Doctoral Dissertation Research in Political Science: The Escalation of Mass Violence Against Civilians

针对平民的大规模暴力升级仍然是研究政治暴力的一个被忽视的主题。本项目研究内战中大规模暴力的动态，特别是通过研究暴力如何以及在什么条件下升级、降级或未能升级。为了回答这些问题，在布隆迪进行了田野调查，布隆迪是卢旺达和刚果的一个鲜为人知的邻国，经历了40多年不同程度的暴力。针对平民的暴力的这种变化使人们能够调查不同地区和不同时间的升级过程，同时保持许多其他因素不变。这项研究将有助于确定一些地方缺乏暴力的原因，另一些地方暴力的降级原因，以及另一些地方暴力升级的原因。这些原因反过来可以指导政策决定如何避免暴力升级，以及如何在暴力开始后有效减少暴力。初步研究包括国内精英访谈和对未发表的文件和数据的分析，有助于查明导致对平民的大规模暴力发生变化的四类原因：冲突前的结构性变量、导致路径依赖的自我强化过程、冲突的内生动力(暴力如何影响暴力)以及一次性事件或关键时刻(如暗杀)。这个项目中有关机制和动力学的问题最好是用定性的方法来分析，这种方法可以解决冲突局势的复杂性。因此，主要通过国家以下一级的人种学调查这些原因，通过对布隆迪十个区的证人、受害者和前战斗人员进行深入和反复访谈来收集信息。这些信息有两种用途。首先，审查非常分散的升级进程，以便了解哪些事件紧跟在其他事件之后，以及是否存在因果关系。其次，一个比较时空单位的框架允许人们测试假设的原因是否存在于它们缺失的类似单位中，这使得我能够排除潜在的原因，以及确定哪些原因似乎具有重要的影响。例如，1972年，鲁蒙日区发生了针对平民的激烈暴力事件，但1993年，该地区几乎没有发生暴力事件，当时该国大部分地区都在经历严重的暴力事件。初步研究表明，地方领导人的团结及其与平民的关系是这两个时期的根本区别。其他时空比较将使人们能够研究其他潜在原因，例如过去的暴力在多大程度上增加或减少了未来发生暴力的可能性。政治学往往专注于政治暴力的静态原因，无法解释随时间和空间的变化。该项目对了解政治暴力的动态作出了重要贡献。它还有可能以保护大规模暴力地区平民的方式影响政策。对升级进程的了解将有助于作出明智的决定，决定如何创造不升级和降级的条件，以及如何避免制造升级的条件。当军队、民兵、叛军或游击队为争夺政治控制权而战时，平民首当其冲。该项目旨在提供知识，以打击针对平民的大规模暴力升级，并创造新的思考和理解政治暴力的方式。

The escalation of mass violence against civilians has remained a neglected topic in the study of political violence. This project examines the dynamics of mass violence in civil war, and in particular by examining how and under what conditions violence escalates, de-escalates, or fails to escalate. To answer these questions, fieldwork is conducted in Burundi, a little-known neighbor of Rwanda and the Congo that has experienced over four decades of violence at varying levels. This variation in violence against civilians allows one to investigate the processes of escalation in different areas and at different times, while holding many other factors constant. This research will help identify the reasons for a lack of violence in some places, the de-escalation of violence in others, and the escalation of violence in yet others. These reasons can, in turn, inform policy decisions about how to avoid the escalation of violence and how to effectively reduce violence once it has begun.Preliminary research consisting of in-country elite interviews and the analysis of unpublished documents and data helped to indentify four categories of causes that lead to the observed variation in mass violence against civilians: pre-conflict structural variables, self-reinforcing processes leading to path dependency, the endogenous dynamics of the conflict (how violence affects violence), and one-time events or critical junctures (such as assassinations). The questions in this project about mechanisms and dynamics are best analyzed by qualitative methods which can address the complexity of the conflict situation. As such, these causes are investigated primarily through ethnography at the subnational level, by gathering information through in-depth and repeat interviews with witnesses, victims, and ex-combatants in ten districts in Burundi. This information is used in two ways. First, the processes of escalation at a very disaggregated level, are examined in order to understand which events followed other events, and whether a causal relationship appears to exist. Second, a framework in which time-space units are compared allows one to test whether hypothesized causes are present to similar units where they are missing, which allows me to rule out potential causes, as well as to identify which causes seem to have an important effect. For example, violence against civilians was intense in 1972 in the district of Rumonge, but then almost no violence occurred in 1993 in the same district, when most of the country was experiencing severe violence. Preliminary research suggests that the unity of local leaders and their relationships with the civilians was an essential difference between the two periods. Other time-space comparisons will allow one to study other potential causes, such as the extent to which past violence increases or decreases the likelihood of future violence.Political science has often focused on the static causes of political violence, which cannot explain change over time and space. This project makes important contributions to the understanding of the dynamics of political violence. It also has the potential to affect policy in ways that will protect civilians in regions of mass violence. An understanding of the processes of escalation will allow for informed decisions about how to create conditions of non-escalation and de-escalation and how to avoid creating conditions of escalation. When armies, militias, rebels, or guerrillas fight for political control, civilians bear the brunt of the costs. This project seeks to provide knowledge to combat the escalation of mass violence against civilians, as well as to create new ways of thinking and understanding political violence.