The Enemy Within: Personal Rule, Coups, and Civil War in Africa

Abstract

Why do rulers employ ethnic exclusion at the risk of civil war? Focusing on the region of sub-Saharan Africa, the author attributes this costly strategy to the commitment problem that arises in personalist regimes between elites who hold joint control of the state's coercive apparatus. As no faction can be sure that others will not exploit their violent capabilities to usurp power, elites maneuver to protect their privileged position and safeguard against others' first-a rising internal threat, rulers move to eliminate their rivals to guarantee their personal and political survival. But the cost of such a strategy, especially when carried out along ethnic lines, is that it increases the risk of a future civil war. To test this argument, the author employs the Ethnic Power Relations data set combined with original data on the ethnicity of conspirators of coups and rebellions in Africa. He finds that in Africa ethnic exclusion substitutes civil war risk for coup risk. And rulers are significantly more likely to exclude their coconspirators—the very friends and allies who helped them come to power—than other included groups, but at the cost of increasing the risk of a future civil war with their former allies. In the first three years after being purged from the central government, coconspirators and their coethnics are sixteen times more likely to rebel than when they were represented at the apex of the regime.

Strategic Logic of Elite Purges in Dictatorships

“…As the likelihood that the military and other elites will attempt a 3 coup increases, the dictator is more inclined to diminish their capabilities to organize a coup by purging strong and competent officers (e.g., Stepan, 1971;Horowitz, 1985;Finer, 1988;Pollack, 1996;Belkin & Schofer, 2003, 2005Pilster & Bohmelt, 2011). In other words, a dictator who faces a high coup risk tends to employ "coup-proofing" strategies in the form of purges and political replacement of military officers and other elites to reduce his coup risk (Biddle & Zirkle, 1996;Quinlivan, 1999;Roessler, 2011).…”

“…One focuses on leaders' incentives to weaken elites' capabilities to organize a coup, and the other emphasizes the opportunities that allow the leaders to pursue such a strategy. Some scholars argue that those leaders who face a high threat of coups are more likely to eliminate strong elites in order to reduce their coup risk (e.g., Biddle & Zirkle, 1996;Roessler, 2011). 1 Although these studies properly capture when dictators need most to purge rivals, they ignore the possibility that leaders' efforts to weaken elites often prompt the elites to launch a counter-coup to replace the leaders before losing their abilities to conduct a coup.…”

Foreign Investment and State Conflicts in Africa

“…Access to these resources with minimal accountability can be used to supply patronage support or for "purchasing" loyalty (Tomashevskiy, 2015). Access to an economic surplus can fund patronage and "buy off" competing elites, guarding against inclusionary types of violence; this can contribute to minimizing the threat of armed challengers and uprisings [for example, see Achy's (2013) example of Algeria; Roessler, 2011]. Leaders in this position need not solely rely on the use of securitization as a strategy to ensure political stability within their borders.…”

Maintaining ethnic dominance: Diversity, power, and violent repression

“…As witnessed in sub-Saharan countries such as Liberia and Uganda, ethnic exclusion can also result from coup d'états or purges within the ruling elite (Roessler 2011). This shows that violent incidents can also feed back into future ethnically exclusive state structures.…”