Blame the victims? Refugees, state capacity, and non-state actor violence

Abstract

Existing research argues that refugee inflows may increase the risk of domestic conflict, particularly civil war that, by definition, involves the state as an actor. However, many of the postulated mechanisms linking refugees to a higher risk of such conflict pertain to tensions with locals, which do not necessarily involve any grievances against government authorities. We contend that it is more likely to identify an association between refugees and non-state actor violence, i.e., armed violence between organized non-state groups, neither of which pertains to the state. We also claim that the extent to which refugees are associated with a higher likelihood of non-state conflict depends on the capacity of governments to manage and mitigate risks. We report evidence that refugee populations can be linked to an increased risk of non-state conflict, as well as for a mitigating effect of state capacity on the risk of non-state conflicts in the presence of refugees. We do not find a clear effect of refugee populations on civil war, suggesting that the link depends on existing conflict cleavages relevant to mobilizing refugees or locals. Our research helps to shed light on the relevant security consequences of managing refugee populations. Despite the common arguments portraying refugees as security risks in developed countries, the risk of non-state conflict applies primarily to weak states that have been forced to shoulder a disproportionate burden in hosting refugees.

From protection to persecution: Threat environment and refugee scapegoating

“… See Cederman, Wimmer & Min (2010) andVogt et al (2015).28 Böhmelt, Bove & Gleditsch (2019) show that the positive relationship between the size of refugee population and non-state actor violence diminishes as state capacity increases.29 The CIRI data end in 2011. Therefore, we ran a robustness test in which we imputed each country's 2011 Physical Integrity Rights Index to the lagged independent variable for the years 2013, 2014, and 2015.…”

Does cultural proximity contain terrorism diffusion?

“…There is ample evidence suggesting that foreign-born individuals are vulnerable to the violation of their rights and are too often the targets of violent persecution from hostile local populations Böhmelt et al, 2019). Within the broader micro-turn in the study of immigration, recent scholarship has begun to compile new data on refugees' involvement in acts of physical violence in their host state, either as the victims or perpetrators of violence (see, e.g.…”

Regional Integration Support: A Positive Externality toward Migration Attitudes

“…Third, immigrants are more likely to create tensions with local populations and intergroup anxiety when countries are unprepared to manage large population movements or are unfamiliar with these emergencies (see Böhmelt et al, ). Distrust of migrants is often heightened by economic hardship and increased contact with out‐group members in times of crisis can elicit negative stereotyping and reinforce – rather than reduce – anti‐immigration stances (García‐Faroldi, ).…”