Do ethno-territorial rebels tolerate political competition? Power- and preference-based explanations

Abstract

During ethno-territorial wars, do rebels try to impose exclusive political control over their own ethnic group or do they tolerate political pluralism? First, rebel groups in conditions making them more capable of imposing political monopolies may more commonly make the attempt. Second, rebel leaders with more extreme nationalist preferences may more commonly try to do so. The paper presents a new, binary measure of whether ethno-territorial rebels attempt to impose exclusive political control. Data from 1944 to 2024 indicate that variation in rebel leadership preferences has greater explanatory power than variation in rebel capacity to impose exclusive control.