This document discusses the definition and causes of civil war. It defines civil war as involving armed conflict between a government and identifiable rebel groups that results in over 1,000 battle-related deaths in a year. The document explores various perspectives on the root causes of civil war, including identity hatred, globalization, bad governance, greed and grievances over resources, as well as the impact of the post-Cold War international system and involvement of warlords, militias and private military companies. It notes there is no consensus but that the impact on civilians through violence and landmines is immense and long-lasting.

1. Civil
war

2. Last week, impact of war on civilians

3. Why do
civil
wars begin

4. What is
civil
war
?

5. a contested
incompatibility
which
concerns types
of political
system…
where the use
of armed force
between two
parties…
… of which
at least one
is the
government
and the
state, results
in at least
1,000 battle-
related
deaths per
year
(PRIO 2013)

6. When an identifiable rebel organization challenges the
government militarily and the resulting violence results in…

7. If… groups are fighting each other this does not constitute
a civil war, but communal violence. The rebel groups must
be able to inflict fatalities on the government side,
otherwise the violence is classed as a massacre, pogrom
or genocide (Hoeffler 2012)

8. civil
war
Explaining

9. identity
hatred

10. people are
brutalised and
killed not because
of anything they
have done… but
simply because of
who they are…
Tutsis in Rwanda,
the Tamils in Sri
Lanka, the Kurds in
Iraq… [Such wars]
are about… the
pursuit of
malevolence and
they are
unrestrained by any
legal or moral rules’
(Garnett in Baylis et al, 2002: 83)

12. clash of
civilizations”

13. Narcissismo f m i n o r d i f f e r e n c e (Ignatieff, Freud)

14. ‘contained’ by Cold War…

15. scours away distinctiveness at the surface of our identities and
forces us back into ever more assertive defence of the inner
differences - language, mentality, myth and
fantasy - that escape the surface scouring. As it brings us closer
together… we react by clinging to the margins of
difference that remain
globalization
Ignatieff 1997: 58

16. identity is not
a skin, but a
mask”Ignatieff 1997: 58

17. Nationalism is not… an eruption of
ancient historical rivalries and
antagonisms…
Ignatieff 1997: 58

18. It is a modern language game, invented to respond... to the
uprootings of modernity

19. globalization has collapsed
identity by bringing us all into ever closer
contact

20. Identity is a narrative that takes
the facts of difference and turns
them into a narrative justifying
political self-determination
Ignatieff 1997: 58

21. The new barbarism

22. motivated and executed in
primeval savagery

23. Characterized by belligerent and irrational
males on ‘pot and dope’

24. Civil war
involves the
paramilitaries,
guerrillas,
militias, and
warlords who
are tearing up
the failed
states of the
1990s

25. and the
barefoot
boys with
Kalashnikovs,
the
paramilitaries
in
wraparound
sunglasses
and the
turbaned
zealots of the
Taliban’
(Ignatieff 1997: 7)

26. These are
wars where
the veneer of
civilisation
has been
ripped away
to reveal
participants
motivated
not by the
narcissism of
difference
but by…

27. … the narcissism
of violence, where torture is
exciting, rape is fun, and
looting is profitable
Gray (1999): 277.

29. Civil war is
thus caused
by refusal to
engage with
modernity
and
neoliberal
values
(Kaldor 2007)

30. Bad
governance
locally

31. civil society
attacks State,
state defends
Corruption,
patronage,
nepotism
authoritarian
repression
Impoverishment,
ignorance and ill-
health
Civil War
Contagion theory

32. civil warfare directly
connected with inadequate
government
Mueller (2002: 36)

33. Bad
governance
globally

34. It also arises from international
system
(Pugh and Cooper, 2004: 23)
Civil war not simply about bad
rulers…

35. World Bank and IMF

36. International economy (privatization)

37. MNCs (diamonds, oil)

38. Capitalism?

39. greed
and
grievance

40. wars for
PROFIT
rebels may be motivated by
the opportunities of private
gain that organized violence
can offer (Hoeffler 2012: 181)

41. fighting for justice or
revenge

42. Aggravated by resource values on international markets

44. The
newwars

45. Cold War ends, superpower control over TW reduces

47. Challengers
include warlords
as well as
civilians

48. No more patronage

50. Guerrillas combine with civilians against governments

52. ‘Barbarians’ invoked to legitimise West

53. ‘civilization’
Blaming ‘barbarism’ conceals the role of
and liberal, global markets

54. IFIs and state policy?

55. What do we know

56. 200+No. of variables
No
of variables
with
consensus

57. We know very little with any
certainty

58. But we know a lot about the
impact on

61. Landmines
reveal
continuity
Between
direct and
Indirect
violence

62. Number of active mines worldwide
110 million in 70 countries
Incidents per month
2000 (44% mortality rate)
De-miners injured and killed
3 in every 5,000 mines cleared
Centuries to clear
all mines
11

65. Access to hospital?

66. Got surgeon?

67. Who’s tending fields/shop/income?

68. Daughterstaken out of school

71. Drain on the state