Is it a civil war, or isn’t it?
There are objective characteristics that all modern civil wars share. Harvard public policy professor Monica Toft lists six criteria. Hint: Iraq meets all of them.
By Monica Duffy Toft
There are six criteria for considering a conflict a civil war.
Q. Is the focus of the war control over which group governs the political unit?
Q. Are there at least two groups of organized combatants?
Q. Is the state one of the combatants?
Q. Are there at least 1,000 battle deaths per year on average?
Q. Is the ratio of total deaths at least 95 percent to 5 percent? In other words, has the stronger side suffered at least 5 percent of the casualties?
Q. Is the war occurring within the boundaries of an internationally recognized state or entity?
(There is more, here. Here's another view of civil war, from the International Herald Tribune:)
Scholars agree Iraq meets definition of 'civil war'
By Edward Wong
The New York Times
Is Iraq in a civil war?
Though the Bush administration continues to insist that it is not, a growing number of U.S. and Iraqi scholars, leaders and policy analysts say the fighting in Iraq in every way meets the standard definition of civil war.
The common scholarly definition has two main criteria. The first says that the warring groups must be from the same country and fighting for control of the political center, control over a separatist state or to force a major change in policy. The second says that at least 1,000 people must have been killed, with at least 100 from each side.
American professors who specialize in the study of civil wars say that most of them agree that the conflict in Iraq is a civil war.
"I think that at this time, and for some time now, the level of violence in Iraq meets the definition of civil war that any reasonable person would have," said James Fearon, a political scientist at Stanford who in September testified to Congress on the Iraq war.
While the term is broad enough to include many kinds of conflicts, one of the sides in a civil war is almost always the sovereign government. Therefore, some scholars say the civil war in Iraq began when the Americans transferred sovereignty to an appointed Iraqi government in June 2004. That officially transformed the anti-American war into one of insurgent groups seeking to regain power for disenfranchised Sunni Arabs against an Iraqi government led by Prime Minister Ayad Allawi and increasingly dominated by Shiites.
Others say the civil war began this year, after the bombing of a revered Shiite shrine in Samarra set off a chain of revenge killings that left hundreds dead over five days and has yet to end. Allawi proclaimed a month after that bombing that Iraq was mired in a civil war. "If this is not civil war, then God knows what civil war is," Allawi said.
Many insurgencies, and ethnic or sectarian wars, are also civil wars. Vietnam and Lebanon are examples.
(There's more.)
By Monica Duffy Toft
There are six criteria for considering a conflict a civil war.
Q. Is the focus of the war control over which group governs the political unit?
Q. Are there at least two groups of organized combatants?
Q. Is the state one of the combatants?
Q. Are there at least 1,000 battle deaths per year on average?
Q. Is the ratio of total deaths at least 95 percent to 5 percent? In other words, has the stronger side suffered at least 5 percent of the casualties?
Q. Is the war occurring within the boundaries of an internationally recognized state or entity?
(There is more, here. Here's another view of civil war, from the International Herald Tribune:)
Scholars agree Iraq meets definition of 'civil war'
By Edward Wong
The New York Times
Is Iraq in a civil war?
Though the Bush administration continues to insist that it is not, a growing number of U.S. and Iraqi scholars, leaders and policy analysts say the fighting in Iraq in every way meets the standard definition of civil war.
The common scholarly definition has two main criteria. The first says that the warring groups must be from the same country and fighting for control of the political center, control over a separatist state or to force a major change in policy. The second says that at least 1,000 people must have been killed, with at least 100 from each side.
American professors who specialize in the study of civil wars say that most of them agree that the conflict in Iraq is a civil war.
"I think that at this time, and for some time now, the level of violence in Iraq meets the definition of civil war that any reasonable person would have," said James Fearon, a political scientist at Stanford who in September testified to Congress on the Iraq war.
While the term is broad enough to include many kinds of conflicts, one of the sides in a civil war is almost always the sovereign government. Therefore, some scholars say the civil war in Iraq began when the Americans transferred sovereignty to an appointed Iraqi government in June 2004. That officially transformed the anti-American war into one of insurgent groups seeking to regain power for disenfranchised Sunni Arabs against an Iraqi government led by Prime Minister Ayad Allawi and increasingly dominated by Shiites.
Others say the civil war began this year, after the bombing of a revered Shiite shrine in Samarra set off a chain of revenge killings that left hundreds dead over five days and has yet to end. Allawi proclaimed a month after that bombing that Iraq was mired in a civil war. "If this is not civil war, then God knows what civil war is," Allawi said.
Many insurgencies, and ethnic or sectarian wars, are also civil wars. Vietnam and Lebanon are examples.
(There's more.)
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