Research
My research has centered on tactics of war-fighting used by rebel groups (what I have called "rebelcraft," as opposed to statecraft in international relations), including: 1) rebel governance; 2) rebel diplomacy; 3) rebels' tactical use of religion; and 4) rebel elections. Exploring their links with important political outcomes such as democratization, statebuilding, and foreign policy, these projects offer implications for understanding violence and nonviolence, war and social mobilization, and the effects of international interventions on conflict dynamics.
Additionally, I am at work on new projects on the rebel lobby; rebel leaders' transnational social networks; and the role of religious identity and ideology in foreign policy.
Additionally, I am at work on new projects on the rebel lobby; rebel leaders' transnational social networks; and the role of religious identity and ideology in foreign policy.
Book
The Wartime Origins of Democratization: Civil War, Rebel Governance, and Political Regimes. Problems of International Politics series. Cambridge University Press, 2016.
Paperback, August 2017
Replication files: see Rebel Governance Dataset
Paperback, August 2017
Replication files: see Rebel Governance Dataset
Peer-Reviewed Articles, Book Chapters, and Edited Volumes
- "Religious Instrumentalism in Violent Conflict," Ethnopolitics 19.2 (2020).
- "Rebel Diplomacy in Civil War," International Security 40.4 (2016). Replication files Bonus photos!
- "Democratization after Civil War: A Brush-Clearing Exercise," International Studies Quarterly 56.4 (2012), with Page Fortna. Replication files
- "Counter-Terrorism and the Rule of Law," in A. Hurwitz with R. Huang eds., Civil War and the Rule of Law, Lynne Rienner (2008).
- "The Nuts and Bolts of Capacity Building: Practicable Lessons from East Timor," Journal of Peacebuilding and Development 2.3 (2006), with Joseph Harris.
- New Nation: United Nations Peacebuilding in East Timor, Nagasaki: Research Institute of Southeast Asia; and Macau (2004), with Geoffrey C. Gunn.
- "Reconciliation as State-Building in East Timor," Lusotopie, Sciences Po Bordeaux (2004), with Geoffrey C. Gunn.
Shorter Pieces (selected)
- "Lobbying Battles in the Libyan War," The Takeaway 11(3), Mosbacher Institute for Trade, Economics, and Public Policy, March 2020.
- "Armed Rebel Groups Lobby in DC, Just Like Governments. How Does That Influence U.S. Policy?" Monkey Cage, The Washington Post, February 6, 2020.
- "Wartime Nonviolent Mass Protests and Post-Conflict Politics," The Politics of Post-Conflict Reconstruction, POMEPS Studies Vol. 30 (2018).
- "The Islamic State as an Ordinary Insurgency," Monkey Cage, The Washington Post, May 14, 2015.
- Also in Islam and International Order, POMEPS Studies Vol. 15 (2015).
- French translation in Orient XXI (June 2015)
- Book review of C. Crocker, F. Osler, and P. Aall, eds, Managing Conflict in a World Adrift, H-Diplo (2015).
Ongoing projects
- Nonviolent mass protests during violent conflict
- Religion and war interventions (with Mohammad Ayatollahi Tabaar)
- Rebel elections (with Kathleen Gallagher Cunningham and Katherine Sawyer)
- Transnational social networks in violent rebellion
- Resistance Organization Leaders (ROLE) Data project (with Benjamin Acosta and Dan Silverman)