STRATEGIC MASS KILLINGS

Bersini DiegoBodini Diego

Fiocchetti FrancescoPugnetti Anna

Università degli Studi di ParmaFacoltà di Economia

International Business and Development13.04.2011

OBJECTIVES

Identify the key variables and situations that make mass killings more likely to occur;

Distinguish the conditions under which mass killings and military conflict intensity reinforce each other from situations where they are substitute modes of strategic violence;

DEFINITION OF MASS KILLINGS

“Mass Killings are the killings of substantial numbers of human beings, when not in the course of military actions against the military forces of an avowed enemy, under the conditions of the essential defenselessness and helplessness of the victims”

BASIC EMPIRICAL RESULTS

Political regime; Group size and power; Ethnic fractionalization and polarization; Economic conditions; International intervention; Civil wars

MODEL OF CIVIL WAR AND MASS KILLINGS

STAGES OF THE MODELSTAGE ONE

Two groups (i,j) of population size (Ni,Nj);

If group j is in power, group i will decide at the first stage;

STAGE TWO

The two groups select fighting efforts (Di,Dj)

STAGE THREE

The victorious group sets rent-share of loosing group to minimum and decides on mass killings

(if the group doesn't rebel...)

STEPS OF THE MODEL

Population Size

Output produced by labor

Individual productivity determined by education and technology

TOTAL OUTPUT

GOVERNMENT REVENUE

Government revenue

State's capacity * Output = Government taxes output at the rate t

Exploitation/Exports of natural resources

Individual productivity determined by education and technology

At the 3° stage, considering the “initial disposable income”, the victorious group decides the amount of mass killings and the share of

government revenue.

Numbers of members of the group to eliminate

INTERNAL CONSTRAINT EXTERNAL CONSTRAINT

Shadow of future rebellions;

The degree of commitment to the democracy;

International pressure for a “fair” treatment of the defeated group as an essential ingredient of democratizationThe closeness of the distributional share to the population size of the losers.

The closer “lambda” is to unity, the closer the imposed distribution will be to fairness.

DETERMINATIONS OF MASS KILLINGS

The winner has to select to maximize the future period playoff, assuming that:

The maximum level of mass killings beyond which the international

community would intervene and stop killings.

DIFFERENCESE BETWEEN AND

1. = based on the humanitarian objective of sparing the lives of non- combatant civilians;

= politically motivated;

2. = stopping the mass killings is done by military intervention (agreement of the international community);

= the pressures for democratization are performed through international agencies (WB, IMF)

3. = the threat of international military intervention is activated while the armed conflict takes place;

4. = part of the post-conflict peace agreements;

Assuming E = 0 the highest payoff is obtained with no mass killings = 0

higher is Lambda it forces to give more resources to the defeated group

With E=0 a decrease in N due to mass killings will cause a proportional decrease of the overall output

EFFECTS ON THE VARIATIONS OF THE VARIOUS KEY PARAMETERS ON THE

WARFARE AND THE USE OF MASS KILLINGS

1 – Effects on changes in group sizes

This analysis brings the same results of the empirical observations:

The small group is not the only one doing mass killings The small group has higher fighting activity in the battlefield

2 – State capacity and productivity

In this case the implication that warfare effort will larger seems difficult to reconcile with empirical evidence.

3 – Natural Resources

When a country becomes more resource rich government revenue is less dependent of the productive activity of its population.

Higher E higher aggregate warfare effort conflict and mass killings

This analysis seems to belong the same results of the empirical literature

4 – Limits to exploitation

Higher “Lambda” tighter pressure for a fair tratement of the loosers.While a moderate pressure for fairness may be beneficial, a tight pressure may

precipitate mass killings. In a NON democratic country had been in peace and is induced to commit democratization, the model predicts that the government could murder part of the opponent before starting

the democratization process.

THE “SHADOW” OF MASS KILLINGS

If is lowered, i.e. if the threshold on mass killings before a foreign intervention is triggered is tightened.

The life tool of being defeated decreases because of a lower , the threatened group decreases its warfare effort.

Comparison between lower and higher

Reduction of would be preferred but:1. Lower decreases the probability of winning for the minority group;2.Leaders of the minority group do not accept a lower .

INTERVENTION OF THE INTERNATIONAL COMMUNITY

Table 1: COUNTRY LEVEL EVIDENCE – EMPIRICAL RESULTS

SIGNIFICANT VARIABLES

• High GDP per capita

• High democracy

• High trade/GDP

• High ethnic polarization

• High population

• High civil war incidence

Reduce the riskof mass killings

Increase the riskof mass killings

WEAKNESS

1. Omitted variables

2. The analysis focuses on current incidence without controlling for lagged incidence

3. Are used only a rather limited number of control variables. Are not a recent data

4. Little attention to the effect of natural resources on mass killings and displacements

Table 3: ETHNIC GROUP LEVEL EVIDENCE [MODEL ANALYSIS]

• The table studies what kind of ethnic groups are victims of military massacres of civilians and of forced resettlements

• To create the table are used 3 dataset:

1. MAR Minorities at risk2. GREG Geo-referencing ot ethnic groups3. PETRODATA Geo-Referenced Petroelum

dataset

SIGNIFICANT VARIABLES

MASSACRES

• High in natural resources

• Low productivity

• Different religion

Increase the risk

RESETTLEMENTS

• High in natural resources

• Different languages

Increase the risk

CONCLUSION

Mass Killing: Region characterized by low teta and high expected lambda

Mass Killings in conjuntion with intersate wars: not exist common pool of resources

Connection between mass killings and fighting efforts: remark 3

Variables that reduce massacres but increase incentive for fighting: productivity, state capacity, low lambda

Variables that increase scope for fighting and mass killings: natural resources