The effectiveness of mediation and peacekeeping for ending conflict

Abstract

Mediation and peacekeeping are commonly used tools to manage conflict. To what extent are they complementary and effective instruments for ending violent conflicts? Generally, they are seen as distinct tools: mediation aims to facilitate negotiated settlements, while the goal of peacekeeping is to prevent agreements from collapsing. However, peacekeeping and mediation regularly occur simultaneously. Arguably, peacekeeping operations rely on continuing political processes, while peacekeepers create a context favorable for mediation and provide a valuable source of independent information. Using a variety of model specifications, including selection models, empirical evidence supports that (a) mediation rather than peacekeeping is key to halting hostilities, (b) mediation and peacekeeping are largely complementary, but (c) this complementarity is conditional: in the post-Cold War period, transformative peacekeeping boosted the effectiveness of mediation to halt civil wars. There is no evidence that peacekeeping on its own matters for ending conflict. Finally, counterfactual analysis shows the substantial impact of mediation and peacekeeping on the frequency of conflict.

Pushing the doors open: Nonviolent action and inclusion in peace negotiations

“…We expect that the regional occurrence of protests could inspire similar civic action elsewhere, whereas we deem it unlikely to influence whether non-warring parties get included in peace negotiations. This approach is similar to Clayton & Dorussen (2022), who, in their study of the effect of mediation and peacekeeping on termination, use a global measure of conflict management as an instrument. In creating the measure of global nonviolent campaigns, Gleditsch & Rivera (2017) generate a count of all campaigns globally, while removing the country itself.…”

Peace Negotiations in Civil Conflicts: A New Dataset

“…To enable causal inference, researchers are often interested in uncovering selection processes that lead to the deployment of UN missions. The PNCC becomes relevant in this respect because peace talks, external mediation, and UN mission assignment are interrelated processes (Beardsley et al 2019; Kathman and Benson 2019; Clayton and Dorussen 2022; Owsiak et al 2021). A growing literature reveals that an overwhelming majority of conflict management attempts come as part of a package (see Greig et al 2019).…”

“…Although earlier research tended to investigate different conflict management instruments such as mediation and peacekeeping in isolation, recent studies increasingly turned towards uncovering interactions between them (DeRouen and Chowdhury 2018; Beardsley et al 2019; Clayton and Dorussen 2022). This is a promising area of research because conflict management attempts are interdependent in time and space (Diehl and Regan 2015).…”

“…Negotiations have a profound impact on civil war processes. They alter incentives and opportunities for violence (Höglund 2008; Sisk 2009; Ruhe 2021); interact with other conflict management instruments including peacekeeping and third-party intervention (DeRouen and Chowdhury 2018; Beardsley et al 2019; Clayton and Dorussen 2022; Owsiak et al 2021); and influence the cohesiveness of rebel groups and decrease the barriers to entry (Lounsbery and Cook 2011; Fjelde and Nilsson 2018; Duursma and Fliervoet 2021). Yet, the systematic study of peace talks remains underdeveloped (Cunningham and Sawyer 2019).…”

“…Second, an emerging literature emphasizes that conflict management attempts –including mediation, bilateral negotiations, and peacekeeping– are temporally and spatially interdependent (DeRouen and Chowdhury 2018; Beardsley et al 2019; Clayton and Dorussen 2022; Owsiak et al 2021). Their occurrence and effectiveness depend not only on their temporal sequence, but also on the interactions between them.…”