Are third-party interventions in civil wars desirable? A multi-method approach to ending intrastate conflicts

This dissertation examines the effectiveness and political support surrounding third-party interventions in civil wars, which have increased in frequency, type, and number of actors since the collapse of Cold War bipolarity. The existing literature has mainly examined the individual effects of third-party strategies, though the growing presence of concurrently occurring types of third-party interventions necessitates exploration of their interactive effects. Thus, this thesis seeks to understand different actions from multiple actors dependently rather than independently. Understanding the effectiveness of these strategies is only one step towards realizing whether third-party interventions are desirable. The motivation and the will of the actors responsible for the policy execution are crucial in realizing the full picture. The ubiquitous problem arising from the third-party interventions requires a multipronged methodological approach. This thesis, therefore, combines both observational and experimental data to explore this issue. While the primary results show that peacekeeping and mediation are the most effective and supported strategies of engagement, both effectiveness and support appear to be highly context-dependent. Further, this thesis surveys American public and political elites to delve into the determinants of support for third-party interventions. It nds that both the public and the political elite are sensitive to civilian casualties, yet in the face of a political rivalry these humanitarian concerns dissipate. Additionally, political elites are interested in ending hostilities only as long as their national security interests are at stake. By filling a gap in the literature, generating original data, and utilizing novel methodological approach, these results have underlined the need for improvement of policy decisions in the area of international confict management and, at the same time, build upon the new direction of research in the eld of confict dynamics.