Julia Strasheim

Refugees welcome? A dataset on anti-refugee violence in Germany

The recent rise of xenophobic attacks against refugees in Germany has sparked both political and scholarly debates on the drivers, dynamics, and consequences of right-wing violence. Thus far, a lack of systematic data collection and data processing has inhibited quantitative analysis to help explain this current social phenomenon. This paper presents a georeferenced event dataset on anti-refugee violence and social unrest in Germany in 2014 and 2015 that is based on information collected by two civil society organizations, the Amadeu Antonio Foundation and PRO ASYL, who publicize their data in an online chronicle. We webscraped this information to create a scientifically usable dataset that includes information on 1 645 events of four different types of right-wing violence and social unrest: xenophobic demonstrations, assault, arson attacks, and miscellaneous attacks against refugee housing (such as swastika graffiti). After discussing how the dataset was constructed, we offer a descriptive analysis of patterns of right-wing violence and unrest in Germany in 2014 and 2015. This article concludes by outlining preliminary ideas on how the dataset can be used in future research of various disciplines in the social sciences.

Pre-Designing Democracy: Institutional Design of Interim Governments and Democratization in 15 Post-Conflict Societies

Does the institutional design of interim governments influence post-conflict democratization? Based on the logic of political engineering we examine whether designing interim regimes to incorporate inclusive representation of all warring parties, constraints on executive power, and decentralized governance enhances the prospects of post-conflict democratization. By analysing 15 interim regimes between 1989 and 2006, we find that while inclusiveness is not associated with democratization, executive constraints and decentralization are. These results point to the importance of establishing institutions that diffuse political power and reduce the zero-sum character of the political contest during transition.

Police reforms in peace agreements, 1975-2011: introducing the PRPA dataset

This article presents new data on provisions for police reform in peace agreements (PRPA) between 1975 and 2011. The PRPA dataset complements past research on the determinants and effects of specific terms in agreements with detailed data on police reform provisions. The PRPA dataset also adds a quantitative dimension to the thus far largely qualitative literature on post-conflict security sector reform (SSR). It includes information on six subtypes of police reform: capacity, training, human rights standards, accountability, force composition and international training and monitoring. We show that there is currently a high global demand for the regulation of police reform through peace agreements: police reform provisions are now more regularly included in agreements than settlement terms that call for power-sharing or elections. We observe interesting variations in the inclusion of police reform provisions in relation to past human rights violations, regime type, or the scope of international peacekeeping prior to negotiations, and illustrate the implications of police reform provisions for the duration of post-conflict peace. Finally, we stimulate ideas on how scholars and policymakers can use the PRPA dataset in future to study new questions on post-conflict police reform.

Power-sharing, commitment problems, and armed conflict in Ukraine

Abstract Why did the Ukraine’s 2004 Orange Revolution initiate a peaceful democratic transition, while the 2014 protests were followed by violent conflict? This article complements previous studies on Russia’s role in Ukraine by focusing on domestic explanations of the recent violence. It shows that structural factors were already conducive to violence in 2004, making it fruitful to analyse the role of agency to explain the 2014 conflict. It demonstrates that while the 2004 transition introduced power-sharing guarantees that mitigated commitment problems for the relevant parties, the 2014 transition saw no such guarantees, making violence a rational strategy for the pro-Russian separatists.

Security sector reform, ethnic representation and perceptions of safety: evidence from Kosovo

Abstract This article explores the relationship between ethnic representation in security sector institutions and perceptions of safety. While most studies on post-conflict institutional reform focus on national institutions and outcomes, this article argues that a more nuanced view on ethnic representation is fruitful in order to account for the everyday perceptions of local people. Drawing on post-conflict Kosovo, the article analyzes how the representation of ethnic minorities in security institutions affects perceptions of safety among individuals across Kosovo’s municipalities. It also analyzes original interview data collected in the Pristina and Mitrovica municipalities that are typical cases of our sample. Both approaches validate that those municipalities that have ethnically representative security institutions also have higher levels of perceived safety.

Veto Players in Post-Conflict DDR Programs: Evidence From Nepal and the DRC

ABSTRACT Under what conditions are Disarmament, Demobilization and Reintegration (DDR) programs successfully implemented following intrastate conflict? Previous research is dominated by under-theorized case studies that lack the ability to detect the precise factors and mechanisms that lead to successful DDR. In this article, we draw on game theory and ask how the number of veto players, their policy distance, and their internal cohesion impact DDR implementation. Using empirical evidence from Nepal and the Democratic Republic of Congo, we show that the number of veto players, rather than their distance and cohesion, explains the (lack of) implementation of DDR.

The Politics of Institutional Reform and Post-Conflict Violence in Nepal

How does the reform of state institutions shape prospects for peace after war? Existing re- search on the institutional causes of peace focuses on how institutional designs, as the out- comes of reform processes, reduce post-conflict violence and promote peace. The literature does not, however, adequately address how the politics that characterise reform processes affect the legitimacy of institutions and whether or not violent protest against these institu- tions ultimately takes place. This focus risks omitting key explanations of how institutional reforms contribute to peace and the mechanisms by which this occurs. By examining the case of Nepal, where clashes between protesters and security forces killed almost 60 people between August 2015 and January 2016, this study shows that emotional rhetoric, elite control of decision-making, backtracking on previous commitments, the acceleration of re- form processes, and the embedding of single reforms in a “concert†of reforms that, as a whole, sparks fears of discrimination are all factors that can lead to post-conflict violence. [GIGA Working paper no. 296].