Partition as a Solution toEthnic Civil War:

Understanding Post-War Violence and Ethnic Separation

Carter JohnsonTbilisi

June 24, 2011

Presentation Overview

1) Motivation

2) Conventional theory of partition and civil war termination Focus on separating ethnic minorities

3) Case Study of Georgia-Abkhazia and Moldova-Transnistria (1994-1998)

4) Develop alternative explanation Refine Ethnic Security Dilemma Focus state building and balance of power

Ethnic Civil War Termination

Partition gaining acceptance in policy communitiesSudan, Kosovo, East Timor, Papua New Guinea,

Afghanistan

No consensus on partition’s effectiveness(Mearsheimer, Sambanis, Kaufmann, Downes)

Controversy over the need for ethnic separation

Negotiated Settlements: Power-Sharing/Autonomy(Horowitz, Ghai, Lijphart, O’Leary)

Peacekeeping/3rd Party Security Guarantees (Walter, Fortna, Sambanis, Doyle)

Realpolitic/Military Victory

(Luttwak, Toft)

Literature on Civil War Termination

Conventional Partition Argument

Ethnic Security Dilemma:

1. Ethnic civil war rigidly divides ethnic groups and prevents post-war cooperation

2. Pockets of ethnic minorities “left-behind” partition line create

offensive opportunities defensive vulnerabilities

Triadic Political Space

1

2

3

Method Structured Comparative Case Studies

Georgia-Abkhazia (1994-1998)Moldova-Transnistria (1993-1997)

Sources

InterviewsCivilianMilitary/PoliceGovernmentMilitants

Archival Material

Gal57%

O&Tk34%

Gul&Sukh9%

Gagra1%

Georgian-Abkhaz Violence in Abkhazia1995-April 1998

Abkhazia1994-1998

Counter-Intuitive Cooperation:

1. Ethnic Georgian civilians demonstrate (limited) cooperation with Abkhaz authorities

2. Ethnic Georgians demonstrate aversion to cooperation with Georgian militants

Evidence from Abkhaz officials, Georgians in Gali, and Georgian militants in Zugdidi

“We didn’t know which [Georgians] were ours and which were theirs.” Georgian Militant 1 (June 2008)

“Of course they [Georgians in Gali] interfered (meshali) in our operations, the [expletive] traitors – they should be shot.” Georgian Militant 2 (March 2008)

“After a couple of years we began talking amongst ourselves in Russian, so locals [in Gali] would think we were Russian or Abkhaz.” Ethnic Georgian Militant 3 (July 2008)

What Militants Said

Abkhazia’s “Six Day War”May 1998

Joint invasion of: Non-state militants Unofficial military Official Ministry of Interior troops

Where do the invade? Only lower Gali region

Partial Invasion: Lower Gali

Comparative State-Building: Lower and Upper Gali

Lower Gali has limited (non-existent) Abkhaz state presence by May 1998 Geography of lower Gali enables increased attacks Increased attacks lead to lower security in lower Gali

“They [Abkhaz militia] didn’t want to patrol lower Gali, of course they were scared, I lost a lot of men.”

Ruslan Kishmaria, Abkhaz President’s Special Envoy to Gali

RAND: 24 Security officers per 1,000 inhabitants Gali: 3.5 per 1,000 in 1997

Upper Gali experienced little conflict 1994-1998 “By 1995 we found a way to get along [nashli obshii iazyk]”

Georgian resident of Upper Gali, Feb.2008

Conclusion from Georgia-Abkhazia

1. Ethnic identity does not predict ethnic cooperation after war as easily as during war.

Ethnic preferences and behavior diverge when incentives are powerful enough.

2. Invading forces only targeted where no effective state existed, where balance of power was in Georgia’s favor.

Where state strength was relatively high, no invasion took place despite “advantage” of compact ethnic kin groups.

Moldova-Transnistria

Pre-War State Consolidation 1989-1991: Transnistria Separates

Geographically Limited Conflict (1992) War limited to two urban centers Limited destruction of security apparatus

Post War attempts at destabilization by Moldova quickly discovered and ended.

“We tried [armed groups], but they only caused us problems so we stopped.”

Anatol Plugaru, former head of Moldova’s security services in post-war period

Conclusion

1. Results do not challenge the ethnic security dilemma: ethnic separation may be a sufficient condition for peace.

2. Results suggest that separation not required to maintain peace if:

a) State building is achieved

b) Balance of power can be maintained

Q & Ajohnsoncarter@gmail.com

Country Post Partition Index War Ends for Five Years?

Violence Ends for Five Years?

Cyprus (1974) 100.00 YES YES

Georgia-Abkhazia (1993) 99.83 YES NO

Pakistan-Bangladesh (1971)

98.91 YES YES

Georgia-S.Ossetia (1992) 98.33 YES YES

Ethiopia-Eritrea (1991) 98.13 YES YES

Azerbaijan (1994) 95.69 YES YES

Bosnia (1995) 86.40 YES YES

Yugoslavia-Croatia (1995) 71.62 YES YES

Israel (1948) 58.56 YES NO

India (1948) 58.56 YES YES

Yugoslavia-Kosovo (1999) 52.14 YES NO

Cyprus (1963) 34.60 NO NO

India-Kashmir (1965) -28.85 NO NO

India- Kashmir (1994) -28.85 NO NO

Somalia (1992) -93.43 NO NO

Moldova (1992) -108.06 YES YES

Russia-Chechnya (1996) -366.67 NO NO

Ethnic Separation and Recurring Violence

Contribution of this Research

1. Theoretical• Ethnic separation remains a sufficient but not necessary

condition for establishing peace• Importance of state building and balance of power as

able to trump ethnic separation

2. Empirical• Collected original cross-national data on partition• 9 months field research (Georgia & Moldova)