scholarly journals Beyond Greed: Why Armed Groups Tax

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Tanya Bandula-Irwin ◽  
Max Gallien ◽  
Ashley Jackson ◽  
Vanessa van den Boogaard ◽  
Florian Weigand
Keyword(s):  
Population Control ◽  
Institution Building ◽  
Armed Groups ◽  
Full Account ◽  
Armed Group ◽  
Revenue Collection ◽  
Systematic Exploration ◽  
Group Taxation ◽  
New Research ◽  
Control Institution

Armed groups tax. Journalistic accounts often include a tone of surprise about this fact, while policy reports tend to strike a tone of alarm, highlighting the link between armed group taxation and ongoing conflict. Policymakers often focus on targeting the mechanisms of armed group taxation as part of their conflict strategy, often described as ‘following the money’. We argue that what is instead needed is a deeper understanding of the nuanced realities of armed group taxation, the motivations behind it, and the implications it has for an armed group’s relationship with civilian and diaspora populations, as well as the broader international community. This paper builds on two distinct literatures, on armed groups and on taxation, to provide the first systematic exploration into the motivation of armed group taxation. Based on a review of the diverse practices of how armed groups tax, we highlight that a full account of their motivation needs to go beyond revenue collection, and engage with key themes around legitimacy, population control, institution building, and the performance of public authority. We problematise common approaches towards armed group taxation and state-building, and outline key questions of a new research agenda.

scholarly journals The Organization of Political Violence by Insurgencies

2012 ◽  
Vol 18 (3) ◽  
Author(s):  
Roos Haer
Keyword(s):  
Political Violence ◽  
Probit Model ◽  
Ordered Probit ◽  
Process Theory ◽  
Ordered Probit Model ◽  
Armed Groups ◽  
Human Right ◽  
Armed Group ◽  
The World ◽  
The Relationship

AbstractA range of theories have attempted to explain the variation in civilian abuse of warring parties. Most of these theories have been focused on the strategic environment in which these acts take place. Less attention is devoted to the perpetrators of these human right abuses themselves: the armed groups. This study tries to fill this niche by using the organizational process theory in which it is assumed that armed groups, like every organization, struggles for survival. The leader tries to ensure the maintenance of her armed group by increasing her control over her troops. The relationship between the level of control and the perpetrated civilian abuse is examined with a new dataset on the internal structure of more than 70 different armed groups around the world. With the help of a Bayesian Ordered Probit model, this new dataset on civilian abuse is analyzed. The results show that especially particular incentives play an important role.

scholarly journals Exploring the Time Domain with Synoptic Sky Surveys

2011 ◽  
Vol 7 (S285) ◽  
pp. 141-146 ◽  
Author(s):  
S. G. Djorgovski ◽  
A. A. Mahabal ◽  
A. J. Drake ◽  
M. J. Graham ◽  
C. Donalek ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Time Domain ◽  
Lessons Learned ◽  
Sky Surveys ◽  
The Past ◽  
Systematic Exploration ◽  
The Time Domain ◽  
New Research

AbstractSynoptic sky surveys are becoming the largest data generators in astronomy, and they are opening a new research frontier that touches practically every field of astronomy. Opening the time domain to a systematic exploration will strengthen our understanding of a number of interesting known phenomena, and may lead to the discoveries of as yet unknown ones. We describe some lessons learned over the past decade, and offer some ideas that may guide strategic considerations in the planning and execution of future synoptic sky surveys.

Trust, Mistrust, and Desertion in Civil Wars

Desertion ◽  
2020 ◽  
pp. 15-37
Author(s):  
Théodore McLauchlin
Keyword(s):  
Civil Wars ◽  
Armed Groups ◽  
Social Rule ◽  
Armed Group ◽  
South Vietnam ◽  
Military Unit

This chapter mentions Viet Cong (VC) companies in South Vietnam that developed serious morale and motivation problems, which pose a major risk of desertion and defection. It investigates where trust and cooperation will come from if soldiers look for their chance to desert and put up a false front of enthusiasm and conviction. It also proposes a crucial way of keeping soldiers fighting through a norm of cooperation in a military unit, emphasizing a social rule saying that each will fight if others do. The chapter discusses whether an armed group can rely simply on the threat of punishment to keep combatants fighting, even if trust is not in the cards. It describes deeply mistrustful armed groups that use factional memberships or stereotypes to assess soldiers' loyalties, showing coercion as arbitrary persecution.

Handling Foreign Fighters

2019 ◽  
pp. 135-172
Author(s):  
Vera Mironova
Keyword(s):  
Local Population ◽  
Group Cohesion ◽  
The Other ◽  
Armed Groups ◽  
Additional Source ◽  
Armed Group ◽  
Local Language ◽  
Other Hand ◽  
International War ◽  
Foreign Fighters

There are several major benefits foreign fighters, and only foreign fighters, can offer armed groups. They have knowledge and experience that the local population does not have and have connections in the international war industry. Usually they are more dedicated to their goals. Foreigners are better at raising funds in their home communities and thus provide armed groups with additional source of income. Finally, they can be successfully used by armed groups for propaganda purposes. On the other hand, it is much harder for the leaders of an armed group to manage foreigners versus locals. First, foreign fighters often do not speak the local language and are not familiar with the terrain. Second, they could have problems with the locals. Third, their presence in the group could decrease overall group cohesion. Fourth, they could be recruited as spies by foreign intelligence agencies more easily than locals. And finally, foreign fighters often joined the conflict with different motives than those of local fighters, which could lead to differences in combat strategy and tactics.

Seeking Safety: Avoiding Displacement and Choosing Destinations in Civil Wars

2009 ◽  
Vol 46 (3) ◽  
pp. 419-429 ◽  
Author(s):  
Abbey Steele
Keyword(s):  
Civil War ◽  
Civil Wars ◽  
Armed Groups ◽  
Community Characteristics ◽  
Armed Group ◽  
Seeking Safety ◽  
Direct Violence ◽  
Perverse Effect ◽  
Shared Characteristic

Despite civil war violence, some civilians stay in their communities. Those who leave choose one of many possible destinations. Drawing on fieldwork in Colombia, this article argues that the way armed groups target civilians explains households' decisions about displacement. When groups of civilians are targeted based on a shared characteristic — `collective' targeting — their best options for avoiding violence differ from those targeted selectively or indiscriminately. This article outlines conditions under which people can stay in contexts of collective targeting, and where they are likely to go if these conditions are not met. A civilian facing collective targeting could move to a rival group's stronghold, cluster with others similarly targeted, or seek anonymity in a city or different region. Community characteristics, such as whether it is urban or rural, as well as macro characteristics of the war, such as whether or not there is an ascriptive cleavage, shape which decisions are relatively safest, which in turn leads to implications for aggregate patterns. For example, clustering together has a perverse effect: even though hiding among others with similar characteristics may reduce an individual's likelihood of suffering direct violence, the community may be more endangered as it is perceived to be affiliated with an armed group. This then leads to a cycle of collective targeting and displacement, which has important implications for the development of warfare. In turn, this cycle and related cleavage formation may have long-term impacts on postwar stability and politics.

Psychoanalysis

2013 ◽  
Author(s):  
Elizabeth Ann Danto
Keyword(s):  
Human Brain ◽  
Human Behavior ◽  
Sigmund Freud ◽  
Emotional Processing ◽  
Human Sexuality ◽  
Organizational Systems ◽  
Systematic Exploration ◽  
Drive Theory ◽  
New Research ◽  
The Mind

Psychoanalysis is both a theory and a therapy, largely based on the work of Sigmund Freud but widely expanded over the last hundred years. Four core models (ego psychology, drive theory, object relations, and self-psychology) evolved from Freud's theories of the mind. While each model takes a different approach to treatment, all result in the systematic exploration of unconscious and seemingly irrational aspects of human behavior. Feminist, postmodernist, and intersectionality theories have added new dimensions to psychoanalytic exploration of individual and family, human sexuality, groups, work and organizational systems, and social struggles. New research in neuroscience is confirming the biological basis for unconscious emotional processing within the human brain.

Lifting the Burden? The Ethical Implications of Studying Exemplary, Not Pathological, Wartime Sexual Conduct

2020 ◽  
pp. 229-242
Author(s):  
Angela Muvumba Sellström
Keyword(s):  
South Africa ◽  
Human Rights ◽  
Sexual Violence ◽  
Ethical Dilemmas ◽  
Gender Inequalities ◽  
Armed Groups ◽  
Armed Group ◽  
Ethical Implications ◽  
Sexual Conduct ◽  
Conducting Research

This chapter examines Angela Muvumba Sellström's fieldwork and encounters with non-state armed groups in Burundi, South Africa, and Uganda that established sexual discipline among their commanders and foot-soldiers. It reflects on ethical dilemmas of conducting research on “non-cases” of wartime sexual violence among armed groups that have regulated sex in wartime conduct. It focuses on the non-use of sex as a weapon of war that may acquit armed groups from other human rights violations they may have committed. The chapter mentions some sexual-violence survivors who are unwittingly silenced by a certain research focus even after the armed groups have regulated sexual conduct. It analyzes the regulation of sexual conduct that may be based on the male leadership of the armed group rather than female sexual autonomy, which may foster entrenched gender inequalities in society.

Interview with Ali Ahmad Jalali

2011 ◽  
Vol 93 (882) ◽  
pp. 279-286 ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Soviet Union ◽  
Washington Dc ◽  
National Defense ◽  
Armed Groups ◽  
Armed Group ◽  
Security Issues ◽  
The Soviet Union ◽  
National Defense University ◽  
Image Position ◽  
Do So

For this issue on understanding armed groups, the Review considered it important to invite someone who could give the inside perspective of an armed group. Minister Ali Ahmad Jalali, currently Distinguished Professor at the National Defense University in Washington, DC, is uniquely placed to do so in the context of Afghanistan: he has at once the experience of a former member of the Mujahideen during the war against the Soviet Union, a former Colonel in the Afghan National Army, and a former Minister of the Interior for Afghanistan from 2003 to 2005. Minister Jalali has published extensively on political, military, and security issues in Afghanistan, Iran, and Central Asia.

Simple soldiers? Blurring the distinction between compulsion and commitment among Rwandan rebels in Eastern Congo

Africa ◽  
2017 ◽  
Vol 87 (4) ◽  
pp. 720-738 ◽  
Author(s):  
Anna Hedlund
Keyword(s):  
Political Ideology ◽  
Armed Groups ◽  
Civilian Population ◽  
Armed Group ◽  
Sharp Distinction ◽  
Ethnographic Fieldwork ◽  
Dual Identity ◽  
Eastern Congo ◽  
Main Factor ◽  
Violent Events

AbstractMedia descriptions of the conflicts in the Eastern Congo usually depict violent events as being systematic attacks by rebels and militias (perpetrators) on the civilian population (victims). While much attention has been given to the victims of such violence, less effort has been made to understand the perspectives and underlying motives for violence of those who are actively engaged in fighting the war. Using anthropological arguments, this article argues that the use of the terms ‘perpetrator’ and ‘victim’ are scientifically problematic when attempting to explain contemporary conflict(s) in the Eastern Congo and other similar war situations in Africa. Based on ethnographic fieldwork among the Democratic Forces for the Liberation of Rwanda (FDLR), whose leadership was an orchestrating agent in the genocide in Rwanda in 1994, I demonstrate that not only is the victim/perpetrator dichotomy unclear, but also that combatants may frequently regard themselves as being both victims and perpetrators at one and the same time. I argue that the main factor behind this dual identity is that, while combatants in the Congo may be under a compulsion to commit violence, they may simultaneously be fully committed to their armed group and to its collective political ideology. While our conventional understanding of the membership of armed groups tends to make a sharp distinction between compulsory participation and commitment to a cause, I show how, in the context of the Eastern Congo, these categories are not, in fact, mutually exclusive.

Fragmented Wars

2018 ◽  
pp. 3-32
Author(s):  
Noam Lubell
Keyword(s):  
Use Of Force ◽  
The United States ◽  
Basic Question ◽  
Armed Groups ◽  
Armed Group ◽  
High Profile ◽  
Self Defense ◽  
Legal Challenges ◽  
State Actor

The use of force against armed groups located in other States is not new, but began receiving heightened attention as a result of U.S. operations in Afghanistan following the attacks of September 11, 2001. The high-profile nature of these events, the resoluteness with which the United States asserted its right to self-defense against an armed group, and the international support that it received all led to increased attention to the surrounding legal matters. Much of the debate centered upon the basic question of whether a State has a right to self-defense in response to attacks perpetrated by a non-State actor located in the territory of another State, absent attribution of the attack to the other State. Other important issues included the classification of hostilities between the State and such a group, and rules governing the conduct of the parties. This chapter sets out to draw together the threads of these debates from the last fifteen years, to analyze new questions that have emerged, examine how they impact upon each other, and suggest a way forward for overcoming legal challenges.

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