IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/taf/ginixx/v40y2014i2p191-215.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

The Impact of Mercenaries and Private Military and Security Companies on Civil War Severity between 1946 and 2002

Author

Listed:
  • Ulrich Petersohn

Abstract

Research has long abandoned the view that only states wage war. On the contrary, civil war research has produced an impressive body of literature on violent non-state actors. Still, a particular group of actors—mercenaries—has been widely neglected so far, although they have participated in numerous conflicts in the second half of the twentieth century. Whether their presence aggravated or improved the situation is a matter of dispute. Some believe that the additional military capabilities provided by mercenaries help to end civil wars quickly without increased bloodshed, while others deem mercenaries greedy and bloodthirsty combatants who contribute to making civil wars more brutal, while a third opinion differentiates between different types of mercenaries. This article tests the impact of mercenaries on civil war severity. The evidence indicates that the presence of both mercenaries and private military and security contractors increases its severity.

Suggested Citation

  • Ulrich Petersohn, 2014. "The Impact of Mercenaries and Private Military and Security Companies on Civil War Severity between 1946 and 2002," International Interactions, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 40(2), pages 191-215, March.
  • Handle: RePEc:taf:ginixx:v:40:y:2014:i:2:p:191-215
    DOI: 10.1080/03050629.2014.880699
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://hdl.handle.net/10.1080/03050629.2014.880699
    Download Restriction: Access to full text is restricted to subscribers.

    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1080/03050629.2014.880699?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Chojnacki, Sven & Metternich, Nils & Münster, Johannes, 2009. "Mercenaries in civil wars, 1950-2000 [Söldner in Bürgerkriegen, 1950-2000]," Discussion Papers, Research Unit: Market Processes and Governance SP II 2009-05, WZB Berlin Social Science Center.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Benjamin Tkach, 2019. "Private military and security companies, contract structure, market competition, and violence in Iraq," Conflict Management and Peace Science, Peace Science Society (International), vol. 36(3), pages 291-311, May.
    2. Ulrich Petersohn, 2017. "Private Military and Security Companies (PMSCs), Military Effectiveness, and Conflict Severity in Weak States, 1990–2007," Journal of Conflict Resolution, Peace Science Society (International), vol. 61(5), pages 1046-1072, May.
    3. Batten, Jonathan A. & Boubaker, Sabri & Kinateder, Harald & Choudhury, Tonmoy & Wagner, Niklas F., 2023. "Volatility impacts on global banks: Insights from the GFC, COVID-19, and the Russia-Ukraine war," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 215(C), pages 325-350.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Ulrich Petersohn, 2017. "Private Military and Security Companies (PMSCs), Military Effectiveness, and Conflict Severity in Weak States, 1990–2007," Journal of Conflict Resolution, Peace Science Society (International), vol. 61(5), pages 1046-1072, May.

    More about this item

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:taf:ginixx:v:40:y:2014:i:2:p:191-215. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Chris Longhurst (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.tandfonline.com/GINI20 .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.