BACKGROUND The Myanmar army and ethnic armed groups agreed to a preliminary ceasefire in 2012, but a heavy military presence remains in southeastern Myanmar. Qualitative data suggested this militarization can result in human rights abuses in the absence of armed engagements between the parties, and that rural ethnic civilians use a variety of self-protection strategies to avoid these abuses or ...

This is the second report on ‘‘International Humanitarian Law (IHL) and the Challenges of Contemporary Armed Conflicts’’ that has been prepared by the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) for an International Conference of the Red Cross and Red Crescent. In the years that have elapsed since the first report was presented to the 28th International Conference in Geneva, in December 200...

Abstract The protection of health care in armed conflict dates to the 1864 Geneva Convention. Yet violations international humanitarian law related occur on a near daily basis, and actors continue obstruct from assisting people need areas. An estimated one-third recorded threats affecting are attributed non-state (NSAAs). given that many NSAAs themselves do fact provide facilitate care, this es...

Why do some armed groups commit massive wartime rape, whereas others never do? Using an original dataset, I describe the substantial variation in rape by armed actors during recent civil wars and test a series of competing causal explanations. I find evidence that the recruitment mechanism is associated with the occurrence of wartime rape. Specifically, the findings support an argument about wa...

We show that the proliferation of armed groups increases amount organized political violence. The natural death a tribal leader provides quasi-experimental variation in number across districts Pakistan. Employing event study designs and IV-regressions allows us to isolate effect on violence from locational fundamentals conflict, e.g., local financing recruiting opportunities or government capac...

Based on a review of the diverse practices how armed groups tax, we highlight that full account why tax needs to go beyond revenue motivations, also engage with explanations related ideology, legitimacy, institution building, legibility and control populations, performance public authority. This article builds two distinct literatures, taxation, provide first systematic exploration motivations ...