Military Strategy and Civilian Suffering in Wartime: Understanding the Consequences of War for Non-Combatants in the 20th Century

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The causes of interstate and civil war have been a topic of central concern to social scientists. In addition, there is a growing body of systematic research on the outcomes of war for the opposing armed forces of each side. A significant gap in basic research on war, however, is the relative lack of rigorous theoretical and empirical analysis that seeks to account for systematic differences in civilian loss of life and suffering in wartime across both time and space. This research project addresses this critical shortcoming in scholarly research with a study of the consequences of armed conflict for non-combatant populations in 219 wars from 1900-2000. In this project a rational choice theoretical model is developed to address the central question: When and why would opposing armed forces in wartime, as a matter of military strategy, adopt policies that target civilians with the result that large numbers of non-combatant populations are directly killed, or are forced to endure conditions that threaten large losses of life? Specifically, hypotheses are developed to explain when opposing armed forces engage in: a) direct military attacks on civilians, b) coercive displacement of civilians from their homes resulting in large-scale refugee flows or internally displaced populations, and c) deliberate policies of destroying agricultural production systems and denying access to adequate food supplies resulting in conditions that threaten famine and starvation. The hypotheses are empirically tested with statistical models on the population of 219 wars (interstate, civil, and de-colonization conflicts) in the 20th century. Comparative case analyses are utilized to illustrate and evaluate the causal inferences drawn from the statistical findings. The published results of the project will produce important contributions to the scholarly literature of political scientists on a neglected aspect in study of war. In particular, the project can broaden existing research to include a systematic analysis of when and why wars can produce devastating consequences for non-combatant populations. While existing research does not provide compelling answers to this question, this project's findings should advance scientific knowledge on this topic. This project can produce broader contributions beyond advances in the research of political scientists on war. First, new data sets on civilian loss of life and suffering in 219 wars are created. These newly created data sets will be made publicly available and should be of value to social scientists studying a cluster of related issues, such as the laws of war, outside intervention in wars, and changes in wartime military strategies. Second, the results of this project should contribute to scholarship in the field of Public Health. Researchers in this field are increasingly concerned with understanding the public health consequences of armed conflict. As a result, the data sets created and the findings of this project should be of interest to Public Health analysts who seek to better understand how political and military decisions increase the vulnerability of civilian populations to risk factors associated with disease and death. Third, the results of this project should be useful to policy makers in states, international institutions, and non-governmental organizations that seek to prevent and respond to humanitarian crises in wartime. For example, by better understanding when civilian populations are at greater risk, policy makers can try to devise policies that will deter combatants from targeting civilians with coercive military force.