O estudo analisa a influência dos boatos na vitória de César sobre Pompeu, ocorrida nas guerras civis de 49 e 48 a.C. Apesar do breve período de disputas, tem como recorte temporal os anos de 54 a 48 a.C., pois foi aí que apareceram os primeiros boatos das lutas entre os generais. Para tanto, toma como fontes obras de gêneros literários variados, situadas entre os séculos I a.C. e IV d.C. Dentro de tal corpus, destacam-se os Comentários sobre as Guerras Civis, redigidos por César, as Cartas a Ático e as Cartas aos Amigos, escritas por Cícero, e a Farsália, composta por Lucano. O referencial teórico abrange os conceitos de boato, janelas de oportunidades, ação coletiva e memória social. O objetivo geral é compreender a relação entre uma stasis, a propagação de boatos e a mobilização dos grupos. Seguem-no os objetivos específicos, por meio dos quais o estudo analisa de que modo as ações coletivas oportunizavam vantagens ou desvantagens militares, e também precisa como a formação de alianças tornou César o favorito ao sucesso. Considera que os boatos foram decisivos para o triunfo cesariano, pois contribuíram para a conquista de apoio, a rendição de cidades e a aquisição de recursos. / This work analyses the influence of rumours concerning the victory of Caesar over Pompey during the civil wars in 49 and 48 BC. Despite the brief period of disputes, this study considers a time frame that encompasses the years from 54 to 48 BC, for it was during this period that appeared the first rumours about the dispute between these generals. For this end, the study takes as sources works of varied literary genres from the 1st Century BC to the 4th Century AD. Within such a corpus, we highlight the Commentaries on the Civil War, written by Caesar, the Letters to Atticus and the Letters to Friends, authored by Cicero, and the Pharsalia, written by Lucan. The theoretical references embrace the concepts of rumour, windows of opportunity, collective action and social memory. The general purpose of this research is to understand the relation between a stasis, rumour spread and the mobilization of groups. The specific objectives concern the understanding of how the collective actions propitiated military advantages and disadvantages; also they specify how the formation of alliances made Caesar the favourite to succeed. It is considered that the rumours were decisive for the triumph of Caesar, due to their contribution regarding the obtainment of support, the surrender of cities and the acquisition of resources.

Personnage de l'entre-deux mettant à mal les frontières communément admises entre l'enfance et l'âge adulte, entre la puissance et la vulnérabilité, entre la victime et le bourreau, l'enfant-soldat est une figure marquante de notre contemporanéité. Il n'est donc guère étonnant de le voir devenir un personnage littéraire. Cette étude a cherché à déterminer, dans une approche comparatiste, quel traitement les oeuvres littéraires réservaient à ce personnage et la manière dont elles en faisaient une figure singulière. Loin de simplement reprendre un répertoire exogène de significations et prolonger la figure médiatique de l'enfant-soldat, loin de miser uniquement sur la violence de son hybridité, les romans africains anglophones et francophones construisent une figure de témoin. Ce que l'étude a souhaité rendre visible, ce sont alors les visions tant historiographiques, éthiques que politiques que porte l'enfant-soldat témoin des guerres civiles africaines / As an in-between character questioning the usually admitted borders between childhood and adulthood, power and vulnerability, victim and executioner, the child soldier is a gripping figure of our contemporaneity. It is thus not surprising he became a literary character. In a comparative approach, this study has sought to determine the literary works treatment of this character and how they turn it into a singular figure. Far from simply resorting to an exogenous list of significations and extending the media figure of the child soldier, far from only focusing on the violence of its hybridity, English and French African novels build a figure of a witness. This study has therefore been interested in revealing the historiographicalas well as the ethical and political visions of the child soldier who experiences African civil wars

The graduation thesis describes some problems of Africa in last 50 years and it pays special attention to the case of Rwanda. It contains also a short history of the african continent as the roots of many conflits have originated hundreds of years ago. It concretely describes 6 african countries: Somalia, Sierra Leone, Kenya, Zimbabwe, Uganda and a special chapter is dedicated to the civil war and genocide in Rwanda.

Cette thèse vise à contribuer aux récents débats sur les avantages potentiels de l'ouverture commerciale entre les pays Africains. Elle le fait en abordant la triptyque Accords Régionaux de Commerce(ACRs), bien-être et conflits.Le continent Africain fait face aujourd’hui à deux enjeux majeurs de gouvernance : l’intégration régionale et la gestion des conflits armés. En effet, les performances commerciales des pays africains restent toujours marginales comparativement au reste du monde. Et ce, malgré les différentes politiques commerciales mises en œuvre depuis les années 70 (politique d'import-substitution, accord régional nord-sud, etc.…). Parmi ces politiques commerciales, les gouvernements Africains ont décidé de privilégier les accords régionaux en vu d’accroître le commerce entre les pays membres. Ces accords ont-ils eu l'effet escompté ? Dans quelle mesure ?Si on se réfère au point de vue largement partagé, la réponse semble être négative. Cependant cette réponse ignore les bénéfices politiques potentiels de l'ouverture commerciale. A ce titre, le travail présenté ici étudie l'effet des accords régionaux africains sur le commerce et le bien-être. Cela en utilisant les derniers développements de la théorie du commerce international ainsi que les meilleures techniques d'estimations des équations de gravité. Deuxièmement, Nous analysons l'effet de l'augmentation du commerce sur la probabilité de survenance d'une guerre civile à la fois de façon théorique et empirique. Les résultats obtenus, nous permettent de conclure que sans la signature des ACRs, près de la moitié des échanges entre leurs membres n'auraient pas été réalisé. D'autre part, cette thèse affirme que le commerce, à la fois domestique et international permet de diminuer le risque de conflit civil en Afrique. / This thesis aims to contribute to recent debates on the potential benefits of trade openness among African countries. This, by addressing the triptych regional trade agreements, welfare and conflict.The African continent is currently facing two major governance challenges: regional integration and the management of armed conflicts. Indeed, the trade performance of African countries remains marginal compared to the rest of the world. This is despite the different trade policies implemented since the 1970s (import substitution policy, North-South regional agreement, etc.). Among these trade policies, African governments have decided to focus on regional agreements in order to increase trade among member countries. Have these agreements had the expected effect ? To what extent ?If we refer to popular belief, the answer seems to be no. However, this answer ignores the potential political benefits of trade openness. As such, the work presented here first examines the effect of African regional agreements on trade and welfare. This is done using the latest developments in international trade theory and the best techniques for estimating gravity equations. Second, we analyze both theoretically and empirically the effect of increased trade on the probability of a civil war occurring. The results obtained allow us to conclude, on the one hand, that nearly half of the trade between members of trade agreements in Africa would not have been possible without the signing of the RTAs. On the other hand, both domestic and international trade, reduces the risk of civil conflict in Africa.

Historians often emphasize the physical features of battleterrain, weaponry, troop formations, earthworks, etc.in assessments of Civil War combat. Most scholars agree that these external combat conditions strongly influenced battle performance. Other historians accentuate the ways in which the mental stresses of soldiering affected combat performance. These scholars tend to agree that fighting effectiveness was influenced by such non-physical combat conditions as unit cohesion, leadership, morale, and emotional stress. Few authors argue that combat's mental influences were more significant in determining success or failure than the physical features of the battlefield. Statistical analysis of the 465 tactical engagements fought by twenty-seven Federal regiments in the First Division of the Army of the Potomac's Second Corps throughout the American Civil War suggests that the mental aspects of battle affected fighting efficiency at least as muchand probably more thancombat's physical characteristics. In other words, the soldiers' attitudes, opinions, and emotions had a somewhat stronger impact on combat performance than their actions, positions, and weaponry.

The thesis analyzes the issue of the influence of presence of natural resources on civil wars in Sub-Saharan Africa. Its purpose is to analyze in detail the possible consequences of natural resources on these conflicts in the area in question. The thesis comprises three main parts. The first theoretical part starts with the introduction of the main theoretical concepts (the "theory" of the curse of natural resources and the concept of a rentier state), which presume the existence of a causal relation between the occurrence of natural resources and negative, mainly development-related, consequences in countries that are dependent on them. Subsequently it described selected economic, social, and institutional undesirable phenomena associated with the presence of natural resources. Professional literature, for instance, often mentions the possible connection between primary commodities and civil wars. In this respect the initial part of the thesis is concluded with a presentation of theoretical explanations of the relation between these two variables. It presents expert views of natural resources as a possible cause of civil wars, potential source of finances, and a factor influencing the duration, the way of waging, and other features of civil wars. It also includes an analysis of the influence of...

This dissertation examines the impact of FDI on peace in civil conflict-experienced states. While economic grievances have often been pointed out as a major cause of civil war within the literature, scholarship on post-conflict peace has focused mainly on political settlements, such as one-sided victories or power sharing, largely ignoring the importance of economic conditions. Thus, this dissertation aims to examine how FDI can affect sustainable peace in conflict-experienced states in terms of prevention of conflict recurrence and regime stability. FDI can be conducive to peace during/after civil conflicts, as it can bring capital which can be used for economic reconstruction and development in conflict-experienced states. Furthermore, this dissertation focuses on the impact of bilateral FDI. When a third party intervenes in a conflict management process and the third party has a great deal of economic interaction with the conflict experienced state, this economic interdependency will affect the third party's motivation to make the conflict-experienced state stable. It also provides third-party with greater leverage over peace efforts. Eventually, this third-party leverage will affect peace during/after civil conflicts. This dissertation is built around three interrelated empirical chapters: (1) determinants of FDI in conflict-experienced states, (2) the impact of FDI on conflict recurrence, and (3) the impact of FDI on regime stability. U.S. and Chinese FDI are used as focal cases for the analysis. This is because they have the most powerful economic and military influences in the world. As a result, this dissertation examines the impact of U.S. and Chinese FDI on peace in civil conflict-experienced states.

For long the discipline of peace studies have investigated causes of war, rather than causes of peace, in an African context. In the northern peripheries of Somalia, a nation ravaged by civil war and conflict, two apparent peace zones have emerged following the complete state collapse of 1991: Somaliland and Puntland. The study explores whether or not these two realities of peace can be defined and characterised as Zones of Peace, or sanctuaries, amidst a civil war. Utilising the analytical tools of Zones of Peace – hitherto applied on conflictual contexts elsewhere but the Horn of Africa – this study suggests that both Somaliland and Puntland are, despite the territorial conflict between them, peace zones granting shelter from the civil war. Suggestively, peace has prevailed in both Puntland and Somaliland due to Somalia’s deteriorated situation, not in spite of it. The study concludes that in order to optimise research concerning Somaliland’s and Puntland’s peace(s), the framework of Zones of Peace can offer in-depth insights on local everyday milieus. The framework partially explains why these local peace(s) has lasted despite lacking external attention and allow for thorough comparison between two homogenous cases. Lastly, both Puntland’s and Somaliland’s inviolability and durability remain unchallenged and rigorous, possibly because of the civil war’s status quo, and since the international community’s foci on south- and central Somalia persists.

Why do some international actors who intervene militarily in civil wars continue their military engagement after the war has ended, while other actors end their intervention and withdraw all military forces at the conclusion of the war? What explains the continuation of outside military intervention from wartime to peacetime, and why might this dimension of military intervention vary across conflicts? In analyzing this puzzle, this study introduces a new theoretical concept: persistent intervention. Defined as the continuation of an external state’s military intervention in a civil war after the war ends, the concept of persistent intervention sheds light on the connections between wartime and peacetime, or the post-conflict period. Drawing on a new dataset on post-war interventions across the globe in countries experiencing civil wars that ended between 1957-2020, as well as detailed comparative case studies of four interventions from the Middle East and Africa, this dissertation finds the availability and access to political and economic gains of the intervention as the main driver of the decision to keep troops in peacetime. The domestic elites' desire to protect these predatory gains from the intervention leaves some interveners entangled in the civil war country, where leaving too soon might devalue and destabilize the investments. The primary factor undermining persistent interventions is found to be intervener domestic instability that disrupts this extractive mechanism. Findings also have implications for external involvement in peace agreements and peacekeeping operations. / Political Science

This dissertation examines the role of third parties in civil war mediation and peacekeeping efforts. The dissertation makes two primary contributions to the literature. First, it builds upon existing literature by applying state-level arguments of third party involvement in mediation and peacekeeping efforts to the United Nations Security Council and regional IGOs. Second, it investigates the role of communication and coordination between third parties in their conflict management efforts.