Doctoral Dissertation Research in Political Science: Intervention, Capabilities, Costs, and the Outcome of Civil Wars

这个项目调查内战的结果：在什么条件下内战各方选择通过谈判结束战争，以及当谈判失败时谁占上风。 研究人员开发了一个正式的模型，认为战争的终止是双方通过比较他们从战斗和谈判中获得的预期效用而做出的理性选择的结果-包括对手可能违背协议的风险。 军事平衡的变化、各方所承受的成本水平以及外部干预的程度决定了内战的结局。假设来自这个博弈论模型，通过使用计算机程序编写的研究人员，产生近似的解决方案的游戏。 在进一步完善了这个正式的模型后，这些假设使用1816年至1997年所有内战的数据进行了测试。 有必要进行进一步的研究和编码，以衡量其中一些战争的军事平衡、相对伤亡水平和最终战争结果。 除了大大增加我们对内战如何结束的理解外，该项目还提供了一个共同的数据资源，其他人可以利用它来发展和测试理论。

This project investigates the outcome of civil wars: under what conditions do the parties to a civil war choose to end the war by negotiation, and who prevails when negotiations fail. The researcher develops a formal model that holds war termination to be the outcome of rational choices that both sides make by comparing their expected utility from fighting and from negotiation -- including the risk that one's opponent may renege on an agreement. Changes in the military balance, the level of costs suffered by each side, and the level of external intervention determine how a civil war ends. Hypotheses are derived from this game-theoretic model by using a computer program written by the researcher that generates approximate solutions to the game. After further refinement of this formal model, these hypotheses are tested using data from all civil wars fought and terminated from 1816 to 1997. Further research and coding are necessary to measure the military balance and relative casualty levels and final war outcome for some of these wars. In addition to increasing significantly our understanding of how civil wars end, the project provides a common data resource with which others may develop and test theories.