Bankrolling Repression? Modeling Third‐Party Influence on Protests and Repression

Abstract

Ukraine's anti‐government protests in 2013–2014, and the ensuing removal of President Yanukovich, raised much speculation about Russia's role in the outcome of the crisis, as well as more general questions related to third‐party influence on domestic protests and repression. Does third‐party assistance to the government increase the level of government repression or deter protesters? Does the leader removal indicate that foreign involvement was a failure? Or can a third party gain from involvement, even if its protégé leader is removed from power? We model external influence on the onset of protests and repression as a game between the government, the protesters, and a third party that supports the government. The main finding is that a third party may “bankroll” repression against the protesters, even at the risk of the removal of their protégé leader, with the goal of deterring future protests within its sphere of interest.

Signals of Support From Great Power Patrons and the Use of Repression During Nonviolent Protests

“…In this body of literature, many of the actions by the international community meant to restrain and pressure authoritarian rulers who have been analyzed, but less attention is paid to those that might spur and facilitate the use of coercion. However, as a recent formal modeling study shows (Chyzh & Labzina, 2018) and a proliferating literature on the international dimension of authoritarianism indicates, third parties may be very important in this regard. For example, a number of studies have documented how dictators look to international partners, now frequently referred to as "black knights" or "autocracy promoters," for diplomatic and material support when trying to bolster their rule and deal with domestic challengers (Ambrosio, 2014;Tolstrup, 2015).…”

Profiling Insurrection: Characterizing Collective Action Using Mobile Device Data

“…Prior work has demonstrated the role of economic conditions, political repression, exclusion of racial, ethnic, or economic minorities, use of force, (mis)information campaigns and social media in explaining when and where protests (Steinert-Threlkeld, 2017;Chyzh and Labzina, 2018;Justino and Martorano, 2019;Fergusson and Molina, 2020;Martinez, Jessen and Xu, 2020;Manacorda and Tesei, 2020), riots (Sullivan, 2019;Hsiao and Radnitz, 2020), violence (Müller and Schwarz, 2020), and armed opposition movements emerge (Oppenheim et al, 2015;Dippel and Heblich, 2021). A significant body of research has also provided evidence that these instances of collective action have affected political reforms (Tarrow, 1994;Rasler, 1996;Kurzman, 1996;Chenoweth and Stephan, 2008;Gillion, 2013;Andrews and Gaby, 2015;Klein and Regan, 2018;De Vogel, 2020), voting patterns (Wasow, 2020;Enos, Kaufman and Sands, 2019;Larreboure and González, 2019), social attitudes and cohesion (Branton et al, 2015;Muñoz and Anduiza, 2019;Mazumder, 2019), and economic activity.…”

Toward a holistic networks approach to strategic third-party intervention: A literature review

“…But not all interveners have an interest in protecting citizens from violence; third parties can provide the resources necessary to bankroll state repression of protesters or rebels, thereby preventing future threats to stability (Chyzh and Labzina, 2018). On the flip side, the mere expectation of aid from a target state’s rival may induce rebels to continue fighting, prolonging violent conflict (Akcinaroglu and Radziszewski, 2005).…”