Insurgent-Population Ties and the Variation in the Trajectory of Peripheral Civil Wars
Anoop Sarbahi
Sarbahi's PhD dissertation is stimulated by the prevalence of a multitude of long-enduring ethnic insurgencies in a vast stretch of landmass extending between Northeast India and the Central Highlands of Vietnam. Often referred to as peripheral civil wars, such conflicts involve a geographically concentrated ethnic minority waging an armed rebellion against a disproportionately powerful state. The project examines the significance of the nature of insurgent-population ties in determining the trajectory of these civil wars. Between 2007 and 2009, Sarbahi undertook field research in Northeast India, conducting ethnographic studies of four peripheral, secessionist movements in Northeast India, centered on the Assamese, Meitei, Mizo and Naga ethnic identities. He also tests the empirical validity of his argument though a cross-national analysis using a new dataset of 54 similar insurgencies world-wide, involving 155 rebel groups, between 1960 and 2010.
Anoop Sarbahi Postdoctoral scholar in the Empirical Studies of Conflict Project (ESOC) and jointly affiliated with the Department of Political Science and the Center on Democracy, Development and the Rule of Law (CDDRL). He received his PhD in political science from the University of California, Los Angeles in 2011. His research interests include civil wars, counter insurgency, post-conflict transition and state rebuilding, electoral dynamics and political violence, democratization and democratic processes, and political economy of inter-group and inter-regional disparities. He has an M.A. in political science from the University of Iowa, and an M.Phil. in planning and development from the Indian Institute of Technology.