Iraq’s popular mobilisation units: intra-sectarian rivalry and Arab Shi’a mobilisation from the 2003 invasion to Covid-19 pandemic

The Popular Mobilisation Units’ (PMU) rise in Iraq resulted from a de facto, post-2003 hybridization of security governance, opposed to an emergency measure combat Islamic State after 2014. Rather than cohesive sectarian movement, the PMU moniker granted government veneer array pre-existing or new militias, representing decentralized Shi’a Arab mobilisation prior 2014, symptomatic Iraq’s divisive patronage politics. Perceived by US and world as ‘pro-Iranian militias’, spoiler sovereignty, Iranian means securing its control over Baghdad, while some militias began NSAAs, have evolved into quasi-state actors becoming part state, but not under complete control. Ultimately, their power within is constrained other political institutions, such electoral cycle, clerical establishment, protest addition pandemic, Covid-19.