilization War'," Working Papers CIE 95, Paderborn University, CIE Center for International Economics.
    4. Vincenzo Bove & Ron Smith, 2011. "The Economics of Peacekeeping," Chapters, in: Derek L. Braddon & Keith Hartley (ed.), Handbook on the Economics of Conflict, chapter 10, Edward Elgar Publishing.
    5. Mehlum, Halvor & Ove Moene, Karl, 2011. "Aggressive elites and vulnerable entrepreneurs - trust and cooperation in the shadow of conflict," Memorandum 16/2010, Oslo University, Department of Economics.
    6. Jelnov, Artyom & Tauman, Yair & Zeckhauser, Richard, 2018. "Confronting an enemy with unknown preferences: Deterrer or provocateur?," European Journal of Political Economy, Elsevier, vol. 54(C), pages 124-143.
    7. Juan F. Vargas, 2011. "Rebellion, Repression and Welfare," Defence and Peace Economics, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 22(5), pages 563-579, October.
    8. Morelli, Massimo & Rohner, Dominic, 2015. "Resource concentration and civil wars," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 117(C), pages 32-47.
    9. Christopher Blattman & Edward Miguel, 2010. "Civil War," Journal of Economic Literature, American Economic Association, vol. 48(1), pages 3-57, March.
    10. Kjetil Bjorvatn & Alireza Naghavi, 2010. "Rent seekers in rentier states: When greed brings peace," Center for Economic Research (RECent) 039, University of Modena and Reggio E., Dept. of Economics "Marco Biagi".
    11. George W Williford & Douglas B Atkinson, 2020. "A Bayesian forecasting model of international conflict," The Journal of Defense Modeling and Simulation, , vol. 17(3), pages 235-242, July.
    12. Anderton,Charles H. & Carter,John R., 2009. "Principles of Conflict Economics," Cambridge Books, Cambridge University Press, number 9780521875578, December.
    13. Robert Schub, 2017. "Unfair fights: Power asymmetry, nascent nuclear capability, and preventive conflict," Conflict Management and Peace Science, Peace Science Society (International), vol. 34(4), pages 431-455, July.
    14. Albornoz, Facundo & Hauk, Esther, 2014. "Civil war and U.S. foreign influence," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 110(C), pages 64-78.
    15. Sara McLaughlin Mitchell, 2017. "Dangerous bargains with the devil? Incorporating new approaches in peace science for the study of war," Conflict Management and Peace Science, Peace Science Society (International), vol. 34(1), pages 98-116, January.
    16. Christopher Blattman, 2009. "Civil War: A Review of Fifty Years of Research," Working Papers id:2231, eSocialSciences.
    17. Thad Dunning, 2005. "Resource Dependence, Economic Performance, and Political Stability," Journal of Conflict Resolution, Peace Science Society (International), vol. 49(4), pages 451-482, August.
    18. Anne Meng, 2019. "Accessing the state: Executive constraints and credible commitment in dictatorship," Journal of Theoretical Politics, , vol. 31(4), pages 568-599, October.
    19. Blouin, Max & Pallage, Stéphane, 2016. "Warlords, famine and food aid: Who fights, who starves?," European Journal of Political Economy, Elsevier, vol. 45(C), pages 18-38.
    20. Dominic Rohner & Mathias Thoenig & Fabrizio Zilibotti, 2013. "War Signals: A Theory of Trade, Trust, and Conflict," The Review of Economic Studies, Review of Economic Studies Ltd, vol. 80(3), pages 1114-1147.

    More about this item

    NEP fields

    This paper has been announced in the following NEP Reports:

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:osf:socarx:38r2h. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: OSF (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://arabixiv.org .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.