Foreign state support for rebel groups

Harriet Goers

Research question

Under what conditions do foreign states provide support to rebel groups?

Existing research and knowledge

My focus and contribution

Cast of characters

Potential foreign sponsor

States that have the capacity and opportunity to provide support to rebel groups fighting in a civil conflict.

Rebel group

Formally organized groups of citizens that present a clearly defined and sustained demand of their government for control of the entirety, or a defined sub-section, of the country’s territory and population.

Government

The incumbent government of the state in conflict. It is the actor against whom demands are made by the rebel group.

Cast of characters

External states

States that have an interest in the conflict.

Why foreign states support rebel groups: the proposed explanation

  • External states have preferred outcomes to civil conflict

  • They can provide support to one side of the conflict to increase the likelihood that their preferred outcome will prevail

  • This support is often costly to provide

External states with shared preferences

  • Suffer a collective action problem

  • An external state can overcome this by imposing a cost on others for their inaction

External states and neutral states

  • External states can also prompt states without an interest in the conflict to intervene

  • Impose a cost for inaction by these neutral states

  • Sometimes seen when alliances or coalitions provide support to one side of a conflict

External states with antithetical preferences

  • External states can also prevent a state with interests that are antithetical to its own from intervening

  • Impose a cost on support provided to the opposition

The costs of coercion

  • The external state’s ability to impose costs on other states varies

  • A product of its relationship with those other states

    • Focus on trade and security dependencies

    • Introduce a new measure of trade dependence1

  • Coercive actions are also costly

A worked example

  • A potential foreign sponsor wants to undermine its rival, which faces demands from a self-determination group operating in its borderlands.

  • The potential foreign sponsor explores providing funding to the SD group.

A worked example

  • An external state is allied with and an important trade partner of the government being challenged.

  • It values highly a swift conclusion to the conflict with a government victory.

  • It is also an important trade partner with the potential foreign sponsor.

A worked example

  • The external state threatens to impose large trade sanctions on the potential foreign sponsor if it provides funding to the rebel group.

  • The cost of the sanctions to the potential sponsor and the provision of funding outweigh its expected benefits from undermining its rival.

  • The foreign sponsor does not offer to provide funding to the rebel group.

How to test this

  • Use existing knowledge to model the probability that potential foreign sponsors will provide support to a rebel group

  • Identify when support was observed but not expected, and when support was not observed but expected

  • Look at the interests held by states on which these rogue potential foreign sponsors depend

  • Does this information help explain these gaps between observed and expected behavior?

Expectations

Contribution

  1. Account for the international dimensions of state support for rebel groups

  2. Provide actionable policy recommendations for states interested in shaping the conduct and outcomes of civil conflict

  3. Expand our focus beyond violent rebel groups and military support

  4. Provide a new measure of state-state trade dependence