African Militaries and Rebellion: The Political Economy of Threat and Combat Effectiveness

War in Africa has recently attracted significant attention because the continent seems more prone to conflict than others and because any disruption in security is especially threatening to populations, like those in most of Africa, where people are already living at the margins. A growing and productive literature has emerged focussing on the motivations of rebels during these wars. Important econometric work has attempted to explain the economic and political motivations of rebels; there have been case studies of different guerilla movements; and cross-national analysis of the organization of rebellion. However, there has been no corresponding literature on, quite literally, the other side: the political economy of how and why national militaries perform during civil war. This article will examine the geographic, political, and economic determinants of how African militaries face the threat of rebellion and of differential levels of effectiveness in combating insurgents. The size of the country appears to be an important determinant of the initial course of an insurrection: in small countries there is often a battle for the capital that can end fairly quickly, but in big countries different armies can occupy important pieces of territory far from each other and avoid having to fight an immediate battle to the death. Once conflicts have begun, it appears that the nature of the rebel threat - especially whether it is internal or external - and the degree of fungible resources provided by the international community are both important determinants of how well African armies are able to mobilize to fight. The article concludes that the international community must consider how to help African countries strengthen militaries as well as police and intelligence agencies, so that it is possible for governments to respond quickly to rebel threats.