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The literature on the effectiveness of peacekeeping has been focused almost exclusively on conflict mitigation. This article expands the scope of this literature by developing a theory that explains how the presence of peacekeeping forces improves population health during periods of intrastate conflict. The argument is put forth that because civil conflict violence clusters geographically it undermines the herd immunity critical-mass threshold. This, in turn, leads to increased infection rates and a tragic surge in preventable deaths. Peacekeepers, because they target conflict 'hot spots' locally, put an end to this cycle and assist in the restoration herd immunity. Using a unique measure of peacekeeping that accounts for the area of the conflict zone, the empirical models uncover a positive relationship between peacekeeping forces and immunization rates, as vaccination rates increase when peacekeepers are deployed into violent conflicts. These findings suggest that peacekeeping missions have the potential to reduce the public health costs imposed by internal conflicts.

The increasing availability of event data has led to a surge in micro-level research investigating civil war violence. Event data, however, introduces bias due to systemic underreporting of events. This study introduces a method that accounts for this bias by making a spatial prediction of unreported events based on the known locations of rebels and their preferences for local-level factors estimated using habitat analysis. I then combine this prediction with known locations of rebel activity and use it to predict rebel territory and relocation patterns. I next perform a regression analysis on 119 African rebel groups that links preferences to conflict behavior. Preferences for gold, petroleum, gemstones, and cobalt are associated with civilian victimization, whereas rebels who prefer steeper slopes are more successful in battles with government forces. Further, government forces tend to be successful when battling rebels with preferences for petroleum and international borders.

This study develops a day-to-day theory of political violence that predicts that rebels respond strategically to the onset of interstate conflict that is directly related to a civil war. Government-initiated interstate conflict is theorized to incentivize rebels to signal their resolve, willingness to bear costs, and vulnerability of government forces. In addition, this form of interstate conflict is predicted to decrease violence against civilian populations, as it makes it more likely that rebels will need to rely on civilians for resources in the future. This is contrary to interstate conflict initiated by an external state, as this signal of third-party support makes civilian support more dispensable from the perspective of a rebel movement. Using a country-day data set constructed from event data, evidence is presented that is consistent with this theoretical logic. Interstate conflict, therefore, is shown to play a significant role in explaining the variation of violent events that occur on a day-to-day basis during a civil conflict. (International Interactions (London)/ FUB)

Previous work has suggested that civil wars can increase the risk of militarized interstate conflict. This research note examines the severity of different suggested linkages between civil war and international conflict using data from 1946 to 2001. The results show that instances of direct intervention and interstate coercion are associated with more severe interstate disputes, comparable in magnitude to the severity of territorial disputes. By contrast, disputes that entail pursuit of rebels across international borders, efforts to deter externalization and spillover events tend to have lower severity. The results underscore the important potential role of internal war for interstate conflicts as well as what types of conflict linkages seem to go together with more severe disputes.

Rebels that fight near or capture cities gain more concessions from the government than those that remain in the periphery. Yet, not all groups challenge urban centers. Previous scholarship expects rebel strength to explain this strategic decision. However, weak rebel groups challenge cities, too. Our approach focuses on the conflict process more broadly. We argue that as the network of rebels challenging the government increases, opposition groups become more likely to attack cities as either they become emboldened, given the government's disadvantage in multi-front wars, or they are propelled to strategic and resource centers in competition with the other groups. Statistical analysis of all African conflicts from 1989-2009 strongly supports this logic, while an exploration of most typical cases highlights each of these mechanisms in practice. This project thus links literature on civil war tactics and conflict contagion.

Rebels that fight near or capture cities gain more concessions from the government than those that remain in the periphery. Yet, not all groups challenge urban centers. Previous scholarship expects rebel strength to explain this strategic decision. However, weak rebel groups challenge cities, too. Our approach focuses on the conflict process more broadly. We argue that as the network of rebels challenging the government increases, opposition groups become more likely to attack cities as either they become emboldened, given the government's disadvantage in multi-front wars, or they are propelled to strategic and resource centers in competition with the other groups. Statistical analysis of all African conflicts from 1989-2009 strongly supports this logic, while an exploration of most typical cases highlights each of these mechanisms in practice. This project thus links literature on civil war tactics and conflict contagion.

How do United Nations (UN) peacekeeping missions influence the use of conflict related sexual violence (CRSV) by armed non-state actors? This study argues efficacy is influenced by conditions that precede deployment and the composition of UN forces. Poor intragroup cohesion within rebel ranks incentivizes CRSV, putting peacekeepers in a precarious position upon deployment. UN police improve law enforcement capabilities, build relationships with local communities, and promote information diffusion mechanisms. As a result, UN police are associated with a decrease in CRSV, even in the most difficult environments.

Higher educational attainment levels are associated with better public health outcomes, lower levels of income inequality, more participation in democratic instructions, and safer communities. Promoting education in war-torn societies can have an immediate impact in mitigating violence and play a significant role in preventing conflict recurrence. This study investigates UN peacekeeping missions' role in this process, positing that UN deployments to locations experiencing armed conflict lead to higher levels of educational attainment by increasing local stability, incentivizing individuals to return to school while also making renewed investment worthwhile. Testing this logic using new data on local-level educational attainment across Africa from 2000 to 2014, this study finds that conflict zones where the UN maintained peacekeeping deployments saw an increase in educational attainment when compared to those that did not, a finding corroborated by coarsened exact matching. Maintaining a modest number of UN forces is shown to increase female attainment by at least 4.89 percent and reduce gender disparity by 5.13 percent, revealing the critical role UN peacekeeping plays in restoring education in the shadow of political violence.

This study investigates the relationship between US strikes targeting Al-Shabaab and civilian victimization using spatially disaggregated data. We find that US strikes make it approximately 5.5 times more likely that civilians are murdered—an effect that is comparable to battles and periods of territorial loss. Disaggregating based on the target of each strike, however, reveals a more nuanced relationship: strikes that destroy Al-Shabaab military assets are associated with more civilian killings, whereas there is some evidence that strikes that kill members significantly reduce this form of violence. This implies an ability of the United States to continue current policy while also minimizing the human costs that directly result from intervention. Notably, however, this would require a policy-shift that avoids destroying Al-Shabaab's war-fighting capabilities, thereby reducing the ability of the United States to undermine the organization's capacity to wage war.

Recent developments in the availability of spatial data and the growing trend of spatial analysis in political science has given scholars the ability to account for local-level factors in the study of political violence and conflict management. In this paper, the authors contribute to this growing body of literature by employing geo-coded data to empirically explore a question central to the study of peacekeeping – when peacekeepers are authorized to enter a conflict, where do they go? In other words, what types of violence are peacekeeping forces most concerned with, and what geographic features might prevent or allow for the deployment of peacekeepers? Using the un mission in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, the authors find that peacekeeping forces were less concerned with non-state violence (rebels fighting rebels) and instead focused on government-rebel confrontations and those instances in which government or rebels attacked unarmed civilians. In addition, peacekeepers are shown to cluster around transportation networks, densely populated areas, surface-based resources, and international borders.