Review Article Review Sample

Article no 1

Sustaining the peace after ethnic civil war
Summary
This article explores all those factors which affect the level and duration of peace after a civil ethnic war. Several models were applied on data of more than three decades indicating that economic and political discrimination can be a real cause of increase in chances of reoccurrence of civil war. Other factors that somehow influence the probability of war include duration and results of war, size and concentration of ethnic group etc. Other consequences of war which include war’s intensity, displacements and deaths etc have not significance of great level. All in all, treatment and interaction of ethnic groups determine the peace of the area and specify the chances of civil war again as above mentioned factors are most important while discussing the after effects of ethnic civil wars (Gurses, Rost, 2013).
The topic of article interests many as this article is related with struggles of global peace. Introduction has been written very clearly explaining the issue under discussion quite well as due to the fact that it explains not only the background of civil wars but also explains the research purpose of the study very well. It clarifies that how different sections of the article would be focusing on different elements of the topic like what are the factors responsible for increase in peace after civil war, is ethnic discrimination one of them and up to which extent it is responsible for starting civil war again.
Different views of scholars have been mentioned in literature review related to the factors responsible for after war peace. Some of them include commitment to political, social and economic problems of the masses or specifically ethnic groups. Second one states that war duration and deaths in war or ability of a specific government to handle or finish problems of people.
It further moves towards the point that whether territorial partition helps in reduction of chances of ethnic wars or not. Different examples were studied related to different countries and situational analysis was made accordingly. It states that establishment of more power sharing intuitions reduce the chances of ethnic wars between different groups of society as they feel more satisfied and happy afterwards. It argues that there may be certain political concerns which may end up in ethnic group discrimination affecting the factors which are directly responsible for civil war. Another issue arisen is endogen city which discusses the fact that whether all these things discussed is real reason for increasing in chances of civil war or not.
Sample of this article has been exceptionally large considering the fact that it has included all national ethnic events from 1950 to 2006. Authors have been very much selective in selecting the cases they have only included the cases where ethnic conflicts were found against the government of one ‘own country or cases where ethnic components are not vague and not clear in terms of their concentration and sizes. Dependent variable in this case is chances of reoccurrence of war where as other variables include economic and political discrimination, war outcomes, war costs, population of country, characteristics of ethnic groups (size and concentration) and presence of peacekeepers within the country.
Models which were applied include cox regression model and parametric models including Weibull regression. The concluded results were high in the favor of hypothesis that political and economic discrimination do result in increasing chances of civil wars. Most of the ethnic discrimination for a group remains stable during the period of war but it increases in after war period in case of negligence of governments. So, governments should pay special attention to ethnic groups by giving them voice for rights.

Article no 2

What fosters Enduring Peace? An analysis of Factors influencing Civil War Resolution
Summary
This article is all about identifying factors responsible for civil war resolution and peace making process after happening of a civil war. As negotiation is an important component of peace making process, it briefly discusses the role of negotiation and how it results in reducing the time period of conflict during civil wars taking place between 1944 & 1997. This article discusses the idea of stalemate and intervention that how it effects on negotiation. It states that negotiating parties fear that they might be thrown out of negotiation on the basis of some potential statements and hence they realize that they will have more benefit by engaging in bargaining. The article however concludes an entirely different idea that argues that intervention of a partial party in support of weak part will increase the feeling of mutual hurting stalemate resulting in short duration of civil war. It also clarifies many prospects and themes (Hosli, Hoekstra, 2013).
Review
This article starts with the idea of intervention between parties of civil war and it discusses that whether intervention is helpful in reducing the time span of civil wars or not. Another point emphasized in article is which one among neutral or partial intervention helps in solving the disputes between two or more nations globally. It also considers the role of mutual hurting stalemate that is it a positive factor in reducing the time duration of war or vise versa. Different statistical techniques have been applied in regard with our findings and results.
Theories discussed in literature review firstly define the idea of intervention and how it is important for removing conflicts and violence level internationally. But with the findings of different articles, we can say that only 25% of civil wars ended with the help of intervention whereas the remaining 75% were ended in case of military victory of one of the parties of conflict. Most of the articles quoted are focused on the point that how civil wars can be ended more quickly without much harm to any of the parties. As for the purpose of literature review, writers have contributed enough by giving opinions and references of other scholars who have previously discussed upon the idea of intervention in civil wars with intention of ending or reducing its time span. It has briefly focused upon the idea of Ripeness which is exclusively involved with cost and benefit analysis of parties involved in war. It also discusses the role of military, government and other mediating parties who are more of hindrance in solving the dispute or issue between the parties.
Its hypothesis heavily relies upon the significance of role of intervention of neutral and partial parties in a civil war. It also focuses upon the relationship of several other factors with time period of civil war (depending variable). Probability of a) starting negotiation and b) reduction of time span of war is also explored. Following are the two types of statistical models are applied for both a and b respectively;

Logistics regression model

Survival Analysis (Cox proportional hazard regression model)
Both of these models are well known and are quite accurate in not only determining the variables responsible but also for determine the extent of correlation between the variables very correctly.
Results show that in case of partial intervention, negotiations were most likely to start rather than the neutral interventions. Partial intervention is most likely to support weak party and it arises the feeling of mutual hazard stalemate. Control variables such as population size, national-ethnic conflicts have no important role and significance in initiating the negotiations. Another surprising result was found that in case of military involvement stalemate, negotiations are most likely to start. Number of parties which are involved in a conflict play key role in determining the fact that negotiations will start or not because results show that if more parties are involved conflict, they will agree to negotiate quickly quite opposite to the case where there are only two parties involved. The results of study are quite reliable as popular and reliable statistical models were used to draw the results and analyze the scenario.

Article no 3

United Nations Peacemaking, Democratic Process and the durability of peace after civil wars
Summary
United nation peace keeping, democratic process, and the durability of peace after civil wars. In these article effects of UN, peacemaking is discussed after the durability for pace and domestic progress in the states of post-civil wars. UN peace making mission give security for resolving all the differences by democratic and peaceful means. . This peace keeping mission give a new start to the democratic progress in such a way that their enemies also have authority to access the resources and power without any army conflict. From the data of 1946 to 2005 about durability of peace and progress of post, civil war states it is concluded in this article that UN mission actually contributes for durable peace in the states of civil war. UN mission achieve this target by promoting the political process in democratic progress (Hartzell, Hoddie, Rothchild, 2001).
Review
This article discusses the role of United Nations peacemaking at post war period in order to establish clear grounds that whether UN peacemaking institution should be trusted with the idea of helping rivals to be friends or not on the basis of past cases where UN peacemaking has played its role in setting up democratic procedures and to what extent it has been successful. Research purpose has been very much clear due to the idea that what the role of UN peacemaking as a unit is in war post periods providing the conflicting parties with different democratic options for their own good. UN peacemaking mission offers a complete democratic system in which government is not to be held by the military in any case so country could stay away from urges like overpowering the other conflicting parties. Hypotheses were designed accordingly. First hypothesis is related with the existence and strength of UN peacemaking mission that if it is strong then there are more chances of establishment of democratic processes in post war period. The second hypothesis questions that whether democratic processes ensure peace in war effecting countries or not. And to what extent peace in the area will be ensured. Data undertaken was large in terms of geographical area and time period covered because data was taken from 71 countries of the world and from 1946-2005. Around 125 civil war cases were studied to find about the accuracy and reliability of the hypothesis. Following are the variables used in the study; democratic process, durability of peace, strength of US peace operation and dummy variable UN peacekeeping mission (only for the accurate testing of hypothesis 2) other controlled variables included in the study are government victory, negotiated settlement and rebel victory. These were also dummy variables included in the test for getting reliable and accurate results. Another controlled variable was external environment which included all basic economic indicators like GDP and GNP etc.
Survival analysis and regression panel analysis were used to test the hypothesis. Many other AIC and BIC models were also run for the purpose of getting accurate results. According to the statistical results we found that in presence in UN peacemaking mission, democratic processes will be encouraged. Same is the case with strength of UN peacemaking mission. More the mission is strong; more are the chances of establishing democratic processes. Among the control variables, population is the one which has high significance upon the establishment of democratic processes. Moreover, no relationship was found between external intervention variables like different economic indicators. So, we can conclude that the writer has given results based on true findings very accurately and reliably. In short, this article is very helpful in saving UN peacekeeping mission from all the critics which it is having due for trying to play positive role among conflicting parties globally.

Article no 4

Summary
Transnational dimension for civil war give a concept of transnational ethnic kin that act as a very important catalyst, which causes to start and sustain the civil wars. National boundaries are transcending by ethnic ties that increased the conflicts by giving sanctuaries and other material and human resources for rebelling. In this article, the author argued that such ties cause difficulties in achieving the power victory of decision and help to make the results more favorable for rebels. There can be a very good and positive relationship between the antagonistic state and ethnic groups. This relationship can be built on by making the cost of repression more for the government with the help of increased economic, political, and military cost. When an analysis is made by taking the data of ethnic civil wars that continues from 1950 to 2006, it is revealed that these all civil wars are actually fought by the rebel groups who were ethnically mobilized. These wars are settled in the favor of the rebels. These rebels are actually ethnic kin from a neighboring country (Balcells, Kalyvas, 2014).
Review
This article is about the existence and role of ethnic groups in civil wars. Author argues that many of the civil wars take place in the situation where ethnic groups are not given proper importance and representation in power sharing institutions and they are repressed up to the point that they may fight against the government and people of country with the help of kin from neighboring countries. Different theories have been studied by the author in order to understand the complete and whole idea of the subject matter in hand.
Hypothesis was developed on the basis of theories and latest current issues heavily related to the issue. Hypothesis questions that civil wars are more likely to result in favor of ethnic groups when they are fought with the help of kin in a neighboring country.
Sample for testing hypothesis include all ethnic cases from 1950 to 2006. Dependent variable I this article is the result of rebel’s attempt that is it successful or not and independent variable in this case is ethnic kin from neighboring country. Other control variables affecting the war outcome included characteristics of ethnic group and the country. Several methods were used by the author to test the link between variables including multinomial logit model (MNLM), Weibull regression model and Survival model. Results suggested that rich countries have less chance that they would be affected by the struggles of rebel and kins from neighboring countries. So, hypothesis was correct with all of its terms and estimates and it suggests that governments should pay special attention to rebel ethnic groups in order to save them in getting hands of kin.
This article can be considered a good one in terms of its reliability and accuracy as several statistical models were applied to it.

Article no 5

Summary
In the article it is discussed that is, it important to consider about the fact that civil war fight was irregular, conventional or may be a conflict of symmetric nonconventional? The answer of this confusion is positive and it is suggested that irregular conflicts has long lasting conflicts than the other forms of conflict. When we talk about the conventional conflicts then they also had sever affect in form of battlefield lethality. Conventional conflicts results in rebel victory while irregular conflict affect the civil people and there is chances of winning of incumbents. These all findings give us an indication about the changing trends of civil war. Civil wars are going to be short, deadly, and more challenging for the government. However, this result as some settlement between armed oppositions and government. In this, article findings suggested about the technology of rebellion when we take the conflicts of macro level such as duration, severity, results of wars. The findings of this article also gave us an idea about the fact that social change and state building is contributed by the irregular civil wars (Gurses, 2014).
Review
As this article is about changing civil war conditions, it studies the role of not only ethnic rebels but also other important parties like government and interventions. It briefly discusses about the duration of civil war that how it is changing from conventional to modern one and how different factors like technology affect it and relates with it. The author has very clearly discussed different possible choices and situations which may affect the time span of war in any possible way.
Sample size of this article is extended in two different datasets. One with 147 civil wars from 1944 to 2004 and second 903 conflicts between 1946 and 2008. Taking up two datasets may complex the procedures and results but it helps in incre4asing the reliability of article. Three different type of hypothesis were developed on the basis of duration of civil war, lethality of conflict and measurement of citizen victimization with respect of irregular conflicts. And lastly, rebel victories are more result of SNC and conventional conflicts rather than irregular ones. The author has divided up research question into many smaller sections and proposed the hypotheses on each of them for making things easier to understand.
Different analysis and models were run for each of the hypotheses. For example; for hypothesis 1Weibull regression model is used and for hypothesis 4 Politicide model is used. Results of test confirm that technologies used by rebellions should be an important variable and authorities should consider it as well.
Article concludes with results that irregular wars are not considered as civil war weapon in reality whereas perceptions are quite reverse. The writer has very beautifully not only explained the hypothesis but also drawn results on basis of reliable models used in the article.

References

Balcells, L., & Kalyvas, S. N. (2014). Does warfare matter? Severity, duration, and outcomes of civil wars. Journal of Conflict Resolution, 58(8), 1390-1418.
Gurses, M. (2014). Transnational Ethnic Kin and Civil War Outcomes. Political Research Quarterly, 1065912914554042.
Gurses, M., & Rost, N. (2013). Sustaining the peace after ethnic civil wars.Conflict Management and Peace Science, 30(5), 469-491.
Hosli, M. O., & Hoekstra, A. (2013). What Fosters Enduring Peace? An Analysis of Factors Influencing Civil War Resolution. Peace Economics, Peace Science and Public Policy, 19(2), 123-155.
Hartzell, C., Hoddie, M., & Rothchild, D. (2001). Stabilizing the peace after civil war: An investigation of some key variables. International organization, 55(01), 183-208.