Electoral Reforms and Post-Civil War Stability

NEW RULES TO AN OLD GAME: ELECTORAL REFORMS

AND POST-CIVIL WAR STABILITY

Eric Keels, B.A.

Dissertation Prepared for the Degree of

DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY

UNIVERSITY OF NORTH TEXAS

August 2016

APPROVED:

T. David Mason, Major Professor J. Michael Greig, Committee Member Idean Salehyan, Committee Member Jacqueline DeMeritt, Committee Member Matthew Eshbaugh-Soha, Chair of the Department of Political Science David Holdeman, Dean of the College of Arts and Sciences Victor Prybutok, Vice Provost of the Toulouse Graduate School Keels, Eric. New Rules to an Old Game: Electoral Reforms and Post-Civil War Stability.

Doctor of Philosophy (Political Science), August 2016, 141 pp., 13 tables, 1 figure, bibliography,

87 titles.

One of the most common features found within peace agreements are provisions that call for post-civil war elections. Unfortunately, recent research on post-civil war stability has consistently demonstrated that the initial elections held after civil wars significantly increases the risk for renewed fighting. While this research does highlight a danger posed by post-war elections, it focuses only on one element associated with post-civil war democracy. I argue that by implementing electoral reforms that are called for in peace agreements, post-war countries reduce the risk of renewed civil war. Implementing these peace agreement provisions increases the durability of post-war peace in two ways. First, by implementing costly electoral reforms called for in the peace agreement, the government signals a credible commitment to the peace process which reduces security dilemmas faced by opposition groups. Second, electoral reforms generate new avenues for political participation for disaffected citizens, which reduces the ability of hardliners to mobilize future armed opposition. I examine how implementing post-war electoral reforms impact the risk of renewed conflict from 1989 through 2010. Using duration models, I demonstrate that implementing these electoral reforms substantially reduces the risk of renewed conflict. Copyright 2016

Eric Keels

ii CHAPTER I

INTRODUCTION

On October 31st of 2010, the Ivory Coast held its first presidential election since the signing of the Ouagadougou Peace Agreement in 2007. The Ouagadougou Peace Agreement had brought an end to the regional and sectarian violence which had destabilized the country since

2002, with Northern Muslims fighting Southern Christians for greater political rights. Soon after the results were tallied up by Ivorian officials and international monitors, the Ivorian

Constitutional Council (composed mainly of supporters of incumbent President Laurent Gbagbo, who represented the largely Christian Baoule´ and the Be´te´ ethnic groups) claimed that roughly

660,000 votes were nullified (Bellamy and Williams 2012). The Gbagbo regime had also engaged in targeted political violence and voter intimidation prior to the election so as to ensure electoral victory. Once it became clear, though, that Laurent Gbagbo was going to lose the election, his supporters began to escalate their attacks so as to discredit the electoral process.

These bursts of pro-government violence set off a cycle of reprisal attacks which eventually led to a recurrence of civil war between the aggrieved North of Cote d’Ivoire and the prosperous

South. While the initial civil war was spurred by systemic political exclusion, the second Ivorian civil war was triggered by events tied to the tenuous first post-war election. While troubling, the violence of the second Ivorian civil war is far from uncommon. Rather, elections (and democracy more broadly) often generate circumstances which undermine the post-civil war peace process

(Paris 2004; Jarstad 2008; Brancati and Snyder 2013). For instance, following the 1992 peace process in Angola, the initial elections spurred the UNITA rebels to abandon negotiations and resume fighting. Similarly, shortly after Charles Taylor won the presidency in Liberia’s 1997

1 post-war election, opposition forces began amassing in the Ivory Coast and Guinea. By 1999, the civil war had restarted in Liberia.

Practitioners of contemporary peacebuilding face a dilemma when trying to resolve intrastate conflicts. In an effort to promote security in war-torn nations, they must often place limits on the degree of post-war democracy so as to promote post-war security and stability (Sisk and Jarstad 2008). This often entails postponing elections, banning parties that campaign on ethnic divisions, and placing unelected militant leaders in prominent positions of power through establishing transitional political power-sharing so as to reduce commitment problems (Paris

2004; Jarstad 2008). Unfortunately, the process of limiting democracy in favor of ensuring post- war security limits the ability of dispossessed citizens to resolve their own grievances through an institutional process. Absent such a device, aggrieved citizens only have unconventional avenues for effecting political change. Without well-functioning democratic mechanisms, citizens are more likely to support hardline elements within the dissident movement or the government. This war-to-democracy dilemma presents considerable problems for the international community as they attempt to solidify peace. As many peacebuilding missions are tasked with not only bringing an end to armed conflict but also with establishing new democratic practices and institutions (Paris 2004), contemporary efforts to establish durable post-war peace must juggle the need for adequate security as well as the process of instituting new democratic institutions.

While the war-to-democracy dilemma would suggest that the establishment of post-war security and post-war democratization are contradictory efforts, there is reason to believe that democracy and security need not be mutually exclusive in the aftermath of civil wars. Much of the previous work on post-war stability focuses almost exclusively on one aspect of the democratic process: elections. This emphasis on only one aspect of functional democracy tends

2 to obscure the need for other parts of the democratic process. Specifically focusing on changes to electoral laws in post-war government, I analyze an avenue for pursuing democratic reforms while at the same time preventing a resumption of fighting by combatants. Elections are assuredly a necessary part of a functioning democracy, but as noted by Dahl (1971; 1989) democracies require much more than regular electoral contests. For democracy to endure governments must allow widespread, if not universal, participation in voting; they must allow open political competition by political parties and by candidates; and governments must have a system in place to translate votes into meaningful national representation.

Unfortunately, countries that suffer civil war often have institutions in place that prevent meaningful competition so elites may consolidate their control of the coercive apparatus of the state (Hardin 1995; Bueno de Mesquita et al 2003). From Apartheid in South Africa to the redistricting efforts of 1952 in Lebanon, elites often manipulate the electoral laws of countries to ensure that their collaborators have a place within government. This manipulation of electoral practices helps to generate grievances within disaffected populations, who in turn engage in revolution to effect political change. Peace agreements present an opportunity for post-war governments to reform the electoral process so as to allow for meaningful competition in elections as well as institute mechanisms that effectively translate votes into national representation. By reforming the electoral process, post-war governments signal their intent to allow meaningful political competition which reduces the risk of renewed civil war. In turn, aggrieved citizens are less likely to engage in risky political violence in favor of using new institutional mechanisms to resolve their grievances. On the other hand, in the absence of electoral reforms post-war dissidents are forced to engage in the same electoral process that was in place prior to and during the civil war, stoking animosity towards new post-war governments.

While reforms may be agreed to as part of the peace process, there is no guarantee that the government will follow through with establishing them. The implementation of electoral reform present an avenue for new post-war governments both to signal their willingness to abide by the political process as well as to provide avenues for aggrieved citizens to effect change without resorting to political violence.

Allowing increased political competition in the post-war process also ensures the survival of post-war democratization. While much of the literature on post-civil war stability focuses exclusively on the risk of renewed civil war, relatively little attention has focused on the survival of democracy in these fragile states. The phenomenon of democratic failure (or autocratic backsliding) should be of special concern to new governments that emerge from negotiated settlements, as the abandonment of democratic practices may undermine the tentative post-war peace. Following the establishment of a peace agreement, elites within the incumbent government often both agree to form a transitional political power-sharing government with their opponents as well as to hold future elections. While elites associated with the previous government may agree to democratic reforms in an effort to prevent future fighting, there is no guarantee that these elites are willing to abide by the terms of the agreement or capitulate to future electoral losses following contentious elections. Rather, the literature would suggest that elites, fearing retribution once out of office, are likely to abandon the democratic practices in favor of consolidating their control of the state (Joshi 2013b). Without reforms to electoral laws, elites may use past practices to prevent meaningful competition and consolidate their control of the state. In addition to reducing the risk of renewed civil war, electoral reforms promote meaningful political competition that preserves democratic institutions and safeguards fragile post-civil war governments from backsliding into autocratic practices. Furthermore, the

4 international community can play a critical role in ensuring that these costly reforms are implemented. In addition to monitoring combatant behavior, UN peacekeeping missions also provides substantial oversight and expertise in establishing new democracies (Joshi 2013a).

While UN peacekeepers may not be capable of ensuring democratic transitions, they are very effective at reducing commitment problems between combatants and pressuring opponents to abide by the terms of the peace process (Walter 2002; Mattes and Savun 2010; Joshi 2013a). In assuaging government concerns that they will not be targeted by electoral loss, as well as applying pressure to elites who refuse to comply, UN peacekeeping missions may assist in implementing costly electoral reforms. By ensuring that post-war governments follow through with implementing new electoral reforms, they generate the foundation for real political competition to occur. Such competition, in turn, reduces the ability of elites within the incumbent government to steal elections thereby preventing governments from backsliding into autocracy.

The implementation of these costly electoral reforms therefore also signals a willingness on the part of the incumbent government to abide by the peace process.

Electoral Laws as a Tool for Political Malfeasance

Electoral laws have long been a tool for elites to limit political competition and ensure their control over the state. After the first Acehnese uprising in the 1970s, the Indonesian government instituted critical changes to the local electoral system to prevent meaningful representation in local governments (Aspinall 2009). Fearful of the rise of secessionist parties within the Aceh regional government, the national Indonesian government instituted a policy that allowed the military regime to essentially revise election results and select pro-government parties within the local legislature. As noted by Aspinall (2009), these reforms limited meaningful political competition and galvanized support for the Free Aceh Movement (or

GAM), which helped to restart hostilities. Similarly, Lebanon’s pro-Christian reforms radically changed the electoral system in 1952, consolidating their control of the presidency. This shift in political power generated substantial ire from the Sunni and Druze communities which contributed to the onset of the Lebanese civil war. One need not look further than the Jim Crow laws instituted in the American South to understand how dominant groups may rewrite electoral laws to ensure their control over local and national government. Changes to electoral laws allow for elites to consolidate their control through elections. This is important, as elections (and the democratic process in general) promote considerable uncertainty in whether the incumbent government will have control in the future (Przeworski et al 1996). While the democratization process is the process of institutionalizing uncertainty (Przeworski 1986), changes to the electoral process that limit competition promote greater certainty on the part of elites as to whether they will remain in office in the future.

Supporters of the incumbent government benefit as well from a rigged electoral process.

As noted by Bueno de Mesquita et al (2003), rulers often must reward supporters to ensure continued loyalty. By using exclusionary electoral laws, incumbent governments may ensure that their supporters are likely to win elections given that opposition forces are unable to effectively compete for office (Hardin 1995). Supporters of the incumbent government are also the beneficiaries of more government expenditure once leaders consolidate their control of the state.

For instance, the largely Christian south of the Ivory Coast was able to direct financial support to their prosperous half of the country while ignoring investment in the poorer north of the country

(Straus 2012). During the contentious political period of 1990s, the Ivory Coast set limitations on the eligibility for political office; specifically, individuals had to be able to prove that their parents were native Ivoirians. This reform also set limitations on northern voters who were

6 descendants from economic migrants from bordering states such as Burkina Faso. Nativists in the Ivory Coast were then able to use office to reward supporters as well as prevent meaningful political competition in the future. While often affecting ethnic or sectarian groups, the use of new electoral laws to prevent meaningful competition is not an ethnic issue itself. For instance, dominant agricultural interests in El Salvador used laws to prevent opposition parties from competing effectively in elections, as these parties were often underfunded (with little access to state funds) and unable to compete against the elite sponsored parties (Wantchekon 1999; Wood

2001). Part of the 1992 peace agreement in El Salvador ensured that opposition parties would receive finance so as to meaningfully compete in elections. The use of electoral laws allows elites to consolidate control, reward supporters, and prevent future opposition to their authority.

Unfortunately, these laws marginalize ethnic, political and economic dissidents as they are unable to effect political change through democratic mechanisms. Without peaceful avenues for promoting political change, disaffected groups engage in political violence or open insurgency to renegotiate the status quo. For instance the 1958 and 1976 Lebanese civil wars can be attributed, in part, to changes in electoral laws that disadvantaged the majority Muslim population. While at the turn of the 20th century, Lebanon’s political and economic power rested with the Maronite Christian community, years of population shifts and economic prosperity had reshaped the power relations between the Christian and Sunni communities (Friedman 1989). In response to growing threats to Christian control, President Sham’un devised changes to the electoral system that would consolidate his control (Traboulsi 2007). In 1952, the Christian

President of Lebanon expanded his powers by reforming electoral laws to monopolize his control over the legislature (reducing the influence of rival sectarian groups). As noted by Traboulsi

(2007),

Presidential control over the executive branch was further complemented by the subordination of the legislature. Sham’un opted for the small electoral district but reduced the number of deputies. According to the new electoral law of November 1952, the country was divided into 33 electoral districts (instead of the previous nine) and the number of deputies reduced from 77 to 44… it guaranteed the president a safe majority in the legislature and amplified the sectarian character of the electoral district. (Traboulsi 2007, 129)

This continued degradation of Sunni representation spurred the emergence of political violence between the sectarian groups which, in turn, evolved into a prolonged civil war. As noted by

Deeb and Deeb (1995), the political goals of the Sunni and Shia political groups were to reform the electoral laws of 1952, thereby reducing the authority of the Presidency and reforming the distribution of seats in parliament. Additionally, the Sunni negotiators also lobbied to remove the sectarian nature of the electoral system (Deeb and Deeb 1995).

Similarly, the conflict in Cote d’Ivoire may be attributed to electoral laws that prevented widespread political participation for non-Ivoirians. After independence from France in 1960, the Ivory Coast quickly became a commercial hub in West Africa. The nation, with the assistance of considerable foreign investment, developed into one of the largest cocoa producers in the world. This sudden economic expansion presented substantial labor shortages within the country. The Ivory Coast quickly responded to this labor deficit by attracting workers from its poorer, northern neighboring states (particularly, Burkina Faso). While addressing the labor shortage, this influx of new ethnic groups into the country presented particular problems for the governing officials in Cote d’Ivoire. Following the liberalization of the political system in the

1990s, Ivorian officials struggled with maintaining political hegemony. New laws were introduced by hardline politicians so as to prevent any candidates from running who could not prove that their parents were of Ivorian descent. In 2002, segments of the armed forces revolted

8 demanding greater recognition of their rights as descendants of immigrants. The resulting political violence escalated into the first Ivorian civil war.

Summary of Chapter II: Electoral Reform as a Tool for Peace

Given the incendiary nature of political exclusion on spurring civil war (Cederman et al

2013), it should not be surprising that peace agreements often attempt to resolve combatant grievances with reforms to the electoral process. While over 60% of all peace agreements ending civil wars call for elections, 40% also call for electoral reforms to accompany those elections.

Unfortunately, electoral reforms are not always implemented (Hogbladh 2011). According to data from the Peace Accords Matrix project (Joshi et al 2015b), most electoral reforms merely are initiated or partly implemented. Once implemented, though, electoral reforms may reduce the risk that combatants will abandon the peace process. These reforms generate durable post-war peace in two ways. First, the implementation of electoral reforms by the incumbent government acts as a costly signal to opposition groups that the elites within the government are interested in abiding by the terms of the peace process. As reforms to electoral laws may threaten the future distribution of political power, the implementation of these reforms should portend costly change in the status quo. As noted by Bueno de Mesquita et al (2003), all governments rely on varying degrees of support from politically relevant segments of society. Additionally, these supporters often benefit from exclusionary policies that ensure their interests are represented at the national and local government. As electoral laws are one mechanism to preserve the status quo, changes to these laws as part of the peace process may threaten the distribution of goods and services.

Supporters of the incumbent government will therefore exert considerable pressure on elites to avoid implementing these costly reforms. Occasionally, leaders even face the risk of assassination or forced removal from office by their constituents for engaging in costly

9 compromises. For instance, the assassination of Anwar Sadat and Yitzhak Rabin occurred following the signing of controversial peace agreements. Similarly, President Nimeiri of Sudan avoided a failed assassination attempt following the incorporation of a new power-sharing government in Sudan in 1972. While the assassinations of Rabin, Sadat, as well as the attempt made on Nimeiri’s life were not the product of electoral reforms, these anecdotes underscore and illustrate the considerable risk that leaders face when they undertake costly reforms as part of a peace agreement. The act of implementing these costly changes by elites within the incumbent government should underscore that these actors are willing to undergo considerable risk so as to prevent future violence. These acts of accommodation signal that elites are willing to abide by the terms of the peace process, which addresses the commitment problem faced by dissidents once entering into a negotiated settlement (Walter 2002).

The second way that electoral reforms promote durable post-war peace is that they dramatically alter the cost benefit analysis of armed dissident groups as to whether they will resume fighting or abide by the terms of the agreement. As noted by Brancati and Snyder (2013), militant groups often have an incentive to return to armed conflict after unfavorable election results (as was the case following the Angolan 1992 National Elections). While the capacity of these groups to engage in political violence is one part of the story, these groups often have to make assessments about their ability to succeed once they have defected from the peace process.

Research by Werner and Yuen (2005) as well as Mattes and Savun (2009) underscore that the stability of negotiated settlements rests, in part, on whether combatants are better off resuming the war as opposed to abiding by the terms of the agreement. This cost-benefit calculation is dependent on whether combatants perceive that they will be successful on the battlefield.

Electoral reforms alter this cost benefit calculation by ameliorating civilian grievances with the state, or at least offering aggrieved citizens a far less risky avenue to effect political change.

Dissident movements rely heavily on civilians for sanctuary, manpower, and supplies

(Lichbach 1998; Kalyvas 2006). Civilian support in civil wars emerges, in part, from having no other meaningful way to effect change. Electoral laws that aggrieve rebels also aggrieve their civilian supporters. As civilians may have few institutional avenues to effect political change, they are more likely to support armed movements to renegotiate the status quo. If no reform to the electoral system is provided, then civilians are likely to provide support to new armed movements. While civilians may suffer in silence, the absence of any fundamental change in the political system may embolden a portion of the aggrieved citizenry to offer support for a new military challenge. On the other hand, if electoral reforms are part of the settlement, then civilians may have new avenues for political change. Electoral reforms may be especially valuable to citizens as using institutional avenues is far less costly than supporting an insurgency.

Support for armed uprisings places civilian collaborators under considerable risk of government sanction. If civilians are given a less costly avenue to effect political change, then there will be less support for renewed civil war. This decline in civilian support should, in turn, alter rebel expectations for success if they return to civil war. This should provide greater stability for the fractious first post-civil war election, as there should be less concern that rebel groups will use war as a means to protest the results. In the first empirical chapter, I examine what role electoral reforms play in reducing the risk that civil wars will recur. I present a theory that argues that the implementation of electoral reforms acts as a signal from the incumbent government that they are willing to abide by the peace process and reduce the willingness of the population to support future political violence. I examine the risk of civil war recurrence following the establishment

11 of comprehensive peace agreements from 1989-2010. Using data from the UCDP Peace

Agreement Dataset (Hogbold 2011), I generate a sample of comprehensive peace agreements. I then matched the establishment of these peace agreements with the dates in which the civil wars terminated using the UCDP Conflict Termination Dataset (Kreutz 2010). Finally, I generated a variable for whether the comprehensive peace agreements implemented electoral reforms using and the Peace Accord Matrix Implementation Dataset (Joshi et al 2015b). This allowed me to examine how the implementation of electoral reforms decreases the risk of civil war recurrence.

Summary of Chapter III: Electoral Reform as a Safeguard Against Autocracy

Electoral reforms also act as a safeguard against autocratic backsliding. Negotiated settlements often spur transitions towards democracy in the aftermath of civil war (Gurses and

Mason 2008; Joshi 2010). What is unclear, though, is what predicts whether these fragile democracies will endure following the signing of the peace agreement. For instance, following the establishment of the 1996 Abuja II accords in Liberia, the regional peacekeeping mission

ECOWAS oversaw the election of Charles Taylor to the office of president. This marked a substantial change from the autocratic rule of Samuel Doe and the ethnic Krahn who assisted in managing the country. Unfortunately, following Taylor’s victory after the establishment of the

Abuja II peace accords he quickly reduced political competition and consolidated his control through a combination of new autocratic laws and fierce repression. This process of autocratic reversal following new elections stands in contrast to Liberia’s experience following the establishment of the Accra III peace accords that ended with Taylor’s removal from office. After broad reforms to electoral districts as well as the liberalization of the party system, Liberia continues to operate as a functional democracy.

Electoral reforms in the aftermath of negotiated settlements ensure that governments do not suffer backslides into autocratic rule. Specifically, these reforms bolster political competition which makes it difficult for one party to monopolize the political process to ensure their control over the governing apparatus. In the absence of reforms to the electoral process, elites within the incumbent government may use the same mechanisms that were in place prior to the civil war so as to consolidate their control of the state. As noted by Joshi (2013b), combatants are often apprehensive over the results of post-civil war elections. As control of the state is often equivalent to having a monopoly over the coercive apparatus of the government, an electoral loss may place their rivals in control of that apparatus. Fearing that the military and police may be turned on them once out of office, elites are willing to mitigate political competition so as to ensure that they remain in office. Supporters of the status quo are limited in their ability to reform institutions by fierce political competition. Electoral reforms promote greater competition in a number of ways. For instance, reforms may liberalize the party system, allowing opposition candidates to run for national office. Reforms may also open political participation to disenfranchised citizens, as well as reform the electoral system so as to fairly translate votes into national representation. These reforms make it difficult for elites within the incumbent government to use the governing apparatus to prevent meaningful competition. Additionally, these reforms mitigate the concerns of incumbents that they will be absolutely removed from the political process once out of office. Reforms to the electoral process ensure that, once removed from office, they will have an opportunity to retake their seats in future competitions. Electoral reforms assist with preserving the survival of new democracies in the post-civil war environment.

Peacekeeping as an Enforcement Mechanism

While electoral reforms may assist with preventing a recurrence of civil war or backslide into autocracy, there is no guarantee that these reforms will be implemented. Rather, while elites may agree to electoral reform as a condition of peace, there may be little incentive for elites within the incumbent government to follow through with implementing these costly provisions.

On the contrary, elites within the incumbent government may be under considerable pressure from their constituents to prevent the implementation of electoral reforms so as to preserve the current distribution of political power and the future distribution of goods and services.

Fortunately, the international community may play a critical role in ensuring that electoral reforms are implemented. As noted by Joshi (2013a), UN peacekeeping missions often bring considerable expertise with regard to the democratic process. Additionally, international peacekeeping missions may apply military pressure to wayward combatants so as to guarantee that the electoral process is conducted in a fair and transparent manner.

This argument contributes, in part, to the current debate surrounding the role of international peacekeeping and democratization. Peacekeepers may play an indirect role in promoting post-civil war democracy. While some research has demonstrated that peacekeeping plays a vital role in promoting post-civil war democracy (Joshi 2010; 2013a), an equal amount of research proposes that peacekeepers may play little or no role in promoting effective post-civil war democracy (Fortna 2008; Fortna and Huang 2012). Rather than taking a hardline on this debate, I merely suggest that the answer may be much more nuanced. Peacekeeping may play an indirect, but very critical role in establishing the foundation for democracy to flourish. As noted earlier, the process of democratization is complicated with multiple factors contributing to whether citizens will have sufficient economic security, cultural affinity, or appropriate

14 institutional mechanisms in place so as to participate regularly in free and fair elections. This is a tall order to ask of peacekeeping missions. Rather, previous studies have noted that peacekeepers do an exceptional job at reducing commitment problems through providing post-war security, sharing information, and acting as observers over the peace process. These attributes contribute to the implementation of peace agreement provisions. With regard to UN peacekeeping, international monitors also provide technical expertise and military support in ensuring that reforms to the electoral process are implemented. Once implemented, these reforms help to guarantee the survival of the fragile post-civil war democracy. While these reforms are insufficient to change society into a more democratic body politic, the reforms (once implemented) act to prevent the government from dismantling democratic institutions.

The second empirical chapter of this dissertation examines how electoral reforms ensure democratic survival as well as what role the international community plays in promoting these reforms. Specifically, I present a theory that argues that peacekeepers play an indirect role in ensuring the survival of post-civil war democracies. While past literature remains divided on whether the presence of peacekeepers is sufficient for promoting post-civil war democracy, such arguments may overstate the role of peacekeepers in the aftermath of civil wars. Rather, peacekeepers play a critical role in observing the peace process and reducing commitment problems. Such key functions are critical in implementing democratic reforms which, in turn, ensure the survival of post-civil war democracy. Using data from UCDP Peace Agreement dataset and the Peace Accord Matrix dataset, I examine the two-stage process by which peacekeepers assist with the implementation of electoral reforms and how these reforms reduce the likelihood that governments will abandon the democratic process in favor of more autocratic policies. Additionally, I provide a brief case study on the successes and failures of the

Ouagadougou Peace Agreement which ended the 2002 Ivorian civil war. The qualitative evidence I present further elaborates how electoral reforms make it more difficult for elites to derail the democratic process as well as the critical role that peacekeepers play in establishing electoral reforms.

Summary of Chapter IV: Electoral Reform and the Incentive for Post-Civil War Election

Violence

To further test the conclusion that electoral reforms promote post-civil war stability, I examine how electoral reforms shape the behavior of government supporter and dissidents. In the third empirical chapter, I move past simple measures of whether civil war recurs and examine how the use of political violence is shaped by changing post-civil war institutions. While much of the literature on the War-to-Democracy Dilemma has posited on the use of election violence in the aftermath of civil wars, very few studies have quantitatively examined the use of election related violence in the aftermath negotiated settlements. I adapt the theoretical claim presented in the first empirical chapter that electoral reforms reduce the risk of armed violence. Specifically, I make the claim that electoral reforms make the electoral process more inclusive and competitive.

By opening up the post-war electoral process should reduce the incentive for dissidents to use election related political violence as a means to influence electoral outcomes. On the other hand, as elections become more competitive we should expect that the incumbent government will use pro-government election related political violence as a way to consolidate their control. Drawing on a sample of comprehensive peace agreements from the Peace Accords Matrix Implementation

Dataset (Joshi et al. 2015b), as well as data on election related political violence in Africa and

Latin America from the Social Conflict Analysis Dataset or SCAD (Hendrix and Salehyan

2012), I examine how the inclusion of electoral reform provisions in peace agreements shape the

16 behavior of political actors. In this manner, I examine whether electoral reforms reduce the use of antigovernment election related political violence as well as pro-government election related political violence.

Summary of Chapter V: Conclusion

The final chapter of the dissertation reiterates my theoretical arguments as well as provides a summary of my findings. In short, the establishment of electoral reforms helps to promote post-civil war stability in a number of ways. Electoral reforms both reduce the risk of renewed civil war as well as deter the use of post-war election violence. Electoral reforms also reduce the likelihood that post-war governments will abandon democratic reforms in an effort to consolidate their control. While these findings offer the international community a mechanism to help solve the war-to-democracy dilemma, the concluding chapter underscores that there is still much more research that is needed in order to fully understand how democracy can not only survive in the aftermath of civil war, but flourish as well.

CHAPTER II

ELECTORAL REFORMS AND PEACE DURATION FOLLOWING NEGOTIATED

SETTLEMENTS

Introduction

For over a decade, scholars of peace science have consistently demonstrated that civil wars that end in negotiated settlements are more likely to recur (Licklider 1995; Mason et al.

2011). Negotiated settlements are often plagued by commitment problems (Walter 2002; Walter

2009), where combatants cannot credibly assure one another that they will abide by the terms of the peace agreement. These settlements are often likely to dissolve due to issues of dual sovereignty (Mason et al. 2011), where opposition forces maintain the capacity to militarily challenge the state. If continued violence appears to be more attractive than abiding by the terms of the settlement, then combatants will abandon the peace process. This presents a challenge to those who wish to find peaceful resolutions to ongoing intrastate conflicts. Post-war peace agreements are further troubled by the process of democratization following the cessation of hostilities. As noted by past literature on peacebuilding, the factors associated with promoting post-war security often hinder the democratization process. Postponing elections, rewarding past perpetrators of atrocities with prestigious places in the government, and the banning of opposition parties that might inflame the population are all examples of the measures taken in the hope that the post-war state will not relapse into civil war. On the other hand, aspects of the democratic process often inflame civil war recurrence. While required elections are the most common provision within peace agreements, elections are often associated with post-war instability. The first election after a civil war ends can often contribute to civil war recurrence

(Flores and Noorudin 2012; Joshi et al. 2015a), and the sooner an election is held following the

18 end of the conflict, the more likely that election will contribute to peace failure (Brancati and

Snyder 2013). In other words, current practices used to generate peace often hinder the democratic process and aspects of the democratic process often place the peace process in jeopardy. This war-to-democracy dilemma is especially troubling as more democratic institutions should provide aggrieved citizens with the ability to address their concerns through non-violent institutions. How then do governments promote post-war democratic reforms without fear that they will spur a resumption of hostilities?

There may be some evidence to suggest, though, that aspects of democratization may not hinder the post-war peace process, but actually increase the durability of post-war peace. While elections are a necessary part of the democratic process, they are by no means the sole factor associated with democratization. Democracies require open competition by political parties, wide participation by the electorate, and an efficient and representative mechanism to translate votes into national representation. Unfortunately, the governments within countries that are plagued by civil war often hinder these different aspects of the democratic process so as to consolidate their control over the governing institutions (Tilly 2003). By instituting laws that prevent meaningful political competition, elites may exclude other interests from the government so as to monopolize the coercive apparatus of the state (Hardin 1995). I argue that peace agreements following civil wars generate an opportunity to reform these systemic practices. Specifically, provisions within peace agreements that call for reforms to the electoral process provide post- war governments with an opportunity to implement democratic practices without generating considerable risk of renewed conflict. For instance, while most post-war peace agreements call for elections (Jarstad 2008), many make little or no effort to reform the electoral process so as to make sure elections are competitive and representative. Furthermore, fewer post-war

19 governments actually implement any reforms to the electoral laws. As electoral laws have been historically used as a means to ensure little or no meaningful competition, post-war elections that occur in unreformed electoral systems will perpetuate incumbent control.

Electoral reforms in peace agreements reduce the risk of renewed conflict in two ways.

First, by implementing electoral reforms called for in peace agreements, the incumbent government signals its resolve to abide by the peace process. Reforms to the electoral system are costly for elites who maintained control of the state during the war. As exclusionary policies practiced during the civil war ensured that beneficiaries of the status quo would have unfettered access to state resources, changes to such a system would threaten their interests. As noted by

Joshi et al. (2015b),

This stems from the fact that accord content tends to be problem-driven and the same processes that motivate conflict actors to negotiate certain content will motivate other actors who may have greater control over the actual implementation process. Stated differently, those policy sectors that are most likely to be targeted with reforms will often be controlled by the very actors who have the most to lose from the reforms being implemented. (Joshi et al. 2015b, 2)

Elites within the incumbent government should therefore be under considerable pressure to maintain the status quo and ensure that there will be no meaningful change to the current electoral laws. By implementing these costly reforms, elites within the incumbent government signal that they are willing to abide by the peace process as they risk losing their supporters.

Additionally, electoral reforms reshape the cost benefit calculus for rebels wishing to return to the battlefield. As hardline elements within the opposition may wish to abandon the peace process in the hope that they can get a better deal following further fighting, their expected success on the battlefield often determines whether they will walk away from the bargaining table. As rebels rely heavily on the civilian population during the war for material support, shelter, and recruits, perceived civilian support for their campaign is a contributing factor as to

20 whether they can maintain an insurgency. By offering civilians new opportunities to participate in the political process, electoral reforms reduce the battlefield prospects for hardline dissidents.

This chapter continues in three parts. First, I examine past literature on negotiated settlements. Primarily, the past literature has contended that resolving commitment problems is often a necessary condition for generating durable post-war peace. Unfortunately, the measures taken to resolve commitment problems tend to undermine the democratic process, such as rewarding past perpetrators of atrocities with positions in the government or delaying the election of a new government. At the same time, democratic practices following civil wars, specifically elections, can promote instability in fragile post-war states. As noted by past literature, post-war elections tend to divide society along wartime constituencies as well as reopen social wounds associated with the conflict (Paris 2004; Brancati and Snyder 2013). In the second section of this chapter, I propose that peace agreements can provide solutions to the war- to-democracy dilemma by reforming the electoral laws within countries. By including electoral reforms, post-war governments can both signal a commitment to the peace process as well as reduce with willingness of combatants to return to the battlefield. Finally, I present statistical evidence of the survival of peace agreements from 1989-2010. The evidence provides robust support for my claims that electoral reforms generate durable post-war peace.

Security and Democracy: The War-to-Democracy Dilemma

As noted by Jarstad (2008), contemporary peacebuilding operations often attempt to foster both post-war security as well as post-war democratization. Unfortunately, the process of democratization following civil wars has often been associated with destabilizing the post-war peace process (Fortna 2008; Jarstad 2008; Brancati and Snyder 2013). The literature on post-war peace duration emphasizes the need to establish mechanisms that reduce commitment problems

21 between combatants and promote security. This focus in the literature tends to ignore the factors that allow citizens to address their own grievances.

One of the common themes in the study of negotiated settlements is that peace is often untenable when there is a large asymmetry of information between the combatants (Walter 1999;

Fearon 2004; Mattes and Savun 2010). Specifically, belligerents may not know the resolve or the strength of their opponents, or whether they intend to abide by the peace process. For instance, longer wars often reduce the asymmetry of information between combatants which generates more durable peace because it allows rebels and the government sufficient time to learn about one another (Walter 1999; Walter 2009; Mattes and Savun 2010). Agreements that emerge from shorter wars leave combatants unsure about their opponents resolve or capability to continue fighting. Peace agreements may also include specific provisions which reduce the asymmetry of information between combatants (Mattes and Savun 2010). Such provisions often call for third party monitors to relay information between combatants as well as terms that call for the civil war protagonists to give information regarding the size of their forces and the location of their troops (Fortna 2004; Mattes and Savun 2009).

Scholars have also emphasized the role of cost-increasing provisions for addressing commitment problems between combatants. Mattes and Savun (2009) have argued that peace agreements which raise the cost of future fighting should make it easier for parties to commit to peace in the present, as the likelihood of victory in the future is diminished. These provisions often call for the removal of foreign fighters, sealing the borders, and providing adequate buffer zones between combatants (Mattes and Savun 2009). Finally, the literature has stressed the importance of power-sharing mechanisms following the end of civil wars (Hartzell and Hoddie

2003; Hoddie and Hartzell 2005; Hartzell and Hoddie 2007). These institutions may be formed

22 in a number of ways, such as political power-sharing, territorial or revenue sharing agreements

(Hartzell and Hoddie 2007). As stressed by the literature, these post-war political institutions reduce commitment problems by making the political process transparent for combatants and reducing the likelihood that any one party may monopolize power following the establishment of a negotiated settlement (Hoddie and Hartzell 2005). In essence, power-sharing agreements should make each combatant a veto player in the peace process.

While the literature has stressed the importance of these security measures, it has provided few solutions for promoting peaceful post-war democratization. Rather, some solutions for promoting durable post-war peace run contrary to establishing more democratic institutions

(Fortna 2008). For instance Rothchild and Roeder (2005) note, that the use of political power- sharing generates undemocratic practices, where veto players may stymie the political process.

As suggested by the authors, elites within the government may promote political gridlock to ensure their role in future governments. Additionally, power-sharing agreements are associated with placing elites in office that may not be accountable to the citizenry (Rothchild and Roeder

2005; Jarstad 2008); specifically, power-sharing agreements that are used as a tool to end conflicts often form transitional governments that are unelected and are not necessarily responsible to the wider population. In instances where differences between combatants are institutionalized (such as consociationalism) cadres of elites may develop.

The war-to-democracy dilemma is further complicated by the fact that democratization following the end of civil wars is often associated with generating greater instability (Jarstad and

Sisk 2008; Flores and Noorudine 2012; Brancati and Snyder 2013), as elections reopen old wounds from the past war (Paris 2004) and defeated candidates often opt for returning to conflict as opposed to accepting the election results (Brancati and Snyder 2013). This is troubling as

23 functioning democratic institutions may provide divided societies the ability to resolve their differences off of the battlefield. Specifically, post-war democracy is “a system where diverse interests are managed through ongoing negotiations and accommodated by accountable and legitimate institutions.” (Jarstad 2008, 18) Establishing these legitimate institutions in the post- war environment represents a constant dilemma for scholars of peace studies. As noted by

Rothchild and Roeder (2005), the promotion of democratic institutions following civil wars offers post-war societies the ability to consolidate peace rather than just initiate the peace process. Similarly, Licklider (2005) notes that sustainable peace is only possible when systemic grievances can be accommodated by peaceful negotiations. While the literature largely confirms that the outcomes of civil wars often impact the likelihood of post-war democratization will occur (Gurses and Mason 2008; Joshi 2010; Toft 2010), there is little research as to how war- torn societies peacefully make the transition from fighting.

Recent studies on the role of post-war elections on the peace process underscore the difficulty in promoting democracy after civil wars. Scholars have noted that the initial post-war election substantially increases the risk of future fighting (Flores and Noorudine 2012; Brancati and Snyder 2013; Joshi et al. 2015a; Keels 2015). As noted by Brancati and Snyder (2013), immediately following the end of civil wars, the most effective organizations are militant groups.

As they may be unhappy with the results of the electoral process, they are more likely to engage in violence so as to renegotiate the status quo. The elections may be even more precarious if they occur in post-war societies that have substantial oil wealth, as elites wish to use the post-war government to increase their own wealth (Keels 2015).

There is some reason to suspect though that the risk posed by post-war democratization may be overstated. For instance, Joshi et al. (2015a) note that the initial post-war elections may

24 increase stability if they occur following the transfer of prisoners or granting of amnesty to dissidents. It is also important to note that elections are just one aspect of the democratic process.

Functioning democracies operate where citizens have universal suffrage. Additionally, democracies allow for opponents of the sitting government to collaborate and form new political parties. As noted by Jarstad (2008), elections are the most common provision in post-war peace agreements. These elections, as demonstrated in the following section, often occur in the same system that initially spurred the civil war onset. As noted by Tilly (2003), elites within war-torn states often form structures of inequality and “opportunity hoarding” (Tilly 2003, 10), so as to prevent outsiders from entering the government and disrupting the distribution of goods and services. As defined by Tilly (2003), opportunity hoarding emerges “when members of a categorically bounded network acquire access to a resource that is valuable, renewable, subject to monopoly, supportive of network activities, and enhanced by the network’s modus operandi.”

(Tilly 2003, 10) Specifically, elites within the government and industry collaborate to ensure their grasp on wealth in society. This invariably relates to the electoral process that such elites construct so as to maintain their grasp on authority. Following the first insurgency in Aceh in

1976, the Indonesian government restructured the electoral system so as to prevent any opposition groups from controlling the subnational government (Aspinall 2009). The elections that followed all occurred within this rigged electoral process, generating considerable discontent

(Keels 2015). This would suggest that before elections could be successful in post-war states, the electoral process should be reformed so as to generate a more level playing field. Unfortunately, electoral reforms are quite uncommon in post-war peace agreements. A cursory look at peace agreements from 1975 through 2010 suggests that provisions that call for elections are included in over two thirds of the peace agreements (Hobsbolt 2011). On the other hand, less than a third

25 of peace agreements implement any sort of electoral reform. In other words, the vast majority of post-war elections occur in contexts where the system is effectively rigged against opposition groups, thereby maintaining the government’s grasp on the levers of authority.

While not often practiced, some peace agreements attempt to address historic political exclusion through electoral reforms. Specifically, these are provisions within peace agreements that seek to change past electoral laws that prevented meaningful political competition. These laws largely determine who is allowed to vote or run for office, which political parties are allowed to compete in elections, and how votes are transformed into national representation through the electoral system. Electoral reforms within peace agreements are therefore intended to adjust or rewrite past electoral laws so as to promote more fair competition in elections and ensure that the system is more representative. In other words, these revisions called for in peace agreements seek to give opponents of the state a reasonable opportunity for victory as well as ensure that the national government reflects the actual results of the elections. For instance, the

Ivory Coast has historically prevented much of the Muslim north from participating in elections by crafting laws that challenged their citizenship. The wealthy southern Christian population was able to dominate elections and ensure their grasp on authority. Following the end of the 2002 civil war, the Ouagadougou Peace Agreement sought to remedy this by developing mechanisms to provide suffrage to many disaffected northerners. Similarly, the Accra III peace agreement in

Liberia sought to liberalize the party system to allow for free and fair political competition. After the election of Charles Taylor following the Abuja II peace agreement, political parties were prevented from challenging him. Political parties were suppressed, and forcefully pushed into de facto one party system (Joshi 2010). The 2003 peace agreement in Liberia sought to remedy this by providing dissident groups with political parties so that they may meaningfully participate in

26 elections. While the inclusion of electoral reforms in peace agreements may be designed to address rebel grievances, there is little research to demonstrate that the implementation of such provisions has any impact on the durability of post-war peace.

Theory: Implementation of Electoral Reforms

Implementing electoral reforms called for in peace agreements should reduce the risk of peace failure in two important ways. First, by following through with the reforms agreed to in the settlement, members of the incumbent government signal a willingness to abide by the peace process. Reforming the electoral process, such as granting suffrage to disenfranchised citizens or changing the electoral system to make it more representative, may hinder the ability of the incumbent government to maintain monopoly control over political office after the election.

Implementing these reforms signals, to former rebels, that elites within the previous government are willing to bear this costly change in order to guarantee peace in the long term. Second, the implementation of these electoral reforms reduces the willingness of hardline elements within the opposition movement to abandon the peace process. As implementing electoral reforms gives disaffected citizens multiple avenues to meaningfully participate in the political process, it reduces the ability of opposition leaders to effectively campaign on popular discontent. Given that rebels must rely on citizen support for shelter, recruitment, and supplies in order to wage war, a lack of substantial civilian dissatisfaction may make it difficult for opposition leaders to continue a prolonged insurgency. As electoral reforms agreed to in negotiated settlements often provide suffrage to citizens, allow opposition parties to compete in elections, and reshape the electoral system to make it more representative, disaffected citizens may have new mechanisms to resolve their grievances outside of the battlefield. This reshapes the cost-benefit calculation made by potential spoilers, as they will be less certain of future success on the battlefield.

Electoral Reform Implementation and Credible Commitments

Reforming the electoral process is a costly decision on the part of elites within the former government. As civil wars often emerge from grievances generated by the practice of political exclusion, prior electoral practices within war-torn states generally reflect undemocratic practices. Reilly (2008) notes the process of democratization, “undermines established political orders, provides a pathway for new entrants to access the political systems… and threatens incumbent authority” (Reilly 2008, 161). As reforms to the electoral process should expand the politically relevant strata, it will undoubtedly reduce the political strength of the incumbent government’s supporters. When supporters of elites within the incumbent government are the only viable political group, then their interests should be primarily represented in the national government. Meaningful reform to the electoral system expands the selectorate size within a country, reshaping what a new winning coalition will look like (Bueno de Mesquita et al. 2003).

Therefore the implementation of these reforms represents a costly commitment on the part of elites within the government, given that those reforms may generate considerable antipathy from their supporters who have undoubtedly benefited from practices of political exclusion. Assuming opposition figures are aware of this threat to incumbent power, they should perceive the implementation of these costly reforms as a sign of credible commitment on the part of their opponents. In other words, the incumbent government’s commitment to the peace process becomes more visible given their costly signaling.

Electoral reforms in peace agreements are often included to address past policies of exclusion. Past research has provided considerable evidence that civil wars often emerge from grievances held by disaffected citizens. Specifically, ethnic or sectarian groups may be excluded from the political process so as to increase the relative power of other groups in society (Brancati

2006; Cederman et al. 2013; Cunningham and Weidmann 2010; Hardin 1995; Horowitz 1985).

While largely ethnic and religious groups are the targets of this sort of exclusionary policy, economic classes may also be limited. For instance, prior to the civil war in El Salvador, opposition parties were often targeted by the state, preventing any meaningful political competition. As Wood (2001) notes, Salvadoran elites had a vested interest in preventing meaningful democratic competition. Wood suggests that the government provided formal and de facto mechanisms to hinder the mobilization of opposition parties in political competition. This occurred despite the population being largely ethnically homogenous. Political exclusion, while often directed at ethnic or religious minorities, is not just a product of ethnic tensions (Hardin

1995). Rather, elites use the process of political exclusion to decrease the size of any winning coalition to increase their own personal power and fortune (Bueno de Mesquita et al. 2003).

Elites therefore manipulate the electoral process, so as to ensure that their supporters are represented within the government and potential rivals are left outside of the political process.

This occurs despite awareness on the part of elites that it may lead to future political violence

(Roessler 2011).

As these practices of political exclusion may have contributed to the onset of the civil war, peace agreements occasionally attempt to address these exclusionary policies through reforms to past electoral laws. For instance, following a settlement to the conflicts in the Ivory

Coast and Rhodesia, combatants agreed to expand suffrage to citizens disenfranchised by ethnicity (specifically, citizenship issues). Similarly, following the signing of the Lomé Peace

Agreement in Sierra Leone, combatants agreed to substantial changes in the electoral system, switching from a complicated national list proportional representation system to a more efficient plurality electoral system based on local constituencies (Peace Accords Matrix). While the past

29 system sought to act as a more representative electoral system, most political parties in the country preferred a constituency based system, as it connected parties to local constituents. In effect, these reforms to the electoral process increase the politically relevant strata by allowing opposition voices to effectively compete in elections or ensuring greater political representation to the disinherited in war-torn countries. While this has the benefit of addressing rebel concerns, it also disrupts the status quo and threatens the position of those who benefited from past exclusionary policies.

As noted by Licklider (1995) and Wagner (1993), civil wars emerge in countries that suffer from systemic problems. Licklider suggests,

An alternate argument is that any state that experiences civil war probably has major internal problems but that those problems are unlikely to be resolved unless the postwar government can undertake structural change at the expense of vested interests. A negotiated settlement to a civil war is likely to result in veto groups that will not surrender power for social change whose impact on them is uncertain; but a military victory will destroy the power of such groups, making renewed conflict more difficult and allowing the government to act as it pleases. (Licklider 1995, 685)

Negotiated settlements, the authors argue, are often unable to remedy these problems due to vested interests who were previous beneficiaries of the status quo. This has led some authors to suggest that social change can only emerge from military victories (Toft 2010), as negotiated settlements are forced to accommodate these beneficiaries. If a settlement to the war is to be reached, the government’s winning coalition should be interested in preserving as much of their power as possible in the post-war environment. Where the state is controlled by a small cadre of elites or is represented by only one ethnic group, then there should be little competition for the distribution of state resources (Bueno de Mesquita et al. 2003). As access to the government expands, their relative power diminishes.

Implementing electoral reforms called for in the peace agreement generates uncertainty about the future distribution of state services as it increases the size of the politically relevant strata. By implementing these reforms, disaffected citizens now have the opportunity to challenge the status quo through non-violent mechanisms, which could hinder the relative power of the government’s supporters. Incumbent government elites therefore face a dilemma when it comes to implementing these reforms. By implementing electoral reforms agreed to in the settlement, elites can signal their resolution to abide by the terms of the peace process, helping to ensure the stability of the post-war peace process. On the other hand, elites risk losing their core supporters by allowing reforms to take place. Supporters may shift their allegiance to more radical elements and remove officials who had agreed to the peace process. For instance, following the 1972 peace process in Sudan, President Nimeiri instituted a political and territorial power-sharing arrangement in which the South gained regional autonomy and Southern leaders were to be included in the national government (for instance, as the vice president of Sudan)

(Atlas and Licklider 1999; Hartzell and Rothchild 1993). This radical shift is political power and the distribution in resources immediately drew the ire of his constituents. While President

Nimeiri had anticipated that he could incorporate new Southerners into his winning coalition

(Atlas and Licklider 1999), an assassination attempt quickly altered his political calculus. A decade after the signing of the Addis Ababa Accords, the president took steps to violate the terms of the peace agreement and restart the civil war. While this example reflects the costly nature of power-sharing agreements, it underscores the risks elites take when they make changes to the governing structure of the state (for example, changing electoral laws).

On the other hand, by implementing the electoral reforms, elites within the incumbent government signal considerable resolve towards generating a more durable post-war peace.

Given that reforming the electoral system is a costly act on the part of these elites (as they risk not only their position, but their lives as well), the implementation of these reforms should signal that they are interested in continuing to abide by the peace process. Assuming that rebel leaders are aware of the fact that figures in the incumbent government are willing to shoulder such a risk, the implementation of these provisions should reduce rebel concerns that the government will not abide by other terms in the peace process.

Hypothesis 1: Implementation of electoral reforms called for in peace agreements should reduce the risk of civil war recurrence.

Post-War Elections, Avenues for Political Participation and Diminished Battlefield Prospects

If the process of implementing electoral reforms reduces the willingness of combatants to abandon the peace process, then those reforms should also reshape the context in which post-war elections take place. Specifically, the implementation of electoral reforms prior to the first post- war election should reduce the risk associated with the initial post-war election. As demonstrated by previous work on post-civil war stability, the initial post-war election tends to destabilize the peace process (Paris 2004; Florea and Nooruddin 2012; Brancati and Snyder 2012; Joshi et al.

2015). I suggest that the implementation of electoral reforms should reduce the risk associated with these elections as it diminishes the battlefield prospects of dissident groups. As well as signaling government resolve to abide by the peace process, the implementation of electoral reforms reduces the incentive for rebel groups to renege on the peace process and return to war.

Given that electoral reforms provide new avenues for political participation for disaffected citizens, hardline elements within the dissident movement may find it more difficult to draw civilian support for future combat. Because civilians undertake great risk in supporting dissidents

(Lichbach 1998; Kalyvas and Kocher 2006), the rebels must be able to offer future benefits that resolve grievances as to offset this risk (Toft 2010). As suggested by Toft,

Rebels who are successful beyond the goal of merely surviving will be able to use this added legitimacy and increasing popular support to amass more resources and develop their institutional capacity… Rebel victory frequently occurs under conditions of revolt against authoritarianism, in which rebel groups are more likely to gain support through promises of reforms to recruits and would-be constituents. (Toft 2010, 28)

Electoral reforms may offer citizens a far less risky option for effecting change.

Following the implementation of electoral reforms, citizens are given new opportunities to address their own grievances through the electoral process. Specifically, reforms to the electoral process such as expanded suffrage, a liberalized party system, and changes to the electoral system should empower citizens to use the political process to resolve their own grievances through the democratic process. When deciding on whether to abide by a peace process or defect and resume armed conflict, combatants often examine what the cost of resuming the conflict would be. As electoral reforms are designed to address citizen grievances over political exclusion, rebels are unable to campaign on the issue of past political exclusion. This in turn should affect how armed groups perceive an electoral defeat. Without the guarantee of civilian support, combatants should be less inclined to abandon the peace process after they are unable to secure office through electoral competition.

Previous work on post-war elections has consistently demonstrated that the first post-war election is often a catalyst for reigniting conflict. Post-war elections often reflect battlefield tensions, dividing societies along wartime cleavages (Brancati and Snyder 2012). One driving factor behind the risk associated with post-war election is that combatants reject unfavorable results in favor of continued conflict. As militant groups are often the most organized in the post- war environment, their respect for electoral results determines the degree to which peace is

33 maintained after the elections are held. As noted by Brancati and Snyder (2012),

“…(combatants) continue to mobilize supporters along wartime constituencies. Former combatants, turned politicians, reignite warfare by rejecting the results of unfavorable elections and returning to war in the short term, or by governing in an arbitrary, exclusionary, and exploitative manner, which creates new grievances and provokes renewed fighting in the long term” (Brancati and Snyder 2012, 7). Therefore, the success of post-war elections is determined in part by whether dissidents are willing to accept electoral defeat. I suggest that electoral reforms reduce the ability of rebel groups to mobilize wartime constituencies as reforms called for in peace agreements address civilian grievances. The implementation of these reforms alters the desire for civilians to support future insurgency, which in turn reduces the battlefield prospects for dissidents who would seek to restart the civil war.

As stated earlier, rebels rely on civilian support to sustain their war effort. While civilians may not personally engage in conflict, they often provide rebels with necessary shelter, supplies and future recruits during the civil war. Support for dissidents is a costly activity, though.

Civilians shoulder considerable risk when they provide shelter or material support for insurgents during the conflict, as they may be sanctioned by the state for either tacit or active support of dissidents (Mason and Krane 1989; Valentino et al. 2004; Kalyvas and Kocher 2007). Rebels must therefore either draw civilian support through the use of coercive political violence

(Kalyvas 2006; Weinstein 2006), or they must offer future benefits such as resolving citizen grievances once they overthrow the state (Toft 2010; Cederman et al. 2013).

Following an electoral defeat, rebel factions who wish to restart the civil war must therefore have issues that they effectively campaign on so as to draw civilian support. If provisions in the peace agreement have been implemented, then it is difficult for hardline

34 elements within the opposition movement to mobilize renewed opposition to the sitting government. As electoral reforms afford citizens a low risk alternative to shaping future policy than civil war, they should be less inclined to support an insurgency. If the government fails to implement the reforms called for in the peace agreement, then rebels seeking to renew the civil war should have less difficulty drawing support for a future war. On the other hand, if the government implements the electoral reforms agreed to in the peace agreement, then civilians will have new opportunities to engage in the political process. The willingness of combatants to abide by the terms of a peace agreement is dependent on how costly they perceive future fighting to be. As noted by Quinn et al. (2007), post-war stability is achieved when the expected utility of peace outweighs the expected utility of future fighting. This cost benefit calculation is shaped in part by the combatants’ expected success on the battlefield (Werner and Yuen 2005). If combatants expect that they will lose on the battlefield in future fighting, then they will be less eager to abandon the peace process for renewed conflict (Mattes and Savun 2009). The implementation of electoral reforms reduces the prospects of future success for rebel groups as civilians are given alternatives for shaping the political process outside of armed conflict. As reforms to the electoral system generate new avenues for political participation, disaffected citizens will have new means of resolving their own grievances.

This argument explains, in part, why rebel groups who face electoral loss are still willing to abide by the terms of the peace agreement. As civilians may opt to use a reformed political system to address their grievances, there is little chance that they will accept the risk of supporting militant groups. Dissident factions, aware that they will have less civilian support during the war, should be more cautious about abandoning the peace process over an electoral

35 loss. Elections that occur following the implementation of electoral reforms should substantially alter with willingness of combatants to abandon the peace process.

Hypothesis 2: First post-war elections that occur after electoral reforms are implemented reduce the risk of civil war recurrence as compared to first post-war elections that occur when no electoral reform has taken place.

Alternative Rival Hypothesis

A case can be made that electoral reforms may be ineffective at generating post-war peace durability or even hinder the prospects for sustained peace after a negotiated settlement.

As noted earlier, electoral reforms should reduce the risk of peace failure because they are perceived as very costly. The implementation of such costly provisions should signal that the incumbent government is interested in abiding by the peace process. But the costly nature of electoral reforms may reduce their effectiveness in promoting durable post-war peace. Elites in the incumbent government should face considerable condemnation from their own supporters by implementing costly reforms to the electoral system. Such reforms will inevitably reduce the role their supporters play in the post-war government which should translate in a decrease in political power for these elites. Facing such pressure, elites may abandon the peace process to maintain their grasp on power.

Previous literature has noted that costly mechanisms may not be as effective at reducing the risk of peace failure. For instance, DeRouen et al. (2009) have found that transitional power- sharing agreements tend to be ineffective at maintaining durable post-war peace as members of the incumbent government may view them as too costly. Additionally, Joshi et al. (2015) have found that the effectiveness of provisions that call for amnesty or prisoner exchanges lies in the fact that they are relatively costless. Low cost provisions build trust and are amenable to both

36 sides, which helps the peace process continue. Costly reforms to the electoral system may therefore have a negative impact on the peace process because they will push the incumbent government away from the negotiating table and reduce the degree of trust between combatants.

In some instances, elites may have no intention of following through with the reforms that are implemented. While new political parties may be formed or the electoral system may be reformed, elites within the government may still seek to steal elections through voter fraud or intimidation. Similarly, elites may only partially implement some reforms, such as voter registration or allowing opposition parties to form, but prevent further changes to ensure meaningful competition. Wantchekon (1999) notes that while new electoral reforms in the 1992 peace agreement in El Salvador called for equitable distribution of campaign funds, most public funds were distributed to ARENA politicians in very competitive races. (Pg. 815)

The post-war challenges of Cote d’Ivoire underscore these arguments. Following the establishment of the Ouagadougou peace accords, the incumbent government was pushed to make substantial changes to the electoral process. Specifically, the government was tasked with granting suffrage to citizens who were accused of being immigrants from Burkina Faso and other

Northern African countries. At the onset of the peace process, President Laurent Gbagbo engaged in preventing any substantial changes to the electoral system. Following immense pressure from the international community, Gbagbo implemented new voting rules that allowed for disenfranchised citizens to participate in the political process. Though this led to increased participation in the 2010 elections, it did not prevent the Gbagbo administration from participating in flagrant illicit electioneering. While the race was eventually called for his challenger, Alassane Ouattara, the 2010 elections were marred by violence and fraud. With this in mind, an alternative rival hypothesis can be proposed:

ARH1: The implementation of electoral reforms called for in peace agreements will have no meaningful impact on post-war peace duration.

Research Design

To test the propositions generated from this theory, I examine the risk of civil war recurrence following full or comprehensive peace agreements from 1989-2010. This sample excludes conflicts that ended in military victory or low activity. The data on peace agreements is drawn from the UCDP Peace Agreement Dataset (Hogbladh 2011) as well as the Peace

Agreement Matrix dataset (PAM) (Joshi and Melander 2011). The UCDP Peace Agreement

Dataset covers peace agreements following the end of civil wars from 1975 through 2011, and gives detailed data on the terms included in each of the peace agreements. Additionally, it provides many copies of the original documents the coders used to identify the various provisions within the peace agreement. I then match the data from the UCDP Peace Agreements

Dataset with the start and end dates of the UCDP Conflict Termination Dataset (Kreutz 2010).1

Using the UCDP Conflict Termination Dataset I examine the resulting peace duration following the establishment of a comprehensive peace agreement. The resulting dataset examines peace spells resulting from the peace agreements in the UCDP Peace Agreement Dataset. Following the example of Kreutz (2010), the unit of analysis is the post-war year.

For my primary independent variable which measures the implementation of electoral reforms, I use Joshi et al. (2015b) data on electoral reforms in Comprehensive Peace

Agreements. Joshi et al define these reforms as:

1 I separate coup d’états from incidents of conventional civil war. Coups were not included in my dependent variable. 38

groups to become active political parties and/or implementing new rules to make the system more democratic and inclusive…Electoral Reform deals with changes to electoral rules, institutions or arrangements. (Joshi et al. 2015 Online Appendix, 18)

My data on implementation of these provisions were drawn primarily from the Peace

Accords Matrix data project. Using electoral reform implementation data from Joshi et al.

(2015b), my primary independent variable (Electoral Reform Implementation) is an ordinal scale of implementation. Specifically, the implementation of electoral reforms ranges from zero, where there is no electoral reform implementation, to three, where electoral reforms are fully implemented. This measurement of electoral reform implementation is advantageous primarily in that it allows for variation in degrees of implementation. In other words, we can compare the effectiveness of electoral reforms that are initiated but never implemented to those reforms that were fully implemented following the end of the civil war.

It should be noted that there are both advantages and disadvantages to using an aggregate measure of electoral reform. While an aggregate measure of electoral reform allows for the simple comparison between post-war countries, it does obscure the effects of different types of electoral reforms. On the other hand, electoral reforms are often designed to address specific historical problems within war-torn states. Reforms to electoral systems can range from transitions to a plurality electoral system in Sierra Leone to switching to non-sectarian elections in Lebanon. By disaggregating electoral reforms, one may make variables too conflict specific, which may reduce our ability to accurately extrapolate the effects of reforming the electoral process. To investigate this, I used primary documents from the Peace Accords Matrix and the

UCDP Peace Agreement Dataset to measure the independent effects of allowing opposition candidates/ parties, expanding suffrage, and reforming the electoral system. Additionally, robustness checks were made to investigate whether transitions to a proportional representation

39 system and a plurality electoral system have similar effects on the durability of post-war peace.

The results confirm that each type of electoral reform increases the durability of post-civil war peace. Similar to Joshi et al. (2015a), my data on first post-war election comes from the IDEA dataset on global elections. Following the coding procedures of Joshi et al. (2015a), I measure the first national election as a binary variable that is coded as a one in the year that it took place and a zero in all other years. Finally, to evaluate my second hypothesis I interact my electoral reform implementation indicator with my variable measuring the first post-war election.

Following the current analyses of the peace spells following civil wars, I employ event history analysis in order to examine the effectiveness of peace agreement provisions (Joshi and Mason

2011; Mason et al. 2011; Hartzell and Hoddie 2003; Mattes and Savun 2009). Event history models examine the risk or hazard of peace failing (Box-Steffensmeier and Jones 2004). This model is appropriate given that time is a critical factor in the post-war environment and plays a role in the changing risk of peace failure (Mason et al. 2011). Following an AIC test for model fit, the Weibull duration model appears to be the best fit for this dataset. Robustness checks were conducted with Log Logistic and Cox Proportional Hazard models.

To control for other factors that may impact the risk of peace failure, I include controls for mechanisms that reduce the commitment problems between civil war protagonists (Walter

2002; Mattes and Savun 2009). Following the example of Joshi et al. (2015b), I include controls for whether the post-war government implemented for a demobilization of armed forces, disarmament of combatants, and reintegration of rebels into society. These data were drawn from the Peace Accords Matrix. I include a control for whether there is an ongoing peacekeeping operation in the country (Peacekeeping) with data taken from the Mullenbach (2005) dataset on peacekeeping. Additionally, I include a control for whether there was a transitional power-

40 sharing agreement implemented following the signing of the peace agreement using data from the Peace Accords Matrix. I also control for whether the conflict was fought over control of the government or of territory (Government Incompatibility) which is drawn from the UCDP

Conflict Termination Dataset (Kreutz 2012). Additionally, I include economic controls (lnGDP

Per Capita) (World Bank), a control variable for the intensity of the conflict (Major War) as coded by UCDP, the length of the conflict (War Duration) which is generated using the UCDP

Conflict Termination Dataset, and the degree of democracy within the country (Polity II).2

Finally, I account for whether the conflict was fought along ethnic lines (Ethnic War) with data from the Joshi and Mason (2011) dataset.

Results

Table 2.1 presents the results from the Weibull duration models. Model 1 presents the very parsimonious impact of electoral reforms without any other covariates. Model 2 presents the results of the implementation of electoral reforms with the inclusion of the primary control variables. Finally, models 3 and 4 present the impact of the first post-war election on the risk of peace failure. Specifically, model 4 demonstrates the impact of the first-post war election after electoral reforms have been implemented in the post-war environment. The results seem to largely support Hypothesis 1, as the coefficients for electoral reform implementation appear to be significant and in the predicted direction. It should be noted that it is the implementation of electoral reforms that reduces the risk of peace failure as compared to simply including electoral reforms in the peace agreement. As demonstrated in Table 2.2, simply measuring the inclusion of electoral reform provisions in peace agreements without accounting for implementation fails to

2 As the impact of electoral reforms may relate to whether the country was previously a democracy, I include a measure of past history of democracy as a robustness check. 41 reach statistical significance. Rather, when looking at the implementation of electoral reforms, each step towards full reform significantly reduces the risk that the civil war will recur. The impact of implementation of electoral reforms that are called for in peace agreements is not only statistically significant, but substantially reduces the risk of peace failure. Examining the hazard ratios of each stage of implementation, electoral reforms carry large marginal effects. The initiation of electoral reforms reduces the risk of peace failure by 69.7%, while the continued implementation drops the risk of renewed violence even further with a reduction in risk by over

90% (푒푥푝−1.193∗2 = 0.092). Finally, full implementation of electoral reforms that are called for in peace agreements reduces the risk of civil war recurrence by 97.2% (푒푥푝−1.193∗3 = 0.038). A graphical illustration of this relationship is presented in Figure I.

Table 2.1 Model 1 Model2 Model 3 Model 3 Weibull Hazard Model on Risk of Peace Failure Hazard Ratios

Implemented Disarmament -8.816*** -8.835*** -8.788*** 0.000153 (0.453) (0.456) (0.472) Implemented Demobilization 1.883*** 1.872** 1.660** 5.260 (0.702) (0.753) (0.713) Implemented Reintegration -8.756*** -9.193*** -8.167*** 0.000284 (1.305) (1.846) (0.716) Implemented Transitional Political Power-Sharing 0.0391 0.0168 0.0158 (0.343) (0.344) (0.342) lnGDP Per Capita -0.589 -0.619 -0.617 (0.470) (0.457) (0.450) Major War 1.715 1.773* 1.768* 5.859 (1.070) (1.067) (1.059) War Duration -1.296*** -1.299*** -1.305*** 0.271 (0.111) (0.113) (0.106) Government Incompatibility 0.119 0.140 0.150 (0.753) (0.765) (0.760) Polity II -0.157** -0.162** -0.162** 0.851 (0.0627) (0.0653) (0.0650) Peacekeeping Operation 0.179 0.254 0.248 (0.721) (0.725) (0.720) First Post-war Election 0.660 0.690 (1.180) (1.200) Implementation of Electoral Reforms -1.231** -1.214** -1.193** 0.303 (0.598) (0.594) (0.599) Electoral Reform*First Election -7.147*** 0.0008 (1.012) Ethnic War -0.500 -0.500 -0.497 (0.762) (0.766) (0.765) Constant 2.573 2.629 2.618 (3.292) (3.260) (3.224)

P 1.22 1.24 1.24 푊푎푙푑 퐶ℎ𝑖2 1736.95*** 1634.08*** 2586.91*** Observations 329 329 329 Coefficients Listed. Robust standard errors in parentheses *** p<0.01, ** p<0.05, * p<0.1

Table 2.2 Inclusion of Electoral Reform Provision Model 1

Integrated Army 1.666 (1.938) DDR -1.076 (2.135) GDP per Capita -0.000525 (0.000477) Major War 1.525 (1.998) War Duration -1.078*** (0.133) Government Incompatibility -0.854 (0.972) Polity II -0.171 (0.128) Peacekeeping Operation -0.0452 (1.039) Political Power-Sharing 0.248 (1.137) First Post-war Election -0.118 (0.994) Electoral Reform Provision -1.926 (2.236) Ethnic War -1.653 (1.809) Constant 0.0212 (1.229)

Observations 320 푊푎푙푑 퐶ℎ𝑖2 365.56*** P .98 Robust standard errors in parentheses. *** p<0.01, **p<0.05, *p<0.1

Weibull regression

Survival

.4 .2 0 5 10 15 20 analysis time

Electoral Reform Imp=0 Electoral Reform Imp=1 Electoral Reform Imp=2 Electoral Reform Imp=3

 Figure I: The Impact of Electoral Reforms on the Survival of Peace Following Negotiated Settlements

Table 2.3 Different Forms of Electoral Reform Weibull Duration Models Model 1 Model 2 Model 3

DDR_index -66.38*** -74.63*** -67.94*** (5.054) (4.977) (5.025) Transitional Political Power-Sharing -0.321 -0.255 -0.315 (0.336) (0.360) (0.348) Major War 0.851 1.107 0.938 (0.857) (0.999) (0.919) lnGDP Per Capita -0.939*** -0.958** -0.998*** (0.334) (0.377) (0.370) War Duration -1.469*** -0.0396 -1.486*** (0.0773) (0.0965) (0.0758) Ethnic War 0.00578 -0.115 0.0552 (0.660) (0.684) (0.640) Polity II -0.127 -0.125 -0.119 (0.0846) (0.0801) (0.0843) Suffrage Reform -18.21*** (1.196) Candidate and Party Reform -20.63*** (1.033) Electoral System Reform -19.00*** (1.051) Constant 5.872*** 4.342* 6.153*** (2.178) (2.317) (2.333)

푊푎푙푑 퐶ℎ𝑖2 1676.41*** Dropped 1610.03*** P 0.94 1.05 0.98 Observations 329 329 329 Robust standard errors in parentheses *** p<0.01, ** p<0.05, * p<0.1

Table 2.4 Type of Electoral Reform Change Weibull Duration Model Model 1

DDR Index -73.52*** (5.314) Transitional Political Power-Sharing -0.197 (0.306) Major War 0.592 (0.786) lnGDP Per Capita -1.007** (0.398) War Duration -1.604*** (0.0403) Ethnic War -0.00385 (0.612) Polity II -0.124 (0.0841) Previous Democratic Experience -19.83*** (0.812) Reform to PR System -19.82*** (1.170) Reform to Plurality System -21.15*** (1.110) Constant 6.662** (2.778)

푊푎푙푑 퐶ℎ𝑖2 5119.62*** P 1.04 Observations 329 Robust standard errors in parentheses *** p<0.01, ** p<0.05, * p<0.1

The results also appear to largely support Hypothesis 2. While the first post-war election in and of itself was not statistically significant (though it is in the expected direction), when interacted with electoral reform implementation it appears to robustly reduce the risk of peace failure in the post-war environment. As noted earlier, the first post-war election tends to increase the risk of peace failure as it can rekindle wartime animosities as well as spur losing factions to abandon the peace process. The results clearly demonstrate, though, that elections that occur following the implementation of electoral reforms substantially reduce the risk of peace failure.

What is especially interesting is the fact that simply initiating the reform process dramatically reduces the risk of renewed civil war. The initiation of electoral reforms reduces the risk of peace failure following the first post-war election by over 99% (푒푥푝−6.84=0.0001 or a reduction in the risk by 99.9999%) from the baseline risk. Similar results are present following each stage of implementation, suggesting that the initiation of electoral reforms provides both a substantial sign of good faith on the part of the incumbent government as well as a diminishment of battlefield prospects for hardline dissidents.

It should be noted that there may be a selection effect at work in the model. It may be that more contentious conflicts are less likely to include electoral reforms in peace agreements than conflicts that are less contentious. To test this assertion, I model a bivariate probit regression, where the first stage is the choice to include electoral reforms in the peace agreement and the second choice is to abandon the peace process and return to civil war.3 Unlike the Heckman censored probit model where the first stage is modeled as a necessary condition for the second

3 The results of the bivariate probit suggest that there is not a connection between the decision to include electoral reforms in peace agreements and the effectiveness of electoral reforms on reducing the risk of peace failure. 48 stage, the bivariate probit model allows for comparing both instances where electoral reforms are part of the peace agreement and where electoral reforms are not part of the peace agreement.

While Heckman models are excellent for modeling phenomena such as accepting international mediation in civil war (where countries must need to be offered mediation before they can accept it), they are less well suited for comparing instances of civil war recurrence. In other words, civil wars may recur regardless of whether electoral reforms are a part of the peace agreement. The bivariate probit model predicts two decisions in the post-war environment. The first decision is whether to include electoral reforms into the peace agreement. The second decision is whether to resume the civil war based off of the first decision. The theoretical justification of the first stage is that the international community has a stake in democratic reforms (Joshi 2013) and that more contentious conflicts should be adverse to the decision to reforming the system. Specifically, conflicts that also have a peacekeeping operation deployed will be also under pressure from the international community to include electoral reforms. Additionally, conflicts fought along ethnic lines will have one ethnic group in power at the time of the conflict and one ethnic group out of power at the time of the conflict. In the post-war environment, I make the assumption that the ethnic group in power will wish to preserve their authority following the establishment of the peace agreement. Elites in the incumbent government will be more interested in preventing any electoral reform from being agreed to. The results support the proposition that peacekeeping increases the likelihood that electoral reform provisions will be included and that ethnic wars will lead to agreements that are less likely to include electoral reforms. A Chi-squared test that

Rho is significantly different from zero failed, suggesting that the first stage plays little or no role in determining the effectiveness of peace agreement implementation in the second stage of the model.

Table 2.5 Model I Bivariate Probit Model Predicting a) Choice to Include Electoral Reform and b) Choice to Return to Civil War Equation Predicting Return to Violence Implementation of Electoral Reforms -1.00 (0.41)** GDP Per Capita -0.0003 (0.0001)*** War Duration 0.10 (0.04)** Major War 0.86 (0.32)*** Peacekeeping Operation 0.16 (0.45) Polity II -0.07 (0.03)** Transitional Power-sharing Government 0.38 (0.36) Ethnic War 0.44 (0.37) T1 -0.13 (0.04)*** T2 0.03 (0.05) T3 -0.02 (0.03) Constant 230.3 (113.6)** Equation Predicting the Inclusion of Electoral Reforms in Peace Agreements Peacekeeping Operation 1.09 (0.49)** GDP Per Capita 0.00001 (0.00004) Ethnic War -1.65 (0.50)*** Polity II -0.08 (0.04)* Past Experience with Democracy 0.28 (0.44) Constant 0.55 (0.44) Rho -0.23(Not statistically different) 푊푎푙푑 퐶ℎ𝑖2 77.32*** N 357 Robust standard errors in parentheses. *** p<0.01, **p<0.05, *p<0.1

Again, the results demonstrate that after controlling for these different circumstances, the implementation of electoral reforms substantially reduces the risk of peace failure. Electoral reforms also substantially reduce the risk of peace failure associated with the first post-war election. Past work has suggested that, following an electoral defeat, the losing factions should be keen to abandon the peace process so as to renegotiate the status quo (Brancati and Snyder

2012). As these factions must rely on “wartime constituencies” (Brancati and Snyder 2012, 7) for support in that decision, then the results presented here suggest that changes in the electoral laws appear to reshape the relationship between combatants and their constituents. It may very well be more difficult for hardliners to drum up support for a return to violence following an electoral defeat given that their wartime constituents may have new avenues to change the political system such as new voting rights, opposition parties or a more representative electoral system.

It may also be argued that failure to implement electoral reforms may represent a threat to the peace process. As the implementation of electoral reforms signal a willingness to abide by the peace process, a failure on the part of the incumbent government to follow through with the terms of the peace agreement may aggravate commitment problems between combatants. To test this assertion, I include a measure for electoral reforms that are agreed to in the peace process, but are not implemented. The results demonstrate that failing to implement electoral reforms agreed to in the peace process does increase the risk of peace failure.

Table 2.6 Electoral Reforms that are NOT Implemented Weibull Duration Model Model 1

DDR Index -70.89*** (4.526) Transitional Political Power-Sharing 0.201 (0.327) Major War 1.528 (0.982) lnGDP Per Capita -0.621* (0.377) War Duration -1.328*** (0.109) Ethnic War -0.283 (0.753) Past Democratic Experience -18.58*** (1.184) Polity II -0.153** (0.0616) Electoral reforms agreed to but never implemented 20.64*** (1.802) Implementation of Electoral Reforms -1.149** (0.572) Electoral Reform*First Election -4.775*** (0.469) Constant 3.068 (2.508)

푊푎푙푑 퐶ℎ𝑖2 3758.83*** P 1.17 Observations 329 Robust standard errors in parentheses *** p<0.01, ** p<0.05, * p<0.1

The model seems to largely support the notion that provisions that address commitment problems reduce the risk of peace failure. Disarmament of combatants and the reintegration of armed forces into society substantially reduce the risk of peace failure. There is also support for the conclusion that longer wars also reduce the risk of renewed fighting (Mason et al. 2011). On the other hand, more violent conflicts appear to increase the risk that a renewed civil war will occur (Walter 2004; Quinn et al. 2007). According to Models 2, 3 and 4 in Table I more

52 democratic societies (as measured by Polity II) are less likely to experience civil war recurrence.

What is surprising is that the result for demobilization for armed forces appears to increase the risk of peace failure. While one could make an argument for this, this result may be the product of multi-collinearity between disarmament and reintegration (with correlation between the variables of about corr=0.66). Following Joshi et al. (2015b) coding procedures, I generate an index (ranging from 0 to 1) for all post-war security measures in Table 2.7 (disarmament, demobilization and reintegration). I then reran the models with this index in place of the post-war security measures.

Table 2.7 DDR Index Check Model 1

DDR Index -69.73*** (3.645) Transitional Political Power-Sharing 0.0158 (0.342) lnGDP Per Capita -0.617 (0.450) Major War 1.768* (1.059) War Duration -1.328*** (0.104) Government Incompatibility 0.150 (0.760) Polity II -0.162** (0.0650) Peacekeeping Operation 0.248 (0.720) First Post-war Election 0.690 (1.200) Implementation of Electoral Reforms -1.193** (0.599) Electoral Reform*First Election -7.247*** (1.012) Ethnic War -0.497 (0.765) Constant 2.643 (3.224)

Chi Squared 2253.24*** P 1.24 Observations 329 Robust standard errors in parentheses *** p<0.01, ** p<0.05, * p<0.1

The results of table 2.7 and 2.8 largely suggest that demobilization, in conjunction with other security measures, substantially reduces the risk of peace failure. Furthermore, I have also run the models with controls for whether the countries were democracies at the end of the war.

These results can be found in table 2.9. The results remain unchanged. Additionally, I ran an additional robustness check where I limit the population of cases to just secessionist or territorial disputes. These results can be found in Table 2.8. The results remain unchanged.

Table 2.8 Weibull Duration Model Robustness Check with just Secessionist Conflicts Model 1

DDR_index -25.62*** (3.594) Transitional Political Power-Sharing 8.951* (4.793) lnGDP Per Capita -2.930 (6.702) Major War 1.794 (4.530) War Duration 5.019 (4.616) Polity II 1.495 (1.864) Peacekeeping Operation -19.60*** (1.978) First Post-war Election 0.858** (0.415) Implementation of Electoral Reforms -11.96*** (4.068) Ethnic War -0.794 (1.008) Constant 0.719 (26.95)

Observations 145 Wald Chi Squared Dropped P 2.04 Robust standard errors in parentheses *** p<0.01, ** p<0.05, * p<0.1

Table 1.9 Weibull Duration Model Model 1 Robustness check controlling for end of war democracy

DDR_index -68.87*** (3.178) Transitional Political Power-Sharing 0.270 (0.479) lnGDP Per Capita -0.553 (0.398) Major War 1.590 (1.310) War Duration -1.465*** (0.141) Government Incompatibility 2.308** (0.928) Polity II -0.220*** (0.0764) Peacekeeping Operation 0.791 (0.688) First Post-war Election 0.550 (1.183) Implementation of Electoral Reforms -1.315*** (0.479) Electoral Reform*First Election -6.876*** (0.926) Ethnic War -0.811 (0.748) Democracy at War's End 2.908*** (1.017) Constant 0.254 (2.694)

Observations 329 Wald Chi Squared 1419.46*** P 1.19 Robust standard errors in parentheses *** p<0.01, ** p<0.05, * p<0.1

Conclusion

The results appear to demonstrate that electoral reforms increase the durability of post- war peace following negotiated settlements. When post-war governments implement electoral reforms that are called for in a peace agreement, they face a lower risk of renewed civil war as compared to countries that do not implement these reforms. As stated earlier, the implementation of these reforms generates greater trust between combatants as well as reduces the future benefit from engaging in renewed civil war. Incumbent governments, facing considerable cost associated with reforming the electoral system, signal that they are willing to abide by the peace process by implementing electoral reforms. On the other hand, rebels should be less willing to restart an insurgency as civilians, having new options to address their own grievances, will be less likely to shoulder the risk of supporting violent dissent. Reforming the electoral process therefore represents a new meaningful strategy to generate durable post-war peace following negotiated settlements.

It should be noted that there is some anecdotal support for the alternative rival hypothesis, that implementing electoral reforms may actually hinder the peace process by generating considerable cost on the incumbent government. As suggested by previous literature, peace agreement provisions that generate considerable cost for the incumbent government may push elites away from the bargaining table (DeRouen et al. 2009). At face value, this seems to challenge the proposition that by empowering citizens to reform their own grievances, the peace process should be more stable as rebel groups are less likely to walk away from the negotiating table. Upon closer inspection, though, the story may be a bit more complicated.

Looking at Cote d’Ivoire’s post-war experience underscores the complications associated with increased voting rights. While suffrage was granted to civilians in 2010, it did not prevent

56 post-war instability following the first election. As suggested by the alternative rival hypothesis, the implementation of electoral reforms may have been too onerous on the incumbent government. While Gbagbo and his supporters attempted to undermine the peace process in

2011, opposition forces largely respected the election results. The incumbent government appeared all too willing to abandon the peace process following the implementation of electoral reforms while rebel forces petitioned the international community for legitimacy. So while the provisions in peace agreements that expand suffrage may not be sufficient to ensure post-war peace, it would be misleading to suggest that they play no role. Rather, the expansion of voting rights may reduce the influence of the incumbent government which could lead to electoral malfeasance on the part of past beneficiaries of exclusionary policies.

The results also provide avenues for the international community to promote post-war elections while avoiding resurgence in violence. Specifically, the implementation of electoral reforms generates conditions that are more conducive to continued democratization without fear of renewed fighting. As suggested by Paris (2004), liberalization within post-war countries requires adequate institutions to handle substantial political and economic change. Reforms to the electoral laws provides, in part, these new institutions to promote post-war democracy while at the same time reducing concerns that defeated combatants will abandon the peace process.

Finally, this research also suggests that the connection between post-war democratization and peace duration extends far past elections. While past research has underscored that elections may destabilize the post-war peace process, few studies have rigorously examined how the electoral process impacts the risk of civil war recurrence. The findings presented here suggest that changes to the laws that govern who is allowed to participate in elections and changes to the process by which votes are translated into national representation can substantially reduce the

57 risk of renewed conflict. So while elections may generate considerable contention, reforms to the electoral process may mitigate some of the risk associated with future electoral contests. What remains unclear is how other aspects of the post-war electoral process impact the subsequent peace process. For instance, how does vote share impact post-war politics? Additionally, how do electoral boycotts by dissident groups impact post-war democratization? There remains amble room within the discipline to identify how policy makers can peacefully navigate the war-to- democracy transition.

CHAPTER III

PEACEKEEPING, ELECTORAL REFORMS, AND POST-CIVIL WAR

DEMOCRATIC SURVIVAL

Introduction

While the last two decades have produced considerable information on the determinants of civil war recurrence, very little research has been done on what promotes and preserves democracy in war-torn states. What research has been done on the determinants of post-war democratization has generated very different conclusions. Some research has maintained that the outcomes of civil wars may play a considerable role in generating democratic change (Gurses and Mason 2008; Joshi 2010; Toft 2010), while other research suggests that post-war democratization is largely determined by traditional drivers of political change such as economic development (Fortna and Huang 2012). Still more is the debate regarding the role of peacekeepers in promoting post-war democratization. While the current scholarship on civil war recurrence notes the critical role peacekeepers play in preventing the resumption of fighting

(Walter 1997; Walter 2002; Mason et al. 2011; Joshi 2013a), there is still no consensus as to whether international peacekeeping missions actually promote or preserve post-war democracy

(Fortna 2008; Ausstessere 2009; Fortna and Huang 2012; Joshi 2013).

This is a necessary conversation to have for a number of reasons. Within the study of civil war, it is now conventional wisdom that a consolidated democracy has little chance of facing a civil war, while countries that are transitioning to democracy are much more prone to suffer intrastate conflict (Hegre et al. 2001; Fearon and Laitin 2003; Collier and Hoeffler 2004).

Equipping post-war countries with effective democratic institutions and practices may serve as a means to prevent future conflict, while allowing disaffected citizens the mechanisms with which

59 to address the systemic grievances that spurred the civil war in the first place. This has been the hope of the international community as democratization, as well as broader liberalization, has been one of the prerogatives of international peacebuilding missions (Paris 2004; Sisk 2008;

Joshi 2013a). Unfortunately, the emphasis on democratization has generated considerable criticism, as peacebuilding missions have often sought to promote elections soon after civil wars, which in turn can generate considerable instability (Paris 2004; Brancati and Snyder 2013). This has led to a heated debate as to what mechanisms are necessary for generating stable post-war democracies, as well as what role peacekeeping missions play in promoting post-war democratization.

Instead of looking at the process of transitioning towards democracy after civil war, this chapter focuses on post-civil war mechanisms that prevent countries from backsliding towards autocracy. I argue for a more nuanced view of the role peacekeepers play in generating durable post-war democracy. Specifically, I argue that peacekeepers play an indirect role in preventing post-civil war countries from backsliding into autocracy. While there is little consensus as to whether peacekeepers play any role in promoting a transition towards democracy, I make the claim that they do play a meaningful role in preventing democratic failure by assisting with the establishment of new institutions. The process of transitioning towards democracy is a complicated affair. States transitioning towards more democratic governments must establish a working party system that translates citizen interests into policy; those parties must demonstrate their willingness and capacity to hand power off to rivals that defeat them in elections; and there must be a culture of democracy that accompanies the democratic institutions (Linz and Stephan

1992; Prezworski et al. 1996; Inglehart and Welzel 2005). When democracy emerges (or when states effectively transition to democracy), it does so in environments characterized by diffused

60 economic wealth, a strong civic culture, and generally through the agreement of elites (Lipset

1959; Almond and Verba 1963; Huntington 1991). None of these crucial components occurs overnight, and it is highly optimistic to assume that peacekeepers can influence the development of each one. As noted by Fortna and Huang (2012), other societal factors such as national wealth are much better predictors of whether a post-war country will make the transition towards democracy. It is a tall order to expect that an international peacebuilding mission will be able to install all of the different facets necessary for democracy to thrive. Rather, we should examine what elements peacebuilding missions bring to the table, and how they may assist with ensuring that countries do not relapse into autocracy.

Combatants in civil war often face commitment problems, where civil war protagonists are unable to credibly commit to the terms of any peace agreement (Walter 2009). As noted by

Walter (2009), “If a settlement cannot be enforced over time and leaves one or both sides vulnerable to attack or abuse, then a decisive military victory may be viewed as the safest and most stable way to resolve a conflict.” (Walter 2009, 246) Peacekeeping missions often reduce commitment problems thereby addressing issues of uncertainty that contribute to civil war recurrence (Walter 1997; Walter 2002). Additionally, peacekeeping missions often bring expertise to post-war bargaining, providing information on how to craft representative institutions as well as the capacity to push intransigent parties to sign off on necessary reforms

(Joshi 2013a). Taken together I argue that peacekeeping missions should be able to help implement necessary democratic institutional changes. These institutional changes help prevent one group from monopolizing the political process thereby ensuring that the country may proceed with the transition towards more effective democratic practices. One specific type of institutional change that is a critical part of the post-war democratic process is reforms to laws.

Most peace agreements do call for some form of reform to the electoral process, but many governments fail to fully implement these changes. Specifically looking at negotiated settlements, I posit that peacekeepers help implement reforms to the electoral laws called for in peace agreements. As elites often shape electoral laws to prevent meaningful competition so as to ensure their grasp on authority, the electoral practices in post-war states are often unrepresentative. I argue that peacekeepers can play a meaningful role in implementing reforms to the electoral laws within a country. In turn, these electoral reforms prevent dominant groups within society from monopolizing the political process and derailing future democratization; thereby preventing democratic failure. Note that I do not claim that these institutional changes are sufficient to generate a transition towards democracy. Rather, they prevent backsliding into more autocratic practices. As stated earlier, a functional democracy requires a number of complicated processes (e.g. a party system, the peaceful transfer of authority, democratic culture, etc.). Further democratization following the start of the peace process should require much more than institutional reforms called for in peace agreements. While not promoting greater transitions towards more democratic governments, institutional reforms, such as changes to electoral laws, provide a necessary buffer to prevent vested interests from relapsing into past autocratic practices.

In the following sections I will discuss the challenge of maintaining democracy in the aftermath of civil war. Specifically, I will provide an overview of what past research has discovered on what drives transitions towards democracy in the aftermath of civil war. This section will also underscore that little is known as to what prevents autocratic backsliding in the aftermath of civil war. To address this gap in the literature, I argue that electoral reforms included in peace agreements substantially reduces the likelihood that post-war governments will

62 abandon democratic reforms in favor of more autocratic policies. I also note that the establishment of electoral reforms is a multistage process, where the international community places considerable pressure on post-war governments to include and establish electoral reforms as part of the peace process. Finally, I test these propositions using a Heckman probit and

Weibull hazard model.

Past Work on Post-War Democratization

I argue that peacekeepers play a meaningful, but indirect, role in preventing countries from relapsing into autocracy following the establishment of a peace agreement. Unfortunately, little is known as to what predicts post-war democratic failure.4 What research that has been done on post-war democracy focuses mainly on the process of democratization. Fortunately, there has been a considerable amount of research done on the process of autocratic backsliding outside of civil war. This body of research on democratic failure (or autocratic reversal) has consistently found that strong economic development ensures democratic survival (Przeworski et al. 1997;

2000; Boix 2003 Acemoglu and Robinson 2005; Svolik 2008). Specifically, greater wealth tends to reduce the risk of autocratic reversal (Prezworski et al. 1997; 2000). Additionally, the distribution of wealth and the type of assets within a country also influences the rate of survival for new democracies (Boix 2003; Acemoglu and Robinson 2005). On the other hand, there is some evidence to suggest that institutional factors impact the risk of democratic failure. For instance, some research has demonstrated that presidential systems appear to be at a greater risk of democratic failure as compared to parliamentary systems (Linz 1994; Linz and Stepan 1996;

Mainwaring and Shugart 1997). It should be noted, though, that this research has been contradicted by Cheibub (2007), who aptly notes that much of the previous research fails to

4 Joshi (2013b) has addressed the risks of democratic failure after civil war. 63 account for the fact that presidential systems are generally established in countries that are not conducive to consolidated democracy in the first place. Specifically, Cheibub argues that many presidential systems are established in countries where the military had historically maintained a strong role in society. These countries, due to the risk of military coup, were more at risk of a democratic failure regardless of whether they use a parliamentary or presidential system. What work that has been done on post-war democratic failure has noted that institutions play an important role in preserving post-war democracy (Joshi 2013b). For instance, Joshi (2013b) notes that proportional representation electoral systems often reduce the risk of autocratic failure after civil wars as these institutions reduce combatant concerns that they will be left out of any new post-war government. Still, relatively little is known as to what impacts the risk of autocratic reversal in post-war governments.

As noted earlier, there is still considerable debate on the determinants of post-war democratization. For instance, past studies on post-war democratization have emphasized the role of civil war outcomes in shaping the likelihood that post-conflict societies will transition towards democracy (Gurses and Mason 2008; Joshi 2010; Toft 2010). Gurses and Mason (2008) suggest that post-war democratization is much more likely following negotiated settlements as opposed to military victories. As compared to military victories, where one’s opponents are forcefully disarmed, negotiated settlements tend to suffer from issues of dual sovereignty where multiple factions maintain the ability to use coercive power (Mason et al. 2011). This ability of both the government and the rebels to use military force leads to a balance of power in the post- war environment. As the decision to resume fighting often emerges when warring parties see more utility in war than peace (Quinn et al. 2007), outcomes that foster a balance of power should reduce the desire to fight in the future and increase the incentive to pursue power through

64 elections, thereby establishing democratic practices. Joshi (2010) generates a similar conclusion.

In his study of post-war democratization, he notes that democratization following prolonged fighting often emerges as a way for elites to offer institutional accommodation to opponents.

Given that rebel groups maintain the ability to fold back into the population (even after defeat) elites must offer institutional accommodations to prevent future violence. Therefore, Joshi

(2010) posits that government victories and negotiated settlements are more likely to witness post-war democratization as opposed to rebel victories.

On the other hand, some scholars posit that post-war democracy is only truly feasible following rebel victories. In Licklider’s (1995) work on civil war outcomes, he presents a social change hypothesis as to why negotiated settlements are so unstable. Licklider notes that, countries that suffer from civil war often have systemic issues that are perpetuated by vested interests who maintain control of the state.

These vested interests, or beneficiaries of exclusion, will seek to maintain their monopoly on power as long as possible, thereby preventing any meaningful change. The social change hypothesis argues that the only way to promote meaningful institutional change in war-torn countries is through some form of military victory. Toft (2010) comes to a similar conclusion, as she argues that successful rebel groups effectively campaign on popular grievances in order to win the war. Once in power, new rebel rulers therefore implement their promised reforms.

Unfortunately, the current work on the connection between civil war outcomes and post- war democratization appears to deliver little consensus as to which outcome provides the 65 foundation for war-torn countries to pursue democratic reforms. Perhaps this is why Fortna and

Huang (2012) suggest that civil war outcomes play a relatively small role in post-war democracy. Rather, Fortna and Huang argue that current findings on the connection between civil war outcomes and post-war democratization are the products of poor model specification.

The authors posit that the main determinants of democratization after civil war fall in line with other studies on the determinants of democratization. Specifically, post-war democracies emerge and endure when there is sufficient wealth in society and when there is no oil present (which has been shown to hinder the democratization process).

Previous work on the connection between peacebuilding and post-war democratization is equally mixed. Work by Joshi (2010; 2013b) and Steinert and Grimm (2015) provide considerable evidence that UN peacekeeping missions assist with the democratization process.

UN peacekeeping missions often address commitment problems between combatants, which in turn generates an environment where opponents are willing to use institutional mechanisms to resolve their grievances (Walter 2002; Joshi 2010). Additionally, Joshi (2013b) suggests that UN peacekeeping missions often provide technical expertise as well as sufficient capacity to push combatants to craft representative and effective institutions, thereby generating more durable post-war democracies. Unfortunately, other researchers have been unable to replicate these findings. For instance, multiple studies on post-war democratization have found little or no connection between the presence of peacekeepers and the transition towards democracy (Gurses and Mason 2008; Fortna 2008; Fortna and Huang 2012).

These contradictory findings may reflect the fact that international peacebuilding efforts often face the war-to-democracy dilemma in post-war states (Jarstad and Sisk 2008).

Specifically, international peacebuilding missions often seek to accomplish two, sometimes

66 contradictory, goals: security and democratization. In an effort to promote greater security following civil wars, the international community will push for policies that hinder post-war democratization such as postponing new elections, banning some political parties, or rewarding combatants who perpetrated gross human rights violations with positions of authority as part of a power-sharing arrangement spelled out in the peace agreement. On the other hand, some aspects of the democratic process are associated with destabilizing post-war security. Specifically, past scholarship has argued that holding elections shortly after the end of civil wars often generates instability (Paris 2004; Flores and Noorudin 2012; Brancati and Snyder 2013). Therefore, when peacebuilding missions attempt to promote democracy, they may be undermining post-war security; and when they promote security, they may be hindering post-war democratization. With these problems in mind, what roles or strategies are available to the international community to promote post-war democracy?

I suggest that past studies on the role peacekeepers play in promoting post-war democracy have often overstated their influence in the democratization process. While peacekeepers may not play a direct role in promoting post-war democracy, they do play an indirect role in preventing post-war countries from relapsing into authoritarianism. As noted earlier, a sustained transition towards more democratic institutions and practices is a complicated affair. It is a tall order to expect that peacekeepers can play a meaningful role in promoting non- violent party competition, a willingness on the part of elites to hand over power once out of office, as well as an expectation within the population that the democratic process is, to paraphrase Linz and Stepan (1992), the only game in town. Rather, peacekeepers and the international community should be expected to excel at reducing commitment problems between combatants and ensuring that provisions within peace agreements are respected by all parties.

While peacekeepers may not be able to instill a democratic culture within the post-war country, they can assist with implementing institutional reforms that help make states more democratic. In that sense, peacekeepers may play an indirect role in promoting durable post-war democracy.

Specifically, I claim that peacekeepers assist with preventing democratic failure by assisting with the implementation of electoral reforms called for in peace agreements.

Electoral Reforms and Their Discontents

I posit that peacekeepers play an important role in the implementation of electoral reforms called for in peace agreements. Electoral reforms are modifications to the electoral laws within countries. Electoral laws often determine who is allowed to participate in elections (as either a candidate or as a voter) and how votes are translated into representation at the regional or national level through changes to electoral systems. Electoral reforms within peace agreements are provisions designed to eliminate unjust electoral practices so as to make elections more representative and competitive. Using the Joshi et al. (2015) definition of electoral reforms, these provisions can be defined this way:

Electoral or Political Reforms involve changes to the electoral system that affect opportunities for participation by individuals in the voting process and/or the ability of political parties to participate in elections. Electoral reform can involve allowing rebel groups to become active political parties and/or implementing new rules to make the system more democratic and inclusive…Electoral Reform deals with changes to electoral rules, institutions or arrangements. (Joshi et al. 2015 Online Appendix, 18)

As noted in Licklider’s (1995) social change hypothesis, civil wars emerge in countries that often suffer from systemic issues, one of which is exclusion from the political process.

While exclusionary laws have often been directed towards ethnic or sectarian groups in society

(Horowitz 1985; Cunningham and Weidmann 2010; Cederman et al. 2013) policies of political exclusion are not solely based along identity cleavages. As noted by Hardin (1995), elites will often form artificial ingroups and outgroups so as to generate selective benefits. By maintaining

68 control over who has access to state goods and services, elites can increase their own wealth and prestige in society (Bueno de Mesquita et al. 2003). Tilly (2003) posits that both economic and political leaders will coordinate so as to limit access to the central government using either institutional arrangements or political violence.

Electoral laws can therefore provide a powerful mechanism to prevent outsiders from challenging the status quo through elections. Elites within the government may shape electoral laws to limit competition for political office to only a select group in society, or they may revise the electoral system to reduce outsider influence in the government. For instance, regimes in the

Ivory Coast as well as Djibouti both used the issue of dubious citizenship as a pretext to prevent meaningful political competition in national elections. In Cote d’Ivoire, political elites who were backed by Southern cocoa farmers were able to maintain their grasp on power by preventing the largely Muslim north from participating in elections, claiming that they were immigrants and not actual citizens of the Ivory Coast. Similarly, the second Aceh insurgency in Indonesia was started in part because the Indonesian government revised the electoral system so as to prevent opposition forces from gaining seats in the regional legislature (Aspinall 2009). In both the

Ouagadougou Agreement in Cote d’Ivoire and the Accord de reforme et concorde civile in

Djibouti, electoral reforms were drafted that directly addressed issues of citizenship, thereby determining who was allowed to participate in elections. In the Acehnese Memorandum of

Understanding between Indonesia and the GAM (Free Aceh Movement), the parties agreed to reforms to the local legislature to ensure representation of the Acehnese following elections

(Högbladh 2011; Peace Accords Matrix). Electoral reforms included in peace agreements are therefore designed to generate meaningful political competition as well as more representative

69 governments. This, in turn, should prevent one segment of society from monopolizing the political process and producing undemocratic measures.

Supporters of the incumbent government may therefore be inclined to hinder the implementation of these reforms as meaningful political competition may threaten the current distribution of goods and services from the state as well as place them at risk for future sanction by new post-war governments. As noted by Joshi (2013a), post-war elites and their supporters are apprehensive about the outcomes of post-war elections. As victors of elections will gain control of the coercive apparatus of the state, those elites left out of office will be concerned with the risk of future retribution. Elites, without guarantees that they will have some form of representation, will be inclined to prevent future democratization (Joshi 2013a). Hartzell and

Hoddie (2015) come to a similar conclusion in their findings on power-sharing arrangements and democratization, arguing that power-sharing arrangements reduce the perceived risk with future democratization. As past literature has argued that power-sharing agreements are not equivalent to democratization (Roeder and Rothchild 2005; Sisk 2008), Hartzell and Hoddie (2015) suggest that the establishment of power-sharing institutions reduce commitment problems necessary for the provision of basic democratic institutions. But even with the presence of very representative institutions, elites within the incumbent government as well as their supporters should be less inclined to continue with the post-war democratization process as they are concerned about former rivals using the coercive apparatus of the state to sanction them.

Elites and their supporters may also have a pressing material concern with staying in power. Assuming that past supporters of the incumbent government received selective benefits for their loyalty, if new politically relevant groups gain a voice within the government, it may disrupt past policies that benefited the incumbent government’s traditional supporters. For

70 instance, following the end of the Salvadoran civil war in 1992, electoral reforms substantially increased the political efficacy of peasants and leftist sympathizers (in conjunction with the distribution of land) (Wood 2001). This, in turn, threatened the political strength of the landed interests as well as the military in the post-war environment. Such groups should therefore be inclined to slow or hinder the implementation of new electoral reforms that would empower disaffected groups in society. If electoral reforms are not implemented, then elections must operate using past electoral systems and laws. As noted earlier, elites within the incumbent government and their supporters often used these laws to prevent meaningful political competition so as to ensure their grasp on authority. By effectively ensuring that the proverbial fix was in, elites may prevent meaningful political competition and consolidate their control of the government. This, in turn, would push the country further back into autocratic practices. In other words, without the implementation of meaningful electoral reforms, nascent post-war governments are at risk of backsliding into more autocratic rule. The process of autocratic backsliding differs from simply not continuing to democratize. In order to consolidate their control of the state, post-war governments may institute new laws to prevent meaningful competition during elections. Post-war governments may also simply ignore provisions included in the peace agreement that are designed to make the country more democratic. For instance, post-war leaders may ignore new term limits placed upon the executive to ensure the regular transfer of power. On the other hand, if new post-war governments establish reforms that allow for greater political competition, then the risk of autocratic backsliding should be reduced. As noted by Wright (2008), new democracies that foster greater political competition are often less likely to experience democratic failure. If electoral reforms are implemented, then post-war

71 governments should be able to continue with the democratization process unhindered by autocratic backsliding.

H1: Post-war governments that do not implement electoral reforms are at a much higher risk of backsliding into autocracy than governments that implement electoral reforms.

International Peacekeeping and the Inclusion of Electoral Reforms

While electoral reforms may assist with sustaining post-civil war democracy, there is no guarantee that these reforms will actually be included in the peace agreement. What then determines whether peace agreements will even be include these reforms? Building on work by

Joshi (2013b), if the peace process has been observed by international peacekeepers, then democratic reforms such as revisions to electoral laws will be a part of the peace agreement. In conflicts managed by the United Nations, there is both an emphasis to resolve the conflict as well as ensure that governments take steps to further democratize. This emphasis on democratization as part of the peace process also translates into reforms to the electoral process that promotes electoral competition and more representative elections. These provisions help sustain post-war democracy leading to greater democratic survival in the post-war environment.

As noted by Joshi (2013b), in addition to monitoring the terms of any ceasefire, international peacekeepers also attempt to promote democratic reforms as part of the peace process. Jarstad and Sisk (2008) call attention to this fact in their work on the process of democratizing after civil war. The authors note that since the end of the cold war, there has been considerable emphasis on the part of the United Nations for promoting democracy as a cornerstone for future peacebuilding operations. For instance, in Boutros Boutros-Ghali’s 1992

Report of the UN Secretary-General: Agenda for Peace, he notes that democracy is a necessary

72 tool for combating global insecurity.5 In this report on the role of UN peacekeepers, Secretary

Boutros-Ghali posits that the United Nations should take an active role in promoting democracy globally, including in war-torn states. This emphasis on promoting democracy within the peace process has been noted frequently in previous research on peacebuilding (Paris 2004; Jarstad and

Sisk 2008; Autesserre 2009; Joshi 2013b; Joshi et al. 2015a). In conflicts in which there has been considerable international attention, new democratic reforms should certainly be a part of the peace process.

While most peace agreements call for new elections as part of the peace process (Jarstad

2008), peace agreements also include provisions that seek to reform the electoral process itself

(Högbladh 2011). In conflicts that are managed by the international community, and especially the United Nations, the final peace agreement will likely include some form of electoral reform.

Hypothesis 2: The presence of UN peacekeepers should increase the likelihood that electoral reforms will be included in post-civil war peace agreements.

Peacekeepers and the Implementation of Electoral Reforms

While elites within the incumbent government, as well as their supporters, have an interest in preventing the implementation of electoral reforms, their efforts may be stymied by the international community. Specifically, peacekeeping missions may play an instrumental role in the implementation of costly electoral reforms by reducing commitment problems as well as generating external pressure on combatants to follow through with the terms of the agreement.

As stated previously, costly electoral reforms should be resisted by vested interests associated

5 Boutros-Ghali, Boutros. June 17th, 1992. “An Agenda for Peace: Preventive Diplomacy, Peacemaking and Peace-keeping.” Report of the UN Secretary-General: “An Agenda for Peace.” Provided by the Council of Foreign Relations. http://www.cfr.org/peacekeeping/report- un-secretary-general-agenda-peace/p23439. Accessed February 15th, 2016. 73 with the incumbent government (such as elites within the incumbent government and/or their supporters). While the incumbent government may have an incentive to support greater political competition (as it gives elites an opportunity to retake their offices should they be removed through an election), there should be some concern with initially stepping down from power. By abdicating control of the executive office to their opponents, elites within the incumbent government also hand over the coercive apparatus of the state. As noted by Joshi (2013a), elites within the incumbent government are typically concerned with leaving office as they are concerned that their opponents may use the coercive apparatus of the state to settle scores. The presence of third party monitors should reduce elite concerns within the incumbent government, as well as the concerns of their supporters, that they will be targeted after the implementation of electoral reforms. Additionally, international peacebuilding missions may also be able to place pressure on elites to follow through with the implementation of the agreement. Elites within the incumbent government may drag their feet with regard to implementing peace agreement provisions. International monitors are able to observe these delays and place pressure on elites to abide by the terms of the agreement. The continued implementation of these reforms will therefore reduce the risk that post-war governments will backslide into more autocratic practices.

One major concern combatants’ face is the uncertainty associated with post-war democratization. Negotiated settlements are inherently dangerous due to the security dilemmas that follow peace agreements. Combatants, unsure of their opponent’s intention, are somewhat loathe to lay down their arms or cooperate with their rivals in institutional settings (Walter 1997;

2002). One role that modern peacekeeping missions take on is to ensure that wartime opponents begin to settle their disputes through new post-war governing apparatuses (Joshi 2013b). This is a difficult task for a number of reasons, but above all else combatants fear the uncertainty

74 associated with the outcomes of post-war elections (Brancati and Snyder 2013; Joshi 2013a). As elections determine which party is in charge of the coercive apparatus of the state, combatants often need guarantees of their safety before participating in the political process. While modern peacekeeping missions may not be able to assist with traditional facets of democratization (such as greater national wealth, a culture of cooperation, or a history of democratic institutions), they are uniquely equipped to reduce commitment problems between combatants (Walter 2002;

Mattes and Savun 2009; Joshi 2013b). Third party monitors often act as guarantors in the post- war environment, ensuring cooperation by both parties in the peace process. Third party monitors also relay information to combatants in any instance in which opponents violate the terms of the peace agreement, thereby raising the cost of defection (Mattes and Savun 2009). By ameliorating combatant fears over electoral outcomes, peacekeeping missions should be able to ensure that important reforms to the electoral system are set in place. If elites are assuaged that they will not become quick targets following their exit from office, they should be more amenable to allowing continued reforms to electoral laws within post-war countries. As noted by

Joshi (2013a) in regards to UN peacekeeping missions, “The objective of any UN peacekeeping in a post–civil war state is to facilitate the implementation of the terms of the settlement…”

(Joshi 2013b, 367) By acting as a guarantor of security following the establishment of a peace agreement, peacekeeping missions should help implement costly electoral reforms. Additionally, peacekeepers lend their technical expertise to the democratic process, which also reduces combatant concerns associated with the electoral process. For instance, Paris (2004) notes that the UN peacekeeping mission in El Salvador expanded the scope of its mission to ensure that the electoral reforms were fully implemented and that the election continued successfully. As stated by the author, “In May 1993, the operation’s mandate was further expanded to include oversight

75 of El Salvador’s first postconflict elections, including voter registration, the campaign, voting, and every stage of vote counting.” (Paris 2004, 123)

Peacekeepers also have the capacity to push combatants to abandon their short term economic interests in favor of long term stability within a country. As the implementation of electoral reforms may reshape how the state distributes goods and services by introducing new politically relevant actors, supporters of the incumbent government may push to delay or prevent the implementation of electoral reforms. Elites associated with the incumbent government may therefore be under considerable pressure from their constituents to prevent the implementation of these costly reforms. Strong third parties may be able to push elites to ignore their constituents and follow through with the terms of the peace agreement. Peacekeeping missions may be able to leverage their connection with the combatants to ensure their cooperation. If these soft approaches to conflict management fail, peacekeepers have also used more forceful measures to pressure combatants to follow through with the terms of the agreement. Previous studies on conflict management have noted the effectiveness of biased third party mediators in bringing combatants to the negotiation table (Savun 2008; Svensson 2009). Specifically, international mediators seeking to protect their protégés will pressure combatants to include costly provisions so as to ensure their role in future governments (Svensson 2009). For instance, as members of the incumbent government may be reticent to agree to establish a political power-sharing government, pressure from an international ally acting as a mediator may convince holdouts to acquiesce to these costly provisions; thereby ensuring both a peaceful settlement and a place in the government for their protégé. Svensson (2009) goes as far as to suggest that biased mediators also promote pro-democracy institutions in the post-war environment, pushing for the presence of third-party monitors and power-sharing agreements in the post-war environment. Such

76 research underscores the role third parties can play in assuaging the concerns of the incumbent government and ensuring that they are willing to abandon short term economic interests for broader stability. Peceny and Stanley (2001) observe that multinational peacekeeping missions provide similar results, as the authors argue that peacebuilding missions in Guatemala and El

Salvador were successful largely due to international pressure to abide by the new democratic processes.

If international pressure fails to generate compliance, international peacekeepers may also have the capacity to forcefully push combatants to abide by the terms of the agreement.

Joshi (2013b) notes that the United Nations leveraged economic threats in Mozambique and

Cambodia to abide by the terms of the post-war peace agreement. Additionally, when Laurant

Gbagbo refused to abide by the results of the 2010 presidential elections in the Ivory Coast, the

UN and French forces used their military capacity to place him under house arrest until a peaceful transition could take place (Bellamy and Williams 2011; Straus 2012). While military force by peacekeepers in favor of pressuring states to abide by the terms of the agreement is relatively rare, it is one tool available to the international community to ensure that members of the incumbent government are willing to implement electoral reforms. While elites within the incumbent government may be under considerable pressure from their supporters to slow or stop implementation of electoral reforms, peacekeeping missions may also exert opposing pressure so as to push elites to follow through with their commitments.

H3: The presence of international peacekeepers in post-war countries will substantially increase the likelihood that post-war governments will implement electoral reforms called for in peace agreements.

Research Design

To evaluate these claims, I examine the inclusion and implementation of electoral reform provisions, as well as the survival of democracy in comprehensive peace agreements from 1989-

2012. My population of comprehensive peace agreements is drawn from the Peace Accords

Matrix Implementation Dataset (Joshi et al. 2015). This dataset provides detailed information on the signatories to peace agreements, the types of provisions included in peace agreements, the degree of implementation, as well as the primary documents used to create the dataset. I then matched the start dates of the peace agreement to the UCDP Conflict Termination Dataset to identify if and when the conflict ended. This produced 34 post-civil war countries, with the unit of analysis being the post-civil war peace year. As autocratic reversals can only emerge when countries have some degree of democratic competition, the analysis is limited to only those countries that meet the minimum level of democratic competition. To identify these regimes, I use the revised Polity II score from the Polity IV dataset (Marshall et al. 2014). The revised

Polity II score is a 21 point scale, ranging from -10 (total autocracy) to +10 (consolidated democracy). Base levels of political competition begin to emerge at -5 and above where political parties are able to compete in elections. Therefore, observations only enter the dataset if they have this basic degree of political competition, giving us 312 observations.

The first purpose of this analysis is to identify whether the presence of international peacekeepers increases the likelihood that electoral reforms will be included in peace agreements. The second purpose of this analysis is to test whether these same international peacekeeping forces also increase the likelihood that reforms will be implemented after such provisions are included in the peace agreement. Finally, I will test whether these electoral reforms, once implemented, prevent post-civil war governments from abandoning the democratization process and backsliding into autocracy. The first step is to evaluate whether a)

78 the presence of international peacekeepers is related to the inclusion and implementation of electoral reforms, and b) that electoral reforms actually reduce the likelihood that a post-war government experiences an autocratic backslide (or democratic failure).

To test this first process, I will examine whether the presence of international peacekeepers increases the likelihood that electoral reform provisions will be included in the peace agreement. As noted by Joshi et al. (2015b), “Electoral or Political Reforms involve changes to the electoral system that affect opportunities for participation by individuals in the voting process and/or the ability of political parties to participate in elections.” (Joshi et al.

2015b Online Appendix, 18) To operationalize this measure, I drew on the Peace Accords Matrix

Implementation Dataset or PAM_ID (Joshi et al. 2015). This dataset includes information on the implementation of comprehensive peace agreements from 1989-2012 across 51 different types of peace agreement provisions. PAM_ID includes a measure for whether electoral reforms were a part of the final comprehensive peace agreement. This dataset specifically includes information on whether or not electoral reforms included in peace agreements were implemented. Using the

PAM_ID, I generated a dichotomous measure for whether electoral reforms were included in the peace agreement as well as a measure for whether or not post-war governments fully implemented electoral reforms.

For the second part of this analysis I look at whether governments experience a democratic failure following the establishment of a comprehensive peace agreement.

Specifically, I code democratic failure as a three point drop during a post-war peace year in the

Polity II index. Movements along the Polity index have been typical in both studies of democratic failure and post-war democratization (Mason and Gurses 2008; Joshi 2010; Aleman and Yang 2011; Fortna and Huang 2012; Joshi 2013a). The specific use of the three point drop

79 on the Polity index has been a common measurement of democratic failure or “autocratic backsliding/reversal” in the study of democratic survival (Aleman and Yang 2011). My variable,

Democratic Failure, is a binary indicator that is coded as a one in the year that the Polity index drops by three points. The three point shift is compared to each post-war country’s Polity II score in the first year of peace. All other years will be coded as a zero. To measure the impact of international peacekeeping missions, I use the PAM_ID measure for whether UN peacekeepers were present in the post-war environment. Specifically, I generate a binary variable that measures all years in which the UN deployed a peacekeeping mission to the post-war state, and zero for all years in which there was no peacekeeping mission deployed.

To test whether or not peacekeepers increase the likelihood that peace agreements will include electoral reforms, it is important to account for other factors that may facilitate or hinder the process of including such provisions. Given that electoral reforms are often used to address exclusionary policies, they may be more likely to be used following conflicts fought along identity lines. As noted by Cederman et al. (2013), ethnic or sectarian exclusion is strongly tied to the onset of civil war. Therefore it is possible that the inclusion of electoral reform provisions in peace agreements is driven largely by the need to reform historic discriminatory electoral laws as opposed to being a product of international pressure. Given this point, I will control for whether the past conflict was fought along ethnic or sectarian lines when examining the inclusion of electoral provisions in peace agreements. Additionally, electoral reforms should be less common in countries that already have functioning democratic institutions by the end of the civil war. If post-war governments already allow open political competition, then there should be less need to impose new laws regulating participation in elections as well as the distribution of votes into national representation. With this in mind, I will include a control for whether or not the

80 post-war government was a functioning democracy at war’s end (Polity II >5) when examining the inclusion of electoral reforms in peace agreements. Finally, in Hartzell and Hoddie’s (2015) work on the establishment of political power-sharing institutions, they note that the dynamics of the past conflict often dictate whether a power-sharing institution is put into place. Given this finding, it is prudent to also control for the intensity and the duration of the past war.

Furthermore, I include a control for national wealth in the model explaining the inclusion of electoral reforms.6

In order to isolate the impact of peacekeepers on the implementation of electoral reforms, it is critical to account for the other factors that may influence whether or not post-war governments follow through with establishing electoral reforms. Fortunately, past research by

Quinn and Joshi (2014) specifically examines what factors influence the implementation of comprehensive peace agreements. Looking at the annualized rate of peace agreement implementation, Quinn and Joshi have demonstrated that three institutional factors contribute heavily to CPA implementation. First, the authors have demonstrated that the size of the post- accord winning coalition size significantly impacts the degree to which CPAs are implemented

(Bueno de Mesquita et al. 2004). The larger the winning coalition size, the greater the annualized implementation of CPAs. In order to account for this, I include a measure of the post-accord winning coalition size as measured by Bueno de Mesquita et al. (2004). Second, Quinn and Joshi note that the establishment of a transitional political power-sharing agreement significantly increases the annualized implementation of CPAs. As noted by Hoddie and Hartzell (2005), political power-sharing mechanisms ensure that the post-war political process is more

6 Given collinearity in the Heckman models, national wealth is dropped in the selection stage in Table 3.2. As demonstrated in Table 3.1, national wealth appears to explain little variation in when electoral reforms are included in peace agreements. 81 transparent. Equally, Quinn and Joshi note that power-sharing mechanisms provide combatants with institutional resources to sanction opponents for perceived foot-dragging on implementing reforms. I therefore include a control for the establishment of transitional political power-sharing mechanisms in explaining the implementation of electoral reforms. Third, Quinn and Joshi demonstrate that verification mechanisms substantially increase the annualized implementation of CPAs. Quinn and Joshi define verification mechanisms as either domestic or international monitors whose sole purpose is to monitor the implementation of peace agreement provisions.

Finally, I control for the number of years since the peace agreement has been in effect (Number of Post-Accord Years). Quinn and Joshi note that the time since the peace agreement has been signed substantially increases the annualized implementation of CPAs. As noted in by Joshi and

Quinn (2016), the process of implementing peace agreements is a holistic process. The successful implementation of past provisions in peace agreements should reduce combatant concerns that their opponents will renege on following through with other peace agreement provisions. Therefore, electoral reform provisions should be more likely to be implemented if other provisions have been implemented. Given this, I include a lagged control for the percentage of the comprehensive peace agreement that has been implemented. Finally, I also control for national wealth as measured by the logged GDP per capita of post-war states. As greater national wealth may allow for governments to offset costly political sacrifices, the incumbent government may use its resources to mollify the concerns of their supporters.

The second part of this analysis focuses on the role of electoral reforms in preventing democratic failure. To capture the effects of electoral reforms, I include a binary variable for whether electoral reform provisions were included in the peace agreement, as well as a binary variable that measured those reforms were fully implemented. For this analysis, I control for

82 national wealth (lnGDP) and the degree of democracy within the post-war country as measured by the Polity II index. As noted by Svolik (2008), national wealth is one of the main indicators of whether a democracy will suffer a democratic failure. Wright (2008) concludes that robust democratic competition safeguards new democracies from suffering a democratic failure.

Therefore, the more democratic a country is the less likely it will suffer an autocratic reversal in the future. I also control for the presence of UN peacekeeping forces and the percent to which the peace agreement has been implemented. It should be noted that the effectiveness of peacekeepers at reducing the risk of democratic failure may be tied to the amount of time they spend on the ground. As peacekeeping missions build trust and reduce commitment problem, the more time peacekeepers spend on the ground the more effective they are at reducing the risk of autocratic reversals. Given this point, I also control for the amount of time peacekeepers have been deployed to the country.

Findings and Analysis

The first stage of this analysis focuses on the role of international peacekeepers in promoting the inclusion of electoral reforms in peace agreements as well as their role in ensuring the implementation of electoral reforms. In order to analyze the effect of international peacekeeping forces on the inclusion of electoral reforms in peace agreements, I first run a logistic regression to estimate the effects of UN peacekeeping missions on the inclusion of electoral reforms in comprehensive peace agreements. To estimate the effects of international peacekeepers on the implementation of electoral reforms I run a Heckman censored probit model. The selection stage of the analysis predicts the inclusion of electoral reforms in peace agreements. The outcome stage of the model estimates the likelihood that those provisions will be implemented.

Table 3.1 Inclusion of Electoral Model 1 Reforms in Peace Agreements

UN Peacekeeping -0.147 Provisions (1.886)

lnGDP -0.313 (0.416) Logged Battle Dead 0.301 (0.276) War Duration -3.65e-05 (0.00417) Ethnic War -1.955* (1.111) Democratic Start 0.532 (1.180) Constant 1.804 (4.640)

Observations 370 R Squared 0.16 Logistic Regression. Coefficients Presented. Robust standard errors in parentheses *** p<0.01, ** p<0.05, * p<0.1

As suggested by the results presented in Table 3.1, the inclusion of electoral reform provisions in peace agreements does not appear to be influenced by the deployment of international peacekeeping forces. Specifically, when UN peacekeeping forces are deployed to a conflict as part of the mediation effort, the peace agreements do not appear to be any more likely to have electoral reform provisions than peace agreements that do not have international peacekeeping efforts. The results do demonstrate that conflicts fought along ethnic lines are much less likely to include electoral reforms as part of the peace agreement. This may

84 underscore that in conflicts fought along ethnic or sectarian lines, groups that have previously held a monopoly on political power are less likely to sacrifice their dominant position through reforming the electoral system.

Table 3.2 Selection Outcome Inclusion and Model 1 Model 1 Implementation of Electoral Reforms

Coalition Size -8.864*** (2.716) Transitional Power- -0.308 Sharing (0.412)

Verification 0.0947 Mechanism (0.584)

Number of Post- -0.202*** Accord Years (0.0716) lnGDP 2.605*** (0.684) Peacekeeping -3.139 Presence (1,282)

퐼푚푝푙푒푚푒푛푡푎푡𝑖표푛푡−1 8.753*** (2.740) UN Peacekeeping -0.444* Provision (0.239)

Logged Battle Dead 0.162*** (0.0173) War Duration -0.000411** (0.000193) Democratic Start 0.179*** (0.0590) Ethnic -1.014*** (0.148) Constant -0.276 -24.89*** (0.214) (6.070)

Observations 350 Uncensored 245 Observations Wald Chi2 1375.38*** LR Test==0 4.37** Heckman Censored Probit Coefficients Listed Standard errors in parentheses *** p<0.01, ** p<0.05, * p<0.1

The results from the Heckman probit examine whether international peacekeepers play a role in implementing electoral reforms. Table 3.2 presents the results of the Heckman probit regression. The selection stage of this model uses the same variables from Table 3.1 to predict the inclusion of electoral reforms. The outcome stage, implementation of electoral reforms, estimates the likelihood of post-civil war governments implementing electoral reforms given that they agreed to include those reforms in the peace agreement. As the results demonstrate in Table

3.2, there appears to be little or no statistical relationship between the deployment of international peacekeepers and the implementation of electoral reforms. This is a surprising finding as past research has demonstrated peacekeepers play a considerable role in reducing combatant concerns, providing technical expertise, and pressuring hardliners to abide by the terms of the agreement which should lead to greater electoral reform implementation. Among the control variables, the measure of national wealth (lnGDP) as well as the lagged total implementation of the peace agreement (퐼푚푝푙푒푚푒푛푡푎푡𝑖표푛푡−1) substantially increase the likelihood that post-war governments will implement electoral reforms. On the other hand, the size of the winning coalition as well as the number of years since the accord was signed appears to significantly reduce the likelihood that electoral reforms will be implemented. Finally, the establishment of verification mechanisms and a transitional power-sharing government appear to have no statistically significant effect on the likelihood that post-war governments will implement electoral reforms.

The second stage of this analysis examines the impact of electoral reform implementation on the likelihood of democratic failure. As noted in the theoretical section I conclude that electoral reforms should have a negative effect on democratic failure, but that the presence of international peacekeepers should have little or no effect on the likelihood of democratic

87 backsliding. Specifically, international peacekeepers only play an indirect role in preserving post-civil war democracy. Peacekeepers help to establish durable democratic institutions, which in turn prevent one side from monopolizing the political process. To evaluate this conclusion, I run a Weibull hazard model with accelerated failure time metric. In other words, I examine whether the establishment of electoral reforms increases or decreases the time until countries suffer a democratic failure. In other words, positive values indicate greater democratic stability while negative values indicate less democratic stability.

Table 3.3 Risk of Democratic Failure Model 1 Model 2

Electoral Reform Implementation 1.094** 1.140** (0.465) (0.507) Electoral Reform Provision 0.633*** 0.633*** (0.0314) (0.0314) Total Implementation 1.795*** 1.795*** (0.214) (0.214) lnGDP 0.229*** 0.229*** (0.0546) (0.0548) lnOIL 0.0164*** 0.0164*** (0.00189) (0.00189) Revised Combined Polity Score 0.193*** 0.193*** (0.0106) (0.0106) UN Peacekeeping 2.041*** 1.064 (0.428) (0.681) Time Since Peacekeeping Began 0.0591*** (0.00755) Logged Battle Dead -0.00405 -0.00405 (0.00910) (0.00910) War Duration -0.00152*** -0.00152*** (0.000288) (0.000288) Constant -1.407*** -1.407*** (0.513) (0.514)

Observations 312 312 Wald 5822.09*** 6698.57*** P 37.2 37.2 Number of Subjects 30 30 Number of Failures 4 4 Weibull Duration Model Coefficients Listed Robust standard errors in parentheses *** p<0.01, ** p<0.05, * p<0.1

Table 3.3 presents the results of the hazard model that predicts the impact of electoral reforms on the risk of a democratic failure. As the results demonstrate, electoral reforms significantly increase the amount of democratic stability in post-war countries by reducing the

89 risk of democratic failure. Both the simple inclusion of electoral reforms in peace agreements as well as the implementation of these reforms increases the amount of time until democratic failure occurs. In order to identify the marginal effects of these variables, I calculate the time ratios (or time until failure) for electoral reform provisions and full implementation. The simple inclusion of electoral reform provisions in comprehensive peace agreements increases the amount of time until a democratic failure occurs by 88% (or 푒푥푝0.633∗1 = 1.88). The implementation of these reforms further ensures democratic stability. Specifically, the implementation of electoral reforms increases the time to failure by 199% (or 푒푥푝1.094∗1 = 2.99). This would seem to lend support to Hypothesis 1 that electoral reforms substantially increase post-war democratic stability.

Interestingly, the presence of UN peacekeeping missions also significantly contributes to post-war democratic stability. While I had made the claim earlier that peacekeepers should have an indirect effect on democratic stability by ensuring electoral reforms are implemented, the data suggests that the presence of these peacekeeping missions have a strong direct effect on the risk of democratic failure. The presence of peacekeepers significantly increases the amount of time until a democratic failure occurs. Specifically, peacekeepers increase the time until failure by

670% as compared to post-war countries in which there is no peacekeeping mission present. This finding would suggest that peacekeepers may not only promote post-war democracy, but also deter governments from abandoning the democratic process in favor of more autocratic policies.

In other words, the presence of peacekeeping substantially reduces the risk of autocratic failure.

Of the control variables, oil wealth, logged GDP, total peace agreement implementation, and greater levels of democracy all reduce the risk of democratic failure. Specifically, as post- war governments continue the process of implementing peace agreement provisions, they

90 increase the amount of time until a democratic failure occurs. Equally, post-war governments that have access to oil wealth also substantially increase the amount of time until a democratic failure occurs. This fits within much of the literature on oil wealth and democracy, as access to oil revenues stabilizes regimes, decreasing the chance that governments will make either transitions towards democracy or reversions towards autocracy (Smith 2004). Finally, greater national wealth as measured by the post-war countries logged GDP and greater levels of democracy both increase the amount of time until autocratic failure occurs.

Qualitative Evidence: Ivory Coast

The statistical results appear to contradict many of the theoretical claims made in this chapter. Specifically, the data underscores that electoral reforms are no more or less likely to be included or implemented in peace agreements when international peacekeepers are deployed as part of the mediation effort. On the other hand, peacekeepers appear to play a direct and meaningful role in preventing autocratic reversals in the aftermath of negotiated settlements.

Similarly, electoral reforms substantially reduce the risk that post-civil war governments will suffer a democratic failure. This underscores that electoral reforms and peacekeeping missions are complementary rather than interrelated. The results underscore that peacekeepers play a significant and separate role in preventing autocratic failures as compared to electoral reforms.

The Ivory Coast’s experience illustrates the complementary roles that peacekeepers and electoral reforms play in preventing autocratic reversals. While the use of electoral malfeasance and political violence following the 2010 election may suggest that electoral reforms may be ineffective at preventing governments from abandoning democratic reforms, the story of Cote d’Ivoire’s post-war democratic reforms is slightly more nuanced. Rather, the electoral reforms that were pushed by the international community helped to create one of the first meaningful

91 elections in the Ivory Coast’s history. This contributed to a substantial domestic backlash against the actions of President Laurent Gbagbo in the aftermath of his electoral loss in December of

2010. Additionally the use of military force by peacekeepers, in conjunction with regional and international condemnation, aided enforcing the results of the country’s first post-war election.

Following the independence of the Ivory Coast in 1960, the country’s president, Félix

Houphouët-Boigny, initiated a policy of vast economic expansion (Woods 2003). Throughout the 1960s, 70s, and 80s the Ivorian government sponsored a massive distribution of land to all those willing to produce cocoa (the primary export of the country). Unique in its scope, this offer was made to both indigenous Ivoirians as well as immigrants from neighboring nations such as

Burkina Faso and Ghana. While the policy disproportionally benefited many of the Southern

Christians within the country (especially Houphouët-Boigny’s ethnic group, the Baoule´), this led to an historic expansion of immigrants seeking land ownership (Woods 2003; Collier 2009).

Though this development program fostered substantial economic growth for decades, its efficacy was stymied by stagnating cocoa prices in the late 80s.

With the decline in commodity prices for cocoa, there was a considerable push for democratic reforms. Houphouët-Boigny, who had ruled absolutely through the decades since independence, was forced to compete in open elections. Fortunately for the former president, his years of rewarding supporters and balancing the interests of multiple ethnic groups allowed him to easily regain office after the first multiparty election (Woods 2003; Bellamy and Williams

2011). Unfortunately for Houphouët-Boigny, he died within a few years of retaking his office. In

Houphouët-Boigny’s absence, a power-vacuum emerged that was easily exploited by ethnic and sectarian hardliners within the country. With the decline in the Ivory Coast’s economy, considerable animosity had developed against the migrants who had arrived decades ago. As

92 noted by Woods (2003), the ethnic Baoule´ government had historically offered lax policies over immigration as they tended to benefit from the influx of foreign workers (garnering their political support as well as benefiting from their labor). For most of Ivory Coast’s modern history, immigrants were allowed to vote, own land, and hold political office (Woods 2003). But with the economic decline, members of the indigenous Baoule´ and the Be´te´ ethnic groups began to garner resentment towards perceived foreigners, leading to an effort to restrict their rights

(despite the fact that many of these immigrant families had been a part of Ivoirian politics since the 1970s). Jingoistic politicians, such as Laurent Gbagbo, began openly deriding the role of non-Ivoirians in the government and economy. In an attempt to consolidate his control of the presidency, Henri Konan Bédié, who had taken control of the office after the death of

Houphouët-Boigny, began to exploit sectarian divisions (Bellamy and Williams 2011). In their efforts to exploit popular animosities toward immigrants, Bédié was able to push through a series of electoral laws that limited the role of immigrants in society. For instance, the legislation pushed for by Bédié mandated that candidates must prove their parents were native to the Ivory

Coast in order to run for national office (Woods 2003; Bellamy and Williams 2011). This had the effect of disqualifying Bédié’s strongest opponent, Alassane Ouattara.

The establishment of anti-immigrant legislation as well as the growing social animosity towards all those that were seen as non-Ivoirian led to the armed insurrection in 2002 by the

Patriotic Movement of Côte d’Ivoire (MPCI) (Bellamy and Woods 2011). This armed group was composed largely of former army officers who had become resentful of the Ivoirité policies instituted by the hardliners. The final straw appears to be the election of Laurent Gbagbo, who as a politician was largely seen as the most outspoken against the role of immigrants in the Ivory

Coast. Shortly after the emergence of the MPCI, other smaller armed dissident groups developed,

93 resulting into a broader dissident movement (the Forces Nouvelles) directed against the Gbagbo government. As noted by Bellamy and Woods (2011), “The rebels demanded recognition of their

Ivoirian citizenship, an end to Ivoirité, and transparent elections.”(830) Despite a substantial international presence from regional, UN, and French peacekeepers, violence within the country continued until 2007 when the Ouagadougou Peace Agreement was established.

The peace agreement focused heavily on the role of citizenship within the Ivory Coast.

Specifically, Ouagadougou Peace Agreement established mechanisms for generating a clear process to allow immigrants (and the children of immigrants) to gain “Substitute Birth

Certificates” (Ouagadougou Peace Agreement, section 1.3.1.2). Most importantly, this allowed for an expansion of voter rolls as well as a mechanism to allow perceived non-Ivorians to compete in elections as candidates and through new parties. Mobile Courts were established to move through the countryside to provide new birth certificates to the population as well as register new voters. As part of the peace process, foreign peacekeepers monitored the establishment of these reforms, ensuring that each stage of the electoral reform would be implemented. Additionally, foreign observers were to observe the 2010 presidential election.

At the initial stages of the election, it became clear that Ouattara (Gbagbo’s main challenger) would defeat him. Following the first round of votes in October 2010, Ouattara seemed to have a clear lead over the sitting president Laurent Gbagbo. Unfortunately, President

Gbagbo began to undermine the electoral process by engaging in voter intimidation and violence.

Despite pro-Gbagbo efforts to steal the election, the results tallied in early December clearly demonstrated that Ouattara had won the election. Faced with the prospect of being removed from office, Gbagbo attempted to conceal the results of the election and sought to discount 660,000 votes (Bellamy and Williams 2011). This action spurred thousands of citizens to take to the

94 streets in protest which in turn triggered severe government repression. By January of 2011, violence had resumed throughout parts of the country. At the same time, the international community (having largely agreed that Ouattara was the victor), expanded its mission beyond protecting civilians to degrading Gbagbo’s ability to engage in political violence. In conjunction with Republican Forces of Côte d’Ivoire (troops supporting Ouattara), the international community oversaw the detainment of Gbagbo and the handover of power to the popularly elected Alassane Ouattara.

The Ivory Coast is an excellent example of the complimentary role peacekeeping plays with electoral reforms because of the events that occurred following the 2010 election. On the face of it, the emergence of voter intimidation and the unwillingness of Laurent Gbagbo to step down would suggest that electoral reforms were unable to effectively safeguard the country against autocratic backsliding. Equally these actions suggest that the international community was unable to deter Gbagbo from abandoning the democratic process in favor of consolidating his control. Similarly, a series of reprisal attacks began to spread throughout the countryside fostering renewed instability. These factors, though, were also accompanied by dramatic changes that also ensured the stability of this post-war country. Given that years of implementing electoral reforms had greatly expanded the voter rolls as well as opened up the election to previously excluded candidates, the presidential race of 2010 had garnered considerable international attention. Following the election, the international community largely agreed that

Ouattara had in fact won the election and that Gbagbo should step down as a result. This finding also translated into broad domestic agreement within the Ivory Coast that Ouattara was the clear victor (Straus 2012). As noted by Bellamy and Williams (2011), the broad international recognition that Ouattara was the clear winner of the 2010 presidential election helped to

95 undercut Gbagbo’s strategy of promoting confusion and disagreement in order to prolong his stay in office. In conjunction with ECOWAS denunciations and sanctions against the illegitimate

Gbagbo regime, French and UN forces stepped up their attacks on pro-Gbagbo militants. This aggressive policy received little international condemnation (though Russian and Indian diplomats did complain that the use of force exceeded the mandate that the peacekeepers operated under). The establishment of electoral reforms provided the foundations for a meaningful election which in turn informed the international community as to which candidate was the actual victor. At the same time, the strong international presence facilitated the establishment of these reforms as well as allowed for the international community to sanction the

Gbagbo regime for attempting to backtrack on the establishment of these reforms.

Possibly the largest impact, though, of electoral reforms was the Ivorian reaction to the

2010 elections. While it is undoubtedly true that the pro-Gbagbo militants engaged in targeted post-war violence, the broader civilian body respected the election results. As noted by Scott

Straus, a longtime observer of politics in the Ivory Coast, opposition against Gbagbo’s intransigence was fairly widespread (Straus 2012). Specifically, as rebels sought to remove

Gbagbo after the 2010 election, there was broad civilian support for their efforts. Furthermore,

Straus notes that the army largely “stood down” (Straus 2012, 188) and allowed rebels, with

French and UN support, to remove the Gbagbo from office. In short, the reforms established following the 2007 peace agreement ensured that the 2010 elections had meaningful political competition, which in turn made it much more difficult for Gbagbo to abandon the democratic process and consolidate his control. These same electoral reforms have also helped to ensure that the recent 2015 presidential elections proceeded peacefully.

Conclusion

Contrary to this chapter’s theoretical arguments, international peacekeepers play a direct and substantial role in preventing democratic failure. Previous literature on the survival of democracy has posited that the preservation of democratic processes requires critical economic stability (Svolik 2008), nationwide interpersonal trust and values of cooperation (Inglehart and

Welzel 2005), as well as the absence of vast natural resources that may stabilize the status quo

(Benjamin 2004; Dunning 2010). While peacekeepers do not appear to play a significant role in assisting with the establishment of electoral reforms, their presence complements the effects of electoral reforms on reducing the risk of autocratic reversals. By resolving commitment problems as well as levying considerable pressure on combatants to abide by the terms of the agreement, peacekeepers appear to deter elites from abandoning the democratic reforms in favor of more autocratic policies. Equally, electoral reforms provide new institutional mechanisms that foster greater political competition, which in turn prevent one party from monopolizing the political process and hindering future democratization. This process suggests that the international community may play a more direct role in preserving post-war democracy.

This proposition fits well with previous findings that argue that peacekeepers play a positive role in democratization as well as past findings that have argued that peacekeepers play little or no role in the democratization process. As noted by Joshi (2013b), international observers may be able to promote greater democratization by offering expertise as well as pressuring combatants to abide by the terms of the agreement. While Joshi posited that this will lead directly to post-war democratization, I argue that peacekeepers assist with preventing relapses into autocracy. As demonstrated by the statistical results and further elaborated by the

Cote d’Ivoire example, peacekeepers play a complementary role with electoral reforms. While the establishment of electoral reforms generates meaningful political competition, which reduces

97 the risk of autocratic reversal, peacekeepers appear to deter elites from abandoning democratic reforms in favor of more autocratic policies. This ties into Paris’ (2004) argument about the ineffectiveness of past peacebuilding operations. As suggested by Paris, the international community often sought to rush post-war governments into elections and market liberalization before communities had a time to adjust and new institutions to handle post-war democracy.

Inevitably, this quick and dirty push for elections fostered new electoral competition in systems that had been previously rigged by supporters of the incumbent government. Similar to Paris’ claim, I argue that reforms to the electoral laws within a country generate more durable post-war institutions. Equally, the presence of international forces deters elites within the incumbent government from abandoning the reform process before new institutions are put into place.

The policy implications for this research should be rather straightforward. Following the end of civil wars, post-war governments who are led largely by incumbents of the past regime may be unwilling to foster new changes to their institutions. Even if elites agree to new changes to the electoral laws within the country, they may have no intention of following through with such costly reforms. Similarly, their supporters may place considerable pressure on them to avoid implementing new electoral laws so that they may be able to maintain the status quo. The international community may be able to resolve this probable foot-dragging on the part of the incumbent government so as to prevent governments from abandoning the democratization effort before new institutions are established. The international community should therefore pressure elites to follow through with terms of the peace agreement even if such pressure draws ire from combatants. While Cote d’Ivoire witnessed some violence in the 2010 elections (as well as continued fighting in 2011), the incumbent government was unsuccessful at derailing the

98 democratic process. With considerable international pressure, Gbagbo acquiesced to the demands of the French and UN peacekeepers and stepped down from power.

CHAPTER IV

ELECTORAL REFORMS AND POST-CIVIL WAR ELECTION VIOLENCE

Introduction

One contemporary dilemma faced by the international community is the establishment of democracy in war-torn countries. Specifically, with regard to civil wars, the international community struggles with both promoting democracy and ensuring that fragile post-civil war societies have adequate security. As has been noted in previous research (Flores and Noorudin

2012; Brancati and Snyder 2013; Joshi et al. 2015a), the initial post-civil war elections run the risk of sending the country back into civil war. Brancati and Snyder (2013) note that this is because armed militant groups, who are generally the most organized post-war groups in society, are willing to engage in political violence to consolidate their control or use political violence to undermine unfavorable election results. With this in mind, what determines whether groups in the post-war environment use political violence? Additionally, and maybe more importantly, when do such groups use political violence to undermine the electoral process and destabilize post-war elections, or use political violence to influence the outcomes of elections? While past studies have examined the connection between elections and civil war recurrence, few studies can tell us when and where instrumental election related political violence emerges in the post- war environment.

I present a theory of post-war election related political violence that suggests that such violence may be used to consolidate power or disrupt the political process. Political violence that is tied to elections in the post-war environment is in part a product of changing political institutions. As comprehensive peace agreements (CPAs) may reshape political institutions, actors in society respond to these institutional changes by either working within the new

100 institutional framework or by using political violence to either consolidate their control over political office or disrupt the political process. Institutional changes that are called for in peace agreements may empower dissidents to use institutional mechanisms to address their concerns, rather than engaging in political violence to renegotiate the status quo. Specifically, the use of peace agreement provisions that reform electoral laws to ensure that elections are more representative and competitive provides aggrieved citizens with the ability to meaningfully participate in the political process. By electoral laws, I mean the laws that dictate who is allowed to participate in elections through voting, who is allowed to compete in elections as candidates or parties, as well as how votes are translated into national representation through electoral systems.

Reforms to these laws should reduce the desire for the disinherited to use political violence as a means to effect political change. As past electoral laws may have been a mechanism to prevent meaningful competition prior to and during the civil war, reforms to the electoral process may reduce antigovernment violence in society. These laws should be especially effective at reducing antigovernment violence during elections, as dissidents would seek to undermine the electoral process if they felt excluded.

Unfortunately, electoral reforms may also increase the desire on the part of the incumbent government to engage in more political violence so as to consolidate its control over the state.

Prior to the establishment of such reforms, elites may have used electoral laws to ensure that their supporters were able to gain access to political office without facing meaningful competition. On the other hand, once electoral reforms are put into place, supporters of the government may face actual competition for political office. With the electoral game rigged in their favor, supporters of the government may not have had to engage in violence to ensure their place within the government. Electoral reforms, in effect, weaken the position of government

101 supporters. As noted by past research on political violence, especially with regards to election violence, groups in weaker positions are often likely to engage in political violence as opposed to using institutional avenues (Bratton 2008; Wilkinson and Haid 2009). This would suggest that, prior to the establishment of electoral reforms, opposition groups would engage in considerable antigovernment violence during elections. Once these reforms have been established, opposition forces are able to compete effectively without resorting to political violence. This effective competition, though, presents a threat to the status quo. Supporters of the incumbent government, fearful of losing influence with the government, engage in political violence during the election as a way to ensure victory or destabilize the process after an electoral loss. In short, I argue that institutional changes generated by peace agreements reshape the incentives for political actors to engage in political violence during post-war elections. Changes to the electoral process that are called for in peace agreements will reduce the incentive for dissidents to engage in political violence during elections as new electoral rules allow opposition groups to compete more effectively during elections. This increase in electoral competition presents a threat to beneficiaries of the status quo. Supporters of the incumbent government engage in political violence so as to preserve their dominant position in society.

The findings of this chapter, though, present a different picture. While I present a theory that electoral reforms should decrease antigovernment election related violence and increase pro- government election related violence, the results suggest the opposite. The results demonstrate that while electoral reforms have no statistical relationship with antigovernment election related violence, the establishment of these reforms actually decrease pro-government election related violence. Specifically, the establishment of electoral reforms reduces the total number of pro- government election related violent events following the establishment of electoral reforms.

102

While the establishment of electoral reforms increases the risk that elites within the incumbent government are elected out of office as a result of more competitive elections, they also ensure that those same elites are offered an opportunity to retake their position through future free and fair elections.

In the following sections I underscore the challenges that the international community faces when promoting democracy in war-torn states. I then present a novel theory of how the establishment of electoral reforms as part of the peace process reduces the incentives of dissidents to engage in political violence during elections, while at the same time increasing the incentive of government supporters to engage in political violence during elections. To assess these claims, I examine the use of election related political violence following the establishment of comprehensive peace agreements from 1990-2012 in Africa and Latin America. Using negative binomial regressions, I show that electoral reforms actually reduce the amount of pro- government election related violence in the post-war environment. Unfortunately, electoral reforms appear to play little or no role in determining whether dissidents engage in antigovernment election related violence. The results also suggest that the presence of international peacekeepers substantially reduces the use of election related political violence while the establishment of transitional political power-sharing governments increases the use of election related political violence.

The War-to-Democracy Dilemma

Past research on the determinants of post-war peace has emphasized the need to reduce commitment problems between combatants so as to prevent a recurrence of war (Walter 1997;

2002). The body of research to date emphasizes the need to increase the cost of defecting from peace agreements as a mechanism to ensure durable peace (Mattes and Savun 2009), the use of

103 power-sharing institutions in order to make the political process transparent (Hartzell and Hoddie

2003; 2007), and the deployment of third party monitors to reduce commitment problems

(Walter 2002; Fortna 2004). Unfortunately, these previous approaches tend to avoid democratic reforms as a mechanism to promote post-war stability.

Rather, some solutions for promoting durable post-war peace run contrary to establishing more democratic institutions (Fortna 2008). Rothchild and Roeder (2005) contend that power- sharing, while effective at initiating peaceful settlements, is often unable to generate a consolidation of the peace. By consolidating peaceful settlements, Rothchild and Roeder refer to the process by which warring parties use institutional mechanisms to resolve their own grievances. The authors suggest that transitional political power-sharing institutions are effectively undemocratic as they place unelected officials in government. Furthermore, Jarstad

(2008) contends that such institutions may lead to greater political discontent as past abusers of human rights in the incumbent government and rebel movement are effectively rewarded by receiving positions within the transitional government. So while political power-sharing as a device may reduce commitment problems between opponents, such institutions may also breed social discontent in the broader population to the extent that they are perceived as undemocratic.

On the other hand, democratic reforms may also generate considerable discontent as well

(Jarstad and Sisk 2008; Flores and Noorudin 2012; Brancati and Snyder 2013). Elections often align the public along wartime cleavages (Paris 2004), as well as generate new opportunities for spoilers to participate in political violence so as to disrupt the peace process (Hoglund 2008).

Finally, electoral defeat may push former militants to resume the civil war so as to ensure their place in future governments (Brancati and Snyder 2013). Considerable empirical research has emerged to suggest that post-war elections increase the risk of civil war recurrence (Flores and

104

Noorudin 2012; Brancati and Snyder 2013; Joshi et al. 2015a; Keels 2015). As suggested by

Brancati and Snyder (2013), this risk is, in part, a product of the fact that militant groups (outside of the government) are the most well organized organizations in the post-war environment. Past research has gone as far as to suggest that post-war elections should be postponed in order to allow civil society organizations to emerge and represent an organized alternative to armed groups (Paris 2004; Brancati and Snyder 2013). On the other hand, Joshi et al. (2015a) note that peacebuilders tend to be under considerable pressure from opposition forces to form new governments after the establishment of a settlement. This past research generally argues that the politics of post-war elections incentivize elites and dissidents to engage in political violence and other illicit electioneering so as to consolidate their control of the government by ensuring electoral victory. Unfortunately, the measures employed by the researchers only capture the emergence of civil war rather than the use of low-level political violence short of civil war that they theorize about. We therefore know very little about the use of low-level political violence in post-war environments or the use of violence that emerges during post-war elections.

Hoglund (2008) suggests that these initial post-war elections create a ripe opportunity for spoilers to undermine the peace process. As elections often cement the peace process as well as legitimize new post-war governments, they are an excellent target for spoilers (Stedman 1997) who wish to renegotiate the terms of the peace agreement. The perpetrators of violence are often militant factions left out of the peace process. As noted by Hoglund (2008), the use of more inclusive institutions should reduce the desire on the part of spoilers to engage in political violence.

Election Violence as a Tool

105

While, arguably, the connection between violence and elections reaches back to the 19th century, the phenomenon has been relatively ignored by social science researchers. However, there has been a dramatic rise in the number of new studies examining the link between elections and violence (Cederman et al. 2010; Cederman et al. 2013b; Collier et al. 2009; Bratton 2008;

Wilkinson 2004; etc.). This chapter looks specifically at the strategic use of election violence by either the incumbent government or opposition groups. Election violence is generally a tool used to shape the outcome of the elections. As noted by Straus and Taylor (2012) in their study of election violence in Africa, elites within the government or groups who support those elites are often the main perpetrators of election related violence. The authors demonstrate that the majority of election related violence occurs before the votes are cast or after the actual elections as a way to contest unfavorable results. For instance, elites and their supporters engage in political violence as a way to intimidate voters in order to vote for them (Bratton 2008). These same beneficiaries of the status quo may also engage in political violence so as to ensure that potential opposition voters do not show up to the polls (Fjelde and Hoglund 2015). As noted by

Fjelde and Hoglund (2015), elites may engage in political violence to displace potential opposition voters well before official campaigning may begin. Hafner-Burton et al. (2014) also suggests that violence may be used by elites to ensure electoral victory. In their cross national study of election violence, the authors argue that elites within the incumbent government are more likely to use political violence ahead of elections when they expect to face increased political competition. Violence is therefore a means to prevent meaningful political competition.

Opposition parties also engage in election related violence so as to ensure favorable results.

Collier et al (2009) suggests that violence is used by weak candidates who lack the resources or political authority to offer preferential policies to attract votes. While elites within the

106 government also maintain the ability to bribe supporters through preferential policies in the future, opposition groups often lack the ability to offer favorable policies in the present. Given this disadvantage, Collier et al. (2009) suggest that opposition groups may use violence as a means to gain an edge during the election.

While Collier et al. (2009) only demonstrate these findings formally, their conclusions have been supported to a great degree by Wilkinson (2004) and Wilkinson and Haid (2009).

Wilkinson’s (2004) analysis of electoral violence demonstrates that it is an effective tool used by political parties locally to rally support. As noted by Wilkinson, the nationalist Hindu party would stoke riots as a way to promote insecurity and draw out their hardline supporters. This was largely done when there was fear that moderate parties, such as the Congress Party, would attract more moderate Hindu voters in competitive districts. Dunning (2011) comes to a similar conclusion, positing that parties will use violence as a means to bolster support for their side.

While election violence suppresses votes for opponents, it also may also underscore political, religious, or ethnic cleavages in society. Election violence is therefore part of a larger strategy of ethnic or sectarian outbidding (Horowitz 1985). Violence perpetrated by Hindu nationalists in the lead up to regional elections was aimed largely to draw out low-caste Hindu voters who had biases against Muslims (Wilkinson and Haid 2009).

But despite the advances made in analyzing the use of electoral violence, little is known about the use of violence in the post-war setting (Hoglund 2008). Recent work by Salehyan and

Linebarger (2015) note, that elections exacerbate social tensions in states with weak or fragile institutions. For instance, their study demonstrates that countries emerging from civil wars are more likely to see greater social unrest as a result of election. Little is known, though, about what drives election related violence in the aftermath of civil wars. Furthermore, there is even less that

107 is known as to what the international community can do so as to prevent the occurrence of election violence in the aftermath of civil wars.

Theory

This theory rests on a few assumptions. First, I assume that post-civil war election violence can be an instrumental act to destabilize the post-civil war electoral process or to shape the outcomes of the elections. As political violence may intimidate voters, elites within the government or the opposition leaders may hope to steal elections through coercive measures.

Additionally, as post-civil war elections are critical for cementing the peace agreement and establishing credible post-war institution, unstable elections should undermine the peace process and force participants to renegotiate the terms of the settlement. Therefore, violence may be used in an attempt to steal the election or undermine the process. I also assume that the use of post- war election violence is used by both members of the opposition and by supporters of the sitting government. While both government supporters and opposition leaders may engage in political violence, their reasons may be vastly different. Opposition leaders will engage in political violence during elections when they feel that the political process is rigged against them. If institutions are established to prevent meaningful competition, then dissidents will resort to antigovernment violence during elections. On the other hand, government supporters are much more likely to engage in political violence when there is greater political competition. While leaders within the incumbent government may have agreed to reforms in the electoral process as a way to end the civil war, they may have little or no intention to actually complying with these new institutional changes. Under international pressure, these elites are forced to expand voter rolls or allow new opposition parties to form. As competitive elections may threaten the current distribution of goods and services, supporters of the incumbent government are much more likely

108 to engage in political violence. Therefore, reforms within comprehensive peace agreements

(CPAs) that are designed to reform the electoral system should decrease the amount of antigovernment violence during post-war elections while increasing the amount of pro- government violence during elections.

Election violence is a strategy pursued by elites within the government and by opposition groups to either influence the results of the election or undermine the process in general. The choice to use violence is one of many options available to elites and opposition forces. For instance, elites could attempt to ensure electoral victory by promising greater spending on public goods so as to ameliorate citizen concerns. This is a difficult task, though, in the post-war environment. By spending portions of public wealth on this newly mobilized segment of society, they may ensure that they will stay in office, but it reduces the total amount of wealth they can spend on themselves or their supporters (Bueno de Mesquita et al. 2003). Low wealth within nations should exacerbate this problem, as there are fewer resources to distribute. As civil wars decimate the amount of wealth within the developing world, elites within the incumbent government may not have the capacity to offer public goods so as to ensure their electoral victory. Additionally, elites could offer bribes to the citizenry as a way to promote greater loyalty

(Bratton 2008). Unfortunately, Bratton (2008) notes that bribes are often an ineffective mechanism to steal elections as there is no verification system to ensure that agents actually vote the way they were told to. Rather, Bratton (2008) notes that voters will often take the money and vote against their principals so as to punish them for attempting to steal the election.

Given the limitations of the post-war environment, election violence remains an attractive mechanism for elites and opposition groups to either ensure electoral victory or undermine the political process if there is no hope of electoral victory. This is especially true given that civil

109 wars give rise to multiple militant groups that have the capacity to inflict considerable harm on the civilian population. As noted by Brancati and Snyder (2013), former militant groups often remain the most organized political groups in the post-war environment; making elections very contentious affairs. These groups are capable of using violence to intimidate possible voters or to undermine the political process if they fear a loss at the polls. While these different strategies may seem at odds with one another, it is not uncommon for elites within the government or opposition groups to use violence for both of these reasons. For instance, during the first post- war election in the Ivory Coast, Laurent Gbagbo initially had pro-government militias and armed forces use political violence in an attempt to intimidate voters in competitive districts. Following the announcement of his defeat, pro-government forces engaged in further political violence so as to undermine the results and give the outgoing president the opportunity to call for new elections on the grounds of electoral malfeasance. Given that political violence is so attractive during post-war elections, the international community may prompt reforms so as to dissuade groups from participating in violence. This may involve transitional power-sharing governments, international monitors, or reforms to electoral laws.

Electoral reforms are often included in peace agreements as a way to address past exclusionary policies. Specifically, government officials have historically rewritten past electoral laws to limit political competition and ensure their grasp on political office. Electoral laws are attractive mechanisms for elites to manipulate the political process. Laws may be used to prevent large segments of society from competing in elections as was the case in Cote d’Ivoire and

Djibouti. In the case of the Ivory Coast and Djibouti, the laws placed strict citizenship requirements for participating in elections. These laws also limit the presence of opposition political parties in elections. For instance, under the guise of security concerns Egypt has banned

110 the Muslim Brotherhood from participating in elections following the recent military coup.

Finally, electoral laws may alter how votes are translated into seats at the national level through changes to the electoral system used as was the case in Lebanon and Aceh. Redistricting in

Lebanon limited the number of Muslims in parliament, while the sub-national military government in Aceh, Indonesia was able to dilute the representation of secessionist parties with laws instituted in the 1970s. In each instance, elites within the government were able to change how elections were conducted so as to ensure a favorable outcome. This, in turn, often generates considerable antipathy from opposition groups. Unable to affect political change through conventional participation, dissidents often pursue political violence as a means to renegotiate the status quo.

If these electoral institutions remain intact in the post-war environment, it greatly undermines the willingness of opposition groups to participate in the post-war elections. To the extent that the rules are designed to maintain exclusionary policies favoring supporters of the incumbent government, opposition groups have an incentive to participate in political violence as a means to renegotiate the status quo. Manipulated electoral laws will also encourage dissidents to use political violence during post-war elections so as to undermine the electoral process with the hopes of renegotiating the status quo. While officially boycotting the elections, opposition groups may also participate in bombings, shootings, and other forms of targeted political violence in an effort to dissuade voters from showing up at the polls.

This was, in part, why past settlements failed during the Lebanese Civil War. As noted by

Deeb and Deeb (1995), the civil war began as a protest against changes instituted by President

Sham’un designed to consolidate Christian authority over the Lebanese state. In his history of

Modern of Lebanon, Trabousli (2007) noted that,

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These changes remained in effect throughout many of the short-term settlements, leading to considerable social discontent on the part of Sunni, Druze, and Shia Lebanese (Trabousli 2007).

It was not until the establishment of the Ta’if Peace Accords of 1989 that the terms of the electoral system were renegotiated so as to allow for greater political representation of Muslims within the government.

There is a cost, though, to the establishment of electoral reforms. Because supporters of the government relied on those laws to ensure their access to state resources, reforms to election laws may alter future distributions of goods and services. Electoral reforms therefore represent a threat to the supporters of the status quo. As electoral reforms are designed in part to make elections more competitive, the government’s supporters may feel under pressure to ensure future electoral victories through illicit forms of electioneering. While elites within the incumbent government may have agreed to changes in the electoral process as a result of international pressure, they may have had little interest in following through with the reforms.

Rather, the use of political violence in the run up to and the aftermath of elections may throw the results of elections into doubt. Elites may use the resulting chaos as a bargaining chip for maintaining the previous system. This was, in part, one reason why Maronite militias as well as the Lebanese National Army engaged in large-scale political violence following the establishment of the Ta’if Accords. While Christian leadership complained about the Syrian presence in Lebanon, observers also noticed that such violence hindered future enactment of

112 electoral reforms which would greatly diminish Christian authority in the central government.

Electoral reforms therefore represent a potential double edged sword for peacebuilding efforts.

Hypothesis 1: Electoral reforms included in peace agreements will reduce the amount of post- civil war election violence committed against the government.

Hypothesis 2: Electoral reforms included in peace agreements will increase the amount of election violence committed on behalf of the government.

Research Design

To test these hypotheses, I look at the use of election related violence following the establishment of comprehensive peace agreements from 1990-2012. My domain of cases is drawn from the Peace Agreement Matrix Implementation Dataset (Joshi et al. 2015). My sample of comprehensive peace agreements comes from the Peace Accords Matrix Implementation

Dataset (Joshi et al. 2015). The Peace Accords Matrix Implementation Dataset (or PAM_ID) includes data on the various types of provisions included in 34 comprehensive peace agreements from 1989-2012. Specifically, the PAM_ID dataset includes detailed data on the degree of implementation of 51 different types of provisions within peace agreements. These data range from the traditional disarmament and demobilization provisions to provisions that call for greater inclusion of women within government (Joshi et al. 2015). As previous studies on election violence have used the country-month as the unit of observation (Salehyan and Linebarger 2015;

Fjelde and Hoglund 2015), my unit of analysis will be the post-civil war country month.

My dependent variables, pro-government and antigovernment election violence, are drawn from the Social Conflict Analysis Dataset (Salehyan et al. 2012). The Social Conflict

Analysis Database (or SCAD) collects data on contentious political behavior within Africa and

Latin America from 1990-2012. This unfortunately limits my analysis to election related

113 violence in the aftermath of comprehensive peace agreements in Latin America and Africa from

1990-2012, providing a total of 17 post-war countries.7 SCAD is an event dataset that includes contentious political behavior such as protests, strikes, riots, as well as pro-government and antigovernment violence. These data are coded from Associated Press and Agence France Presse news wires (Salehyan et al. 2012; Fjelde and Hoglunnd 2015). The data are also coded by the issue and target of political behavior. This allows for the user of the dataset to isolate their analysis only to contentious behavior related to elections. As noted earlier, my primary dependent variables are pro-government and antigovernment election related violence. Pro- government violence is coded in the SCAD dataset as violence perpetrated by the government

(or on behalf of the government) against opposition figures or groups (Saleyhan et al. 2012).

Antigovernment violence is coded as organized violence against the government or government related targets perpetrated by non-governmental groups. Essentially, antigovernment violence in the SCAD dataset is violence perpetrated by organized opposition groups against the state while pro-government violence is violence perpetrated by the government against opposition groups.8

For the purposes of this chapter, pro-government election violence is coded as all instances of pro-government violence that are related to elections as indicated by the SCAD dataset.

Similarly, antigovernment election violence is coded as all instances of antigovernment violence

7 Guatemala, El Salvador, Guinea-Bissau, Mali, Senegal, Niger, Ivory Coast, Liberia, Sierra Leone, Congo-Brazzaville, Burundi, Rwanda, Djibouti, Angola, Mozambique, South Africa, Sudan 8 This measurement does not include “Extra-government Violence” which looks at organized violence between non-governmental actors. The decision to exclude these events from the analysis is largely driven by theoretical concerns. While dissidents may attack supporters of the government rather than directly targeting state targets, this measure also includes instances of communal violence where ethnic groups engage in extra-governmental score settling. Including such events in this analysis may bias the analysis. 114 that are related to elections. This operationalization of antigovernment and pro-government election violence is similar to that used by Fjelde and Hoglund (2015). As noted by the authors,

We identify electoral violence by issue – not simply by timing – for two reasons. First, electoral violence can occur at any time during an electoral cycle. Forcible displacement of voters ahead of voter registration and candidate intimidation during party primaries are two examples of electoral violence occurring well before the electoral campaigning and voting operations begin. Secondly, an approach that simply includes all violent events during a delineated period around elections independent of issues risks pooling together very heterogeneous forms of political violence, of which only some are related to the elections. Some of this violence might include armed conflict events, and this might weaken the explanatory power of theories relating specifically to electoral violence. (Fjelde and Hoglund 2015, 11)

In Fjelde and Hoglund’s (2015) analysis, they operationalize their dependent variable as a binary indicator of whether pro-government or antigovernment election violence occurred within a country month. As opposed to their work, I will use a count of all pro-government and antigovernment election violence that occurred within a country month. While this analysis looks at all instances of pro-government and antigovernment election related violence regardless of timing, I include a control for whether the violence occurs within three months of the election.

Specifically, the control Election Months measures the month in which the election takes place as well as the three months prior to the election and the three months after the election takes place. This is a binary measure where a one indicates an election month and a zero otherwise.

My primary independent variable, Electoral Reform, is drawn from the PAM_ID dataset.

For the purposes of this analysis, the PAM_ID dataset includes detailed information on which peace agreements established electoral reforms and which peace agreements did not. Joshi et al.

(2015) describe these reforms as:

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system more democratic and inclusive…Electoral Reform deals with changes to electoral rules, institutions or arrangements. (Joshi et al. 2015 Online Appendix, 18)

The PAM_ID data are set up as an ordinal scale from 0-3, where zero indicates that no electoral reforms have been established and three indicating that the post-war government has fully implemented electoral reforms. Unfortunately, the PAM_ID dataset provides annualized implementation data, not monthly. As my unit of analysis is the post-war country month, annualized data may suggest that reforms have been established prior to the election when in fact reforms were implemented following the election. Given this, I include a binary control variable that measures whether the electoral reforms were implemented prior to the election or whether electoral reforms were implemented following the election.

I also draw on factors related to civil war recurrence as controls for this analysis. Post- war election violence may in fact spur the recurrence of civil war (Brancati and Snyder 2013).

Therefore it is prudent in any study of post-civil war election violence to account for many of the factors that drive post-civil war stability (and instability). As noted by past research on negotiated settlements, combatants often face commitment problems when entering into peace agreements (Walter 2002; Fortna 2004; Mattes and Savun 2009). Specifically, civil war protagonists are generally concerned that their opponents will not abide by the terms of the settlement. Therefore, the post-war peace process often includes measures to address this commitment problem. Recent work by Joshi and Quinn (2016) notes, that the durability of comprehensive peace agreements often relies on the degree to which peace agreements are implemented. As provisions in peace agreements are implemented, combatants become more confident in the peace process, thereby reducing concerns that their opponents will not commit to the terms of the agreement. I therefore include a control for the degree to which peace agreements have been implemented. Using data from the PAM_ID, I generated a measure that

116 ranges from 0-1 and reflects the percent of implementation of peace agreements.9 Previous work has also noted that successful agreements often include international peacekeepers to act as third party monitors (Walter 2002; Fortna 2004). Using data from Mullenbach (2005), I include a binary measure for the presence of international peacekeeping forces. Finally, past research has demonstrated that transitional political power-sharing agreements may assuage combatant concerns by making the political process transparent (Hartzell and Hoddie 2003; Hartzell and

Hoddie 2015). I use data from the PAM_ID dataset to include a measure of whether a transitional political power-sharing government has been established (Joshi et al. 2015). Similar to electoral reforms, Joshi et al. (2015) measures transitional political power-sharing provisions as ordinal scales, where a zero indicates that the provisions have not been put into place and a three indicates that the provisions have been fully implemented.

I also introduce controls for factors associated with the previous conflict. Specifically, I include a measure for conflict intensity as well as conflict duration. Past research on civil war recurrence has noted that more violent civil wars often have the most fragile post-war environments (Quinn et al. 2007; Mason et al. 2011). To account for this, I include a measure for the logged total deaths in the previous civil war. On the other hand, past research has noted that longer civil wars tend to generate more durable post-civil war settlements (Walter 2002; Walter

2009; Mason et al. 2011). I therefore include a control for the duration of the previous civil war.

I also include a control for the number of previous civil wars as measured by the UCDP Conflict

Termination Dataset. Finally, the timing of elections often influences whether armed groups will

9 Specifically, the measure is the number of provisions implemented divided by the number of provisions agreed to. This measure changes as more peace agreement provisions are implemented. 117 attempt to destabilize post-war elections (Brancati and Snyder 2013). Given this past finding, I include a control for the time since the previous civil war ended.

Finally, I include the logged GDP Per Capita of post-war states as a control for national wealth. Additionally, I account for the degree of democracy within the post-war country using the Polity II indicator from the Polity IV database. This is a 21 point ordinal scale, ranging from -

10 (complete autocracy) to +10 (complete democracy). Similar to recent studies on the success of comprehensive peace agreements, this variable is lagged (Joshi et al. 2015). It should also be noted that there may be some collinearity between my primary independent variable (Electoral

Reform) and changes in the Polity II scale. Specifically, changes in electoral laws that ensure more competitive and representative elections will also underscore further democratization.

Fortunately, correlation tests indicate that there is very little multi-collinearity between these different variables. To control for temporal dependence, I include a lagged measure of pro- government election violence and a lagged measure of antigovernment election violence. As past pro-government violence may lead to future antigovernment violence (and vice versa), I include the lagged measure of antigovernment and progovernment election violence in each model. As the primary dependent variable is a count of violent events during elections, all models will be estimated with a negative binomial regression (Long 1997).

Results

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Table 4.1: Model 1 Model 2 Negative Binomial Regression Pro-government Antigovernment Pro-Government and Antigovernment Election Election Election Violence Violence Violence lagged ProGov Violence 0.674*** 0.847** (0.254) (0.345) lagged AntiGov Violence 0.499*** 0.712*** (0.125) (0.180) Allegations of Fraud -21.22*** 1.736*** (1.006) (0.596) Election Months -0.0662 0.355 (0.291) (0.298) International Election Monitors 0.605 -0.694 (1.053) (0.536) Peacekeeping Mission -3.293*** -1.477*** (1.147) (0.544) Transitional Political Power-Sharing 2.331*** 1.525*** (0.744) (0.388) Number of Previous Conflicts -0.758* 0.352** (0.417) (0.160) Electoral Reform -0.765*** -0.0648 (0.240) (0.277) Reform Prior to Elections 0.238 0.656 (0.770) (0.505) lnGDP 0.262 -0.508* (0.562) (0.295) Lagged Polity 2 -0.0367 -0.0433* (0.0352) (0.0256) War Duration -0.00840*** 0.00533*** (0.00163) (0.00187) Logged Battle Deaths 0.707*** 0.170* (0.163) (0.0982) Total Peace Agreement Implementation -0.642 -4.367*** (0.994) (1.591) Time Since War -0.00552 0.0374 (0.0568) (0.0478) Constant -8.058*** 0.415 (2.438) (2.234)

Observations 2,723 2,723

Robust standard errors clustered by countries in parentheses. *** p<0.01, ** p<0.05, * p<0.1

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Table 4.1 presents the results of the negative binomial regressions. Specifically, Model 1 presents the relationship between electoral reforms and the use of pro-government election related violence. Model 2 presents the relationship between electoral reforms and the use of antigovernment election related violence. The results do not appear to support either Hypothesis

1 or Hypothesis 2. The findings in Table 4.1 demonstrate that electoral reforms have no statistical effect on the number of antigovernment election related violent events. In other words, the establishment of electoral reforms in the post-war environment appears to have no significant effect on whether dissidents attempt to engage in illicit electioneering through political violence.

On the other hand, the results appear to demonstrate that the establishment of electoral reforms significantly reduces the number of pro-government election related violent events. This finding not only does not support Hypothesis 2, but it suggests the opposite: the establishment of electoral reforms reduces the number of pro-government election related violent events.

While these results suggest a statistical relationship between electoral reform and the number of pro-government election related violent events, they do not provide any illustration as to the marginal effects of electoral reforms on political violence. To identify the substantive effects of electoral reforms on the number of violent events that occur during post-war elections I calculate the Incident Rate Ratios (IRR) for my variables of interest. The IRR is simply an exponentiated coefficient that expresses a percentage increase or decrease in the number of events based on changes in the variable of interest. Values above one indicate a percentage increase in the number of events and values below one indicate a percentage decrease in the number of events. Calculating the IRR for electoral reforms on the number of pro-government election related violent events demonstrates a substantial marginal effect. The full

120 implementation of electoral reforms reduces the number of pro-government election related violent events by 90% (or {100*[(푒−0.765∗3)-1]}=-89.9%).

While this finding is surprising, it does fit with some past research on democracy and democratization. As noted by Przeworski (1986), the process of democratizing is the process of institutionalizing uncertainty. Elites are only willing to allow meaningful democratic competition if they have some guarantee that they will have an opportunity to possibly win back power in future elections (Prezworski 1991). Joshi (2013) notes that this uncertainty is magnified by the post-war context, as elites within the incumbent government may fear that they will be targeted by their opponents once out of office. The process of reforming electoral laws may mitigate some of these fears by ensuring that elections will allow for meaningful political competition in the future. While elites within the incumbent government may feel threatened by the increased political competition associated with electoral reforms, these same reforms should also mitigate elite concerns that they will be prevented from effectively competing in future elections. Given this point, elites should therefore be less inclined to use political violence as a tool to ensure electoral victory following the establishment of electoral reforms.

As has been suggested by Fjelde and Hoglund (2015), the results appear to demonstrate that the drivers of antigovernment election related violence differ from the factors that promote pro-government election related violence. Similar to electoral reforms, the number of pro- government election related violent events is reduced by longer civil wars as well as multiple previous civil wars. The effect of war duration is reversed when looking at antigovernment election related violence. The number of antigovernment violent events associated with elections increases following longer civil wars as well as multiple previous conflicts. This may underscore that elites within the incumbent government are concerned with post-civil war stability following

121 the end of prolonged civil wars. On the other hand, longer conflicts may allow for greater opposition coordination which enables dissidents to use political violence as a tool to ensure electoral victory.

Similar to war duration and the number of previous conflicts, allegations of voter fraud appear to have remarkably different effects on the use of pro-government and antigovernment election related violence. As would be expected, allegations of voter fraud increase the number of antigovernment election related violent events. Expectations that the incumbent government is attempting to steal the election should increase the amount of antigovernment violence associated with elections. Interestingly, though, allegations of voter fraud are negatively associated with pro-government election related violence. This finding differs remarkably with

Fjelde and Hoglund’s (2015) study in which allegations of voter fraud increases both pro- government and antigovernment election related violent events. This may suggest that in the post-war context, the incumbent government may substitute the use of violence of with voter fraud.

Looking only at antigovernment election related violence, the number of events appear to be reduced by greater national wealth, more democratic governments, and total peace agreement implementation. Specifically with regard to peace agreement implementation, the process of following through with promises made during the peace process substantially reduces the number of antigovernment election related violent events. As peace agreements are implemented, the incumbent government signals its willingness to abide by the peace process. In calculating the IRR, an increase by one standard deviation in total peace agreement implementation reduces the number of antigovernment election related violence by 55.8% (or

{100*[(푒−4.37∗0.187)-1]}=-55.8%). Interestingly, total peace agreement implementation appears

122 to have little effect on the amount of pro-government election related violence. This finding seems to further underscore that the motivations for pro-government election violence may differ from the motivations for antigovernment election violence.

With that said, transitional political power-sharing arrangements appear to substantially increase both pro-government and antigovernment election related violent events. On the other hand, international peacekeeping forces appear to reduce both antigovernment and pro- government election related violent events. The effects of transitional political power-sharing on election related violence is somewhat surprising. As noted by Hoddie and Hartzell (2005), political power-sharing mechanisms tend to make the post-war political process more transparent as well as ameliorate dissident concerns that the incumbent government will abandon the peace process in favor of consolidating their control. The results, though, demonstrate that the establishment of these mechanisms substantially increases the number of both antigovernment and pro-government election related violent events. One explanation for this finding may be that transitional political power-sharing mechanisms increase the number of potential spoilers in the peace process (Steadman 1997). As resistance movements during civil wars often rely on multiple dissident groups, there may be a number of leaders within the opposition.

Unfortunately, transitional political power-sharing institutions only have a few positions available for dissidents within the government (Roeder and Rothchild 2005). Those left out of the transitional political power-sharing government may attempt to destabilize the electoral process by engaging in election related violence so as to gain guarantees that they will be a part of any future government.

On the other hand, the presence of international peacekeepers in the post-war environment substantially reduces both pro-government and antigovernment election related

123 violence. There has been a substantial amount of research on the role of peacekeepers in promoting durable post-civil war peace (Walter 1997; Walter 2002; Fortna 2004; Mason et al.

2011; Joshi and Mason 2011). Similarly, some research has suggested that peacekeepers may play a critical role in transitions towards democracy in the aftermath of civil wars (Joshi 2010;

Joshi 2013b). The findings presented in this chapter would appear to sit between these two branches of post-civil war literature. The presence of international peacekeeping forces appears to reduce the number of antigovernment and pro-government election related political violence.

This effect should ensure that post-war elections are less likely to destabilize the peace process as well as allow for future regular transfers of power.

CONCLUSION

The results presented here suggest a mixed story. I presented a theory that suggested the presence of electoral reforms may reduce the rate of antigovernment violence committed during elections, as reforms to the electoral laws may make participation in the electoral process more feasible for previously excluded groups. On the other hand, the establishment of post-civil war electoral reforms may make elites within the incumbent government and their supporters more willing to engage in political violence as victory in elections is less certain. Given that electoral reforms are intended to make the political process more inclusive and competitive, previous beneficiaries of exclusionary policies may be at a disadvantage in post-civil war elections.

Therefore elites within the incumbent government and their supporters may be more willing to engage in political violence so as to ensure their grasp on power. The empirical results, though, present a mixed picture. The findings suggest that electoral reforms do not appear to have any significant effect on the use of antigovernment election related violence. Electoral reforms do

124 have a strong relationship with pro-government election related violence. Interestingly, reforms to the electoral process significantly reduce the number of pro-government election related violent events. The data suggests that the establishment of these reforms substantially revises the incentives for elites within the incumbent government. By revising electoral laws to ensure open political competition in elections, post-war elites gain some degree of confidence that they will be able to retake political office in the future if they lose elections.

One troubling finding is that there is some evidence that transitional political power- sharing mechanisms may generate post-civil war election violence. As previous scholarship on power-sharing has noted, the establishment of transitional power-sharing governments may reduce the risk of renewed conflict as it makes the governing process more transparent (Hartzell and Hoddie 2007). The results presented here would suggest, though, that election violence may be more common following the establishment of these transitional political power-sharing mechanisms. The data demonstrated that the establishment of transitional political power-sharing governments increases both antigovernment as well as pro-government election violence. This finding may be indicative of Rothchild and Roeder’s (2005) argument of a second generation problem, where hardliners in the incumbent government and excluded dissident leaders within the opposition may stoke public outcry against concessions made by sharing power. Fortunately, the presence of international peacekeepers substantially reduces the number of both pro- government and antigovernment election related violence.

The findings related to electoral reform, peacekeeping, and power-sharing underscore that there is no one universal solution to post-war stability. Similar to past research that has demonstrated that peacekeeping is an effective tool at preventing a recurrence of civil war

(Walter 2002; Fortna 2004; Mattes and Savun 2009) third party monitors also appear to be

125 effective at preventing election related political violence. Specifically, third party peacekeepers reduce both pro-government and antigovernment election related violence. Additionally, the establishment of electoral reforms reduces pro-government election related violence but appear to have no effect on antigovernment election related violence. While transitional political power- sharing governments may bring combatants to the negotiating table, they tend to promote election related violence in the post-civil war environment. These findings suggest that the international community should be conscious of the type of tools that they are employing so as to generate durable post-civil war stability. While some tools may be effective at addressing the combatant’s commitment problems, they are not effective at ensuring that post-war elections are stable.

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CHAPTER V

CONCLUSION

As demonstrated by the results, electoral reforms have a substantial impact on the stability of post-civil war states. Specifically, electoral reforms reduce the risk that post-civil war governments will abandon democratic practices in favor of more autocratic policies.

Additionally, post-war governments that implement electoral reforms are also substantially less likely to suffer a civil war recurrence. As electoral reforms are costly for the incumbent government, they signal a willingness to abide by the terms of the peace agreement. Electoral reforms also make the initial post-war election more stable, as it reduces the support dissidents need in order to resume fighting. Given an absence of military support, dissidents are much more likely to accept the results of the post-war election. While these findings advance the current literature on post-civil war negotiated settlements and democratization, there is still much that is unknown about the post-war democratization process.

As noted earlier in this dissertation, peacebuilders face considerable obstacles in promoting democracy in the post-war environment. As suggested by much of the literature on democracy after negotiated settlements, the process of instituting democratic reforms in the aftermath of civil war often triggers a renewal of civil war (Paris 2004; Flores and Nooruddin

2012; Brancati and Snyder 2013; Joshi et al 2015). The process of peacebuilding in the post-war environment calls for establishing adequate security and promoting meaningful change through new or reformed democratic mechanisms. Unfortunately, because the latter undermines the former, peacebuilding missions are forced to promote security at the cost of further democratization (Sisk 2008). This is troubling in as far as functional democratic institutions

127 afford aggrieved citizens the opportunity to address their problems through non-violent mechanisms. This dissertation hoped to provide an avenue that would allow peacebuilding missions to promote democratic reforms without fear that the combatants would abandon the settlement and return to conflict. Focusing specifically on reforms to electoral laws, I provide a partial solution to the war-to-democracy dilemma.

As electoral laws have historically been used to prevent meaningful political competition in the developing world, they are in essence tools of political exclusion. By using peace agreements to address the issue of political exclusion through electoral laws, peacebuilding missions help to ensure that elections are more representative and competitive. These reforms specifically attenuate the risk of civil war recurrence by signaling to dissidents that the incumbent government is interested in abiding by the terms of the peace agreement. As elites within the incumbent government and their supporters benefited from past exclusionary policies, changes to the electoral laws may represent a threat to the current distribution of goods and services. As elites implement costly changes to the electoral process, they shoulder considerable risk in alienating their supporters. These changes, due to their costly nature, should signal to dissidents that the incumbent government is interested in abiding by the terms of the settlement.

Similarly, the implementation of electoral reforms substantially reduces the risk that the initial post-civil war election will lead to a civil war recurrence. Part of the war-to-democracy dilemma rests in the unwillingness of armed groups to abide by the terms of elections (Jarstad and Sisk

2008; Brancati and Snyder 2013). As armed militant factions are often the most well organized groups in the post-war environment, they often play an outsized role in post-civil war elections.

Upon facing an unpopular election result, groups are willing to abandon the peace process so as to renegotiate the terms of the settlement (Brancati and Snyder 2013). Reforms to the electoral

128 laws undermine this process by empowering aggrieved citizens to use the electoral process to address their own grievances. As supporting insurgencies is a costly strategy for civilians, given that the state may sanction them, they will only do so if there is few options for effecting political change. If electoral laws have been revised to allow citizens to effect change through supporting opposition candidates or their votes become more meaningful in a more representative electoral system, then aggrieved citizens will prefer to use conventional participation as opposed supporting political violence.

The statistical results seem to largely support these conclusions. Electoral reforms, in and of themselves, can reduce the risk of civil war recurrence by 97%. Similarly, the first post-civil war election that occurs after reforms have been implemented reduces the risk of renewed civil war by over 99%. Electoral reforms therefore play a critical role in ensuring that post-war governments institute democratic practices without leading to renewed civil war. The results largely confirm the findings that electoral reforms are effective tools at stabilizing the post-war environment. What is exceptionally attractive about these findings is that the reforms presented here underscore that peacebuilding missions can promote democracy and security at the same time. The initial conclusion that the democratic process undermines post-civil war security is not completely accurate. Rather, peacebuilding missions have some control over the context in which post-civil war elections occur. Following the implementation of electoral reforms, post-war elections may actually reduce the risk of civil war recurrence.

Electoral reforms also promote more durable post-civil war democracy. Specifically, electoral reforms generate meaningful political competition which, in turn, makes it more difficult for elites within the incumbent government to derail the democratic process. As elites have historically used electoral laws to prevent meaningful competition, the absence of reform

129 would allow members of the incumbent government of preventing further democratization.

While much of the literature on post-civil war democracy focuses on the process of democratization little attention has been paid to the survival of democracy in the post-civil war environment (Joshi 2013a). The results presented in Chapter III demonstrate that governments emerging after the establishment of a peace agreement do face a risk of abandoning the democratic practice and reverting to more autocratic politics. The data also suggests that electoral reforms play a substantial role in preventing governments from doing this. By implementing electoral reforms, post-war governments are much less likely to suffer an autocratic reversal.

The results also demonstrate that peacekeepers play a crucial role in preventing autocratic reversals and ensure democratic survival, though this relationship is not what my hypotheses predicted. My initial hypothesis was that peacekeepers may be unable to effectively generate durable post-civil war democracy on their own. As effective democratic practices are often the product of economic wellbeing, democratic culture, and previous experience with democratic institutions, it seems unlikely that the presence of peacekeepers is a sufficient condition for promoting democracy. Rather, I argued that peacekeepers may lay the foundation for meaningful democratic competition. Peacekeepers should play a critical role in ensuring that democratic reforms are included in peace agreements and that those democratic reforms are implemented.

The results of the chapter proved to be surprising. Looking at comprehensive peace agreements from 1989-2012, the findings suggest no relationship between the deployment of peacekeepers and the inclusion of electoral reforms in peace agreements. Equally, once controlling the for the selection of electoral reform provisions in peace agreements, there was no evidence to suggest that the presence of international peacekeeping missions significantly increases the likelihood

130 that electoral reforms will be implemented. What the findings do demonstrate is that peacekeepers play a complementary role in preserving democratic stability with electoral reforms. Once controlling for the effects of electoral reforms, the presence of international peacekeepers substantially reduces the risk that elites will abandon the democratic process in favor of more autocratic policies. The data underscore that peacekeepers play an equal role in ensuring democratic survival. To further investigate this, I examine qualitative evidence from the

Ivory Coast’s peace process from 2007-2011. The qualitative evidence underscores the different roles that peacekeeping and electoral reforms play in maintaining democratic stability in the aftermath of civil war.

Chapter IV of my dissertation examined how electoral reforms shape the incentive for dissidents and government supporters to use election related political violence in the aftermath of negotiated settlements. While electoral reforms appear to substantially reduce the willingness of combatants to engage in renewed civil war, it remains unclear as to whether they shape the incentive of opposition groups and government supporters to use election related violence to influence the outcomes of post-war elections. This is an important topic, as there has been little quantitative evidence examining the use of post-civil war election related violence. As electoral reforms are generally designed to address the grievances of opposition figures, I posited that the establishment of electoral reforms should reduce the willingness of opposition groups to use antigovernment election related violence. On the other hand, as electoral reforms make post-war elections more competitive, elites within the incumbent government (as well as their supporters) should be more inclined to use political violence as a way to maintain control of the state during elections. The results, though, proved to be surprising. Electoral reforms appear to have no significant effect on whether opposition groups engaged in election related political violence in

131 the aftermath of civil war. Electoral reforms do appear to actually reduce the number of pro- government election related violent events in the aftermath of negotiated settlements. The results suggest that government officials strategically agree to establish electoral reforms. By ensuring that elections are competitive, elites provide institutional guarantees that they will have the chance to retake their seats in the future if they lose the initial post-war elections.

While this dissertation has produced a number of clear findings about how peacebuilding missions can overcome the war-to-democracy dilemma through addressing electoral laws in war- torn states, there still remains much that is unknown about the post-war democratization process.

For instance, while it is clear that the initial post-civil war election may increase the risk of civil war recurrence, little is known about what determines election quality. As the initial post-civil war election determines who will maintain a monopoly on the coercive apparatus of the government, the quality of that election should be of critical concern to the international community. Elections that are riddled with fraud and intimidation will undermine the legitimacy of post-war governments thereby reducing the willingness of dissidents to abide by the peace process. Discovering what shapes the quality of post-civil war elections is an important avenue of research for students of post-war democracy. Rebel capacity and organization, the presence of international monitors, UN security, and ethnic composition of the government are all factors that may shape the quality of post-civil war elections.

Additionally, there is little knowledge of which peace agreement provisions actually address the issue of political exclusion. Theoretically, I suggested that rebel groups should be less capable of engaging in renewed insurgency after the implementation of electoral reforms as citizens have new ways of engaging in the political process. This assumes that electoral reform addresses issues of political exclusion. Similarly, autocratic reversal is less likely after the

132 implementation of electoral reforms due to the emergence of greater political participation and competition. What is unknown is whether electoral reforms actually reduce political exclusion.

This is a larger issue in the study of peace agreement provisions. The working principle in power-sharing is that it allows disadvantaged groups to have a voice in the government. Does this process, in turn, actually reduce political exclusion in society? With the assistance of the

Ethnic Power Relations dataset (Wimmer et al 2009), we can actually gauge how well peace agreement provisions reduces the rate of political exclusion in post-war countries.

Finally, there is little that is known about the electoral strategies of combatants. While emerging research has uncovered the origins of rebel political parties in the post-war environment, little research examines the strategies employed by rebel political parties or parties affiliated with the incumbent government. For instance, when do rebel parties boycott the electoral process? When do governments choose to collaborate with former opponents? And finally, what post-war devices, like transitional justice mechanisms, shape the success of these groups in elections and collaboration? While this is a broad research agenda, it underscores how little is actually known about the process of democracy in the aftermath of civil war. On issues of collaboration, it might be fruitful to examine the emergence of coalition governments in the aftermath of civil wars. What factors determine, not only the absence of fighting, but also the emergence of actual collaboration as a means to promote peace?

The results presented here demonstrate that reforms of the electoral process provide considerable stability for post-war states. As post-war peacebuilding efforts struggle to accommodate security needs with democratic aspirations, this research provides a necessary bridge between those two goals. The implementation of electoral reform signals to dissidents that post-civil war governments are committed to the peace process. These reforms also make it more

133 difficult for militant groups to abandon the peace process and for elites within the incumbent government to forsake post-war democratization efforts. While there is still much that is unknown about the process of post-civil war democratization and collaboration, this research allows for peacebuilders to institute better policies so as to achieve democratization and security in the aftermath of intrastate conflict.

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