Geography, Natural Resources, and Civil War: Synthesizing ‘Greed and Grievances’ Case Studies of Sierra Leone and The Sudan T.O. Kropholler (Bsc) Master's Thesis Master's Programme: International Relations Graduate School of Social Sciences Student number: 6176216 Supervisor: Dr. Polly Pallister-Wilkins Second Reader: Dr. Ursula Daxecker Date: 24-05-2016 Page Count: 48 1 Abstract The aim of this thesis is to get more in depth knowledge about how geography and natural resources relate to civil war. It also attempts to synthesize the narratives of ‘greed’ and ‘grievances’ which are important in the debate concerning causes of civil war. I found that (1) in each case the location of armed conflict and natural resource do not precisely overlap, but fighting over control of resource rich areas does take place in between the capital cities and the resource rich areas. (2) The hypotheses of Le Billon concerning the relationship between the geography of natural resources, and the type of armed conflict are only partly correct. (3) When the characteristics of terrain and ‘grievance’ factors are included, the hypotheses of Le Billon increase in validity, thus beginning to synthesize the ‘Greed vs Grievance’ narratives. These results were realized by performing two case studies (1) The Sierra Leone Civil War, (2) The Second Sudanese Civil War. In both of these case studies, I tested the hypotheses of Le Billon (2001) which guides most of the debate concerning geography, natural resources and civil war, by overlapping diamond and oil deposits with the location of armed conflict. I backed these ‘mappings of natural resources and armed conflict’ up with a literature study on the course of each conflict. 2 Contents 1. Introduction 4 2. Methodology 7 3. Theoretical Approach to Civil War 9 3.1 Motivations for Civil War: Greed vs Grievances 10 3.2 Feasibility of Civil War: Natural Resources & Geography 12 4. Case Studies 15 4.1 Sierra Leone 15 4.1.1 Mapping Conflict and Diamonds 15 4.1.2 The Course of the Conflict 21 4.1.3 Analysis of the Conflict 25 2.2 Sudan 28 4.2.1 Mapping Conflict and Oil 28 4.2.2 The Course of the Conflict 34 4.2.3 Analysis of the Conflict 38 5. Conclusion 41 6. Bibliography 42 7. Appendices 44 3 1. Introduction Civil war is one of the most complex phenomenon to study in social sciences, there are always numerous actors, causes, interests and feelings involved which are almost never clear to the observer, but are obscure. Recent revolutions and civil wars in North Africa and Europe acknowledge the fact that civil wars are still contemporary, in fact if we look at the world today it is overwhelmed with civil war. Civil war is also one of the greatest destroyer of peoples’ lives. Not only the people who die directly in battle, but also the people who die in starvation, sickness and ethnic cleansing. Civil war also is one of the greatest causes of forced migration, which inevitably leads to more pain and misery with refugees. It is also one of the greatest destroyers of wealth for societies and those who manage to survive. All these factors make civil war an interesting and relevant area of research for political scientist. In recent years scholars have done a lot of research on the causes of civil wars. The assumption is ‘if we know the cause, we know the remedy’. These researches are often quantitative large N studies which manage to produce strong correlations between the presence of natural resources, and the onset of civil war in countries. These results juxtapose conventional wisdom that civil wars are fought because of resentment among ethnic groups in countries. The debate that followed is called the ‘Greed vs Grievance’ debate, in which the greed camp is currently the winning narrative. This is largely because the ‘greed’ narrative is better at quantifying indicators. The ‘grievance’ camp however seems to be fighting its way back, which is something to be glad of, because in social sciences reality is never dichotomous, black and white, but always a grey soup of synthesis. Both however do already seem to agree on one thing: that natural resources and spatiality, or geography, matters. I therefore take this agreement between both narratives as a starting point for my thesis in an attempt to synthesize both narratives, which of course will hopefully lead to further and better research in order to fully understand and eradicate civil war. 4 The research questions that will guide me on this endeavor are formulated as follows: Did the geographic location of diamonds and oil affect which type of armed conflict took place in The Sierra Leone Civil War and The Second Sudanese Civil War? How did the geography of diamonds and oil affect the course of the Sierra Leone Civil War and The Second Sudanese Civil War? To what extent is a synthesis of the ‘greed’ and ‘grievances’ narratives possible in the way The Sierra Leone Civil War and The Second Sudanese Civil War were conducted? In order to answer the first question I will test the following hypotheses: Hypotheses: H1: The more proximate a point resource to a country's capital, the more likely a coup d'état or state control will take place. H2: The more distant a point resource to a country's capital, the more likely secession will take place. H3: The more proximate a diffuse resource to an country's capital, the more likely rebellion or looting will take place. H4: The more distant a diffuse resource to a country's capital, the more likely warlordism will take place. These hypotheses are derived from Le Billon’s 2001 article “The Political Ecology of War” which deals with the relation of the geography of natural resources and civil war, and takes up an important position in the academic debate. I will test these hypotheses by (1) analyzing the location and concentration of diamonds, oil, and natural gas in relation to the location of actual fighting; (2) doing a literature study of the actual fighting: "who fights who, and to what objective?"; (3): Where the evidence does not concur with above mentioned hypotheses, I will provide possible explanations for this difference, which should result in more a more comprehensive understanding of armed conflict in relation to natural resources and geography. 5 This is the first chapter, the introduction. In the second chapter of this thesis I will present the methodology. I will (1) argue why I have chosen Sierra Leone and Nigeria as my case studies; I will (2) present the data with which I will analyze the case studies and why it is so compelling; (3) present the limitations of the methodological problems and possible limitations. In the third chapter of this paper I will present the theoretical framework. I will present the two main narratives: ‘greed’ and ‘grievance’ as the causes for civil war. In the second part of the theoretical framework I will present the theory behind the hypotheses of Le Billon. In the fourth chapter of this thesis, I will present the case studies. The first parts of each subsection are the descriptive parts, and then the analysis follows. The fifth chapter concludes and reviews. 6 2. Methodology Case Selection The Sierra Leone Civil War is a classic case of a ‘resource war’ the term ‘blood diamond’ was coined in the aftermath of this conflict. After and even during the war, scholar reopened the academic debate concerning geography, natural resources and civil war. The result of this is that there is a lot of published work available on the Sierra Leone Civil War, which is advantageous to my research. Furthermore, the Sierra Leone Civil War is often depicted as purely a war fought over its diamond riches, which leaves room for the ‘grievance’ narrative to add explanatory power. The Second Sudanese Civil War was one of the longest running civil wars, and one of the most lethal. It is often depicted as both a ‘resource war’, and an ‘ethnic’ war. It is also much publicized, and the war still resonates in South Sudan and in Darfur, which gives it an up-to- date literature. Both cases are similar in the fact that they are both complex and well documented. They are also both former British Colonies, which limits the feasibility of any historical critiques concerning these civil wars. They also both have large Muslim and Christian populations, which decreases any religious claim on a cause for civil war. The most important difference between the two cases is state size. I have deliberately chosen two cases which differ in size, because theory concerning geography, natural resources, and civil war suggests that distance, and therefore size does matter. Data Selection In order to map and overlap armed conflict and natural resources, I will use three PRIO datasets: (1) The PRIO Conflict Site dataset, which is a geo-referenced dataset on armed conflict (Halberg, 2012); (2) the PRIO Diamond Resources Dataset (Gilmore et al, 2005); and (3) the PRIO Petroleum Dataset (Lujala et al, 2007). The Conflict Site dataset includes all armed conflicts from 1989 until 2008. It basically provides me with two things that I need: (1) The coordinates of the core of armed conflict each year; (2) The radius of those armed conflicts. It defines armed conflict as a conflict 7 between at a minimum of 25 battle deaths per year per given geo-referenced armed conflict. This might sound as a small number of battle deaths, and it is, but considering the thousands of battle deaths in both wars I do not expect any problems regarding validity of this measurement.