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This study challenges the long-standing thesis that by the failure to repeal or greatly reduce the war tariffs, the government and the Republican party embarked on a deliberate policy of aiding business.

Doctor of Philosophy / Security Studies / Andrew G. Long / This dissertation advances the study of civil war by addressing the means through which states’ police forces may affect the probability of civil war onset. I improve upon extant work on civil war and state capacity by considering the ability of police to act autonomously from the state and operate as a distinct element of the state’s security sector. The project consists of four substantive chapters. One chapter addresses the role of police capacity in preventing civil war and determines that simple measures of police strength do influence the probability of civil war onset. Also, anocracies require a greater number of police to prevent civil war. The next chapter tests whether police repression could lead to civil war by creating grievances among the populace. Tests of this hypothesis determine that while police repression can increase the probability of civil war, it is not as powerful a predictor as state repression overall. The third chapter looks at the effect of the mode of organization of police forces and contains two contrasting hypotheses. The first proposes that police force centralization increases the probability of civil war onset by increasing the likelihood that the state and police view the utility of employing repression more favorably. The other proposes that centralization reduces the probability of civil war onset by making the police more effective. Nevertheless, neither hypothesis yields significant outcomes when tested. The final chapter employs two case studies about the experience of police serving as military during a civil war. I find that in both cases, police service in what are typically military functions did tend to make the police more repressive after the war, which contributed to reoccurrence by giving dissidents a cause around which to rally and by reducing the dissidents’ perceptions of the utility of non-violent means of protest. I conclude the study with a summary of the major findings, suggestions for further study, and recommendations for policy makers.

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The Civil War contained many examples of courage and commitment to duty that were inspired by religion. In recent years much has been written on this subject of religion and the Civil War but virtually all of it is written about Protestant chaplains and this has created a gap in the record. This thesis covers the role played by Catholic chaplains in Confederate army regiments from Louisiana. It explores their life, ministry, military role, and impact on the regiments. To cover this in depth the Catholic chaplains selected we those who left published records.

Indiscriminate violence against civilians is a recurrent problem in armed conflicts of all sorts. However, from a social science perspective this type of violence poses a puzzle. The literature on government and non-government violence mostly assumes that indiscriminate violence has counter-productive effect and is ultimately self-defeating. Yet, this begs the question as to why an actor should use indiscriminate violence at all? This dissertation tries to solve at least part of the puzzle. First, it critically reviews the literature and points to some misunderstandings that have made progress in comprehending indiscriminate violence more difficult. Second, the dissertation provides a theory on the effects of indiscriminate violence that targets groups, i.e. group-selective violence. While most of the literature assumes that violence against groups seeks to coerce the groups that are attacked, this dissertation widens the view and includes non-targeted groups in the calculation as well. It thereby demonstrates that group-selective violence can be able to produce coercive effects among those groups that are not targeted while generating only limited counter-productive effects. Empirically, this dissertation provides two types of supporting evidence. First, it will provide several case studies as a plausibility probe. These cases are designed to highlight that group-selective violence is used in the way proposed by the theory and has the hypothesized effects. Second, the dissertation will test the hypotheses of the theory of group-selective violence with data on violence against civilians in ethnic wars. Here quantitative methods are used to investigate the patterns and the consequences of violence. Both empirical investigations provide support for the notion that group-selective violence can be beneficial for the perpetrator and that it is used to achieve those benefits. In sum, this dissertation puts forth the theoretical background and empirical support for the effectiveness of group-selective violence.

Under what conditions do rebel organizations control territory during civil war? How do civilians influence the distribution of territorial control? Why do rebels invest in governance, and why do they target civilians with violence, in some locations but not others? This dissertation advances a political accountability theory to explain how civilians influence the distribution of territorial control and governance during civil war. Existing research explaining variation in rebel territorial control and behavior have emphasized structural and organizational factors, identity politics, economic conditions, and geography. However, the classic insurgency literature and recent counterinsurgency doctrine emphasize the importance of securing civilian support and protecting the population to achieving military objectives in civil war. If true, civilians retain at least some power over rebel personnel. The accountability theory of rebel conduct provides a unified framework linking inter-related conflict processes associated with rebel groups’ territorial control, governance, and strategic use of violence during civil war. It argues that community collective action capacity, the ease with which communities facilitate collective action to pursue common interests, influences the distribution territorial control and belligerent conduct during civil war. The empirical strategy draws upon complementary quantitative and qualitative methods to test the accountability against plausible alternatives using village-level data from the communist insurgency in the Philippines. The results provide robust support for the accountability theory over plausible alternatives, and yield policy implications for peace-building and economic development in conflict-affected states.