Foreign military intervention and post-colonial state-building: An actor-centric analysis

Abstract

In an era where state borders are relatively fixed and interstate wars are uncommon, it seems wise to begin to look beyond full-scale war when examining the relationship between military force and state-building. We thus examine the impact that a low-scale form of armed force, foreign military intervention, has on state-building in post-colonial countries. Using selectorate theory within an actor-centric framework, we hypothesize that certain democratic interveners tend to have a positive impact on post-colonial state-building efforts, while non-democratic and intergovernmental organization interveners have little if any impact. We test our theory using interrupted time series methodology in panel corrected standard error estimates of 80 countries from 1972 to 2002. While our empirical results are somewhat mixed, they demonstrate that different sets of interveners do have different state-building impacts.

Interstate Rivalries and Expansions in Military Capacity

“…In another study on the effect of external actors in state capacity, Pickering and Kisangani (2014) use an actor-centric approach to study the impact of low-scale military force on state-building in post-colonial countries. They find that democratic interveners tend to have a more significant, lasting impact on postcolonial state-building than non-democratic interveners and international governmental organizations (IGOs) (Pickering and Kisangani, 2014: 259). Also, they find that non-major power democracies have a positive impact on state building while major power democracies seem to have a negative impact (Pickering and Kisangani, 2014: 260).…”

“…They find that democratic interveners tend to have a more significant, lasting impact on postcolonial state-building than non-democratic interveners and international governmental organizations (IGOs) (Pickering and Kisangani, 2014: 259). Also, they find that non-major power democracies have a positive impact on state building while major power democracies seem to have a negative impact (Pickering and Kisangani, 2014: 260). In sum, although scholars have attempted to delve into the nuances of the effect of international conflict and interstate rivalry on state building, none of these studies have considered the possibility that the attributes of an interstate rivalry can also have a significant effect on state capacity, and particularly on military capacity.…”

Partisan electoral interventions by the great powers: Introducing the PEIG Dataset

“… 1. The literature on interventions in IR is quite large and cannot, of course, be reviewed here in detail. For some of the most recent research on, for example, the effects of interventions of different types see Bapat and Kwon (2015), DeMeritt (2015), Downes and Monten (2013), Hultman et al (2015), Pickering and Kisnagni (2014) and Sullivan and Karreth (2015). …”