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

州际战争和内战的起因一直是社会科学家关注的中心话题。此外，对双方敌对武装力量的战争结果进行的系统研究也越来越多。然而，在战争基础研究方面的一个重大差距是，相对缺乏严格的理论和经验分析，试图解释战争期间平民在时间和空间上的生命损失和痛苦的系统性差异。这项研究项目通过研究1900-2000年间219场战争中武装冲突对非战斗人口的影响，解决了学术研究中的这一重大缺陷。在这个项目中，开发了一个理性选择理论模型来解决核心问题：在战争期间，作为军事战略问题，敌对武装力量何时以及为什么会采取针对平民的政策，结果是大量非战斗人口直接被杀害，或者被迫忍受威胁到大量生命损失的条件？具体地说，提出假设是为了解释敌对武装部队何时从事以下行为：(A)对平民进行直接军事攻击；(B)强迫平民流离失所，导致大规模难民流或境内流离失所人口；(C)蓄意破坏农业生产系统和剥夺适当粮食供应的政策，造成饥荒和饥饿的威胁。这些假设通过对20世纪219场战争(州际战争、国内战争和去殖民主义冲突)人口的统计模型进行了实证检验。比较案例分析被用来说明和评估从统计结果中得出的因果推断。该项目发表的成果将对政治学家在战争研究中被忽视的一个方面的学术文献做出重要贡献。特别是，该项目可以扩大现有的研究，包括对战争何时以及为什么会对非战斗人口产生毁灭性后果的系统分析。虽然现有的研究没有为这个问题提供令人信服的答案，但该项目的发现应该会促进关于这个主题的科学知识。这个项目可以产生更广泛的贡献，而不仅仅是政治学家对战争的研究进展。首先，创建了关于219场战争中平民伤亡和苦难的新数据集。这些新创建的数据集将公开提供，对于研究一系列相关问题的社会科学家来说应该是有价值的，例如战争规律、外部干预战争和战时军事战略的变化。其次，该项目的成果应该有助于公共卫生领域的学术研究。这一领域的研究人员越来越关注了解武装冲突的公共卫生后果。因此，公共卫生分析员应该对创建的数据集和该项目的结果感兴趣，他们试图更好地了解政治和军事决定如何增加平民人口对与疾病和死亡有关的风险因素的脆弱性。第三，该项目的成果应有助于各国、国际机构和非政府组织的政策制定者在战时预防和应对人道主义危机。例如，通过更好地了解平民人口何时面临更大的风险，政策制定者可以尝试制定政策，阻止战斗人员以胁迫军事力量针对平民。

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.