Friends Or Foes? The Insurgent's Dilemma of Seeking Legitimacy While Keeping Secrets

Download or read book Friends Or Foes? The Insurgent's Dilemma of Seeking Legitimacy While Keeping Secrets written by Edwar E. Escalante and published by . This book was released on 2023 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Why do some rebel groups seek legitimacy more than others? This article develops a theory to explain that the variation among insurgencies will depend on a trade-off insurgents confront between the interest to obtain legitimacy and the exposure to vulnerability. Inclusive legitimacy-seeking insurgencies will benefit from having more members since the rebellion costs fall as they are shared, and the insurgency will deploy flexible rules to incorporate new partners and establish alliances. Exclusive, less legitimacy-seeking insurgencies will emphasize secrecy by selecting members and producing rigid rules to protect the insurgency from internal and external threats. This characterization has implications for the decision-making, recruitment, and intensity of violence unleashed by the insurgency. Faced with this trade-off and constrained by the likelihood of factionalization, insurgencies engage in coordinated violence. The theory is supported by an analysis of Peru's 1980-2000 insurgencies: the Shining Path and the Tupac Amaru Revolutionary Movement.