Plausible deniability? An investigation of government and government-outsourced violence in refugee hosting areas

This paper examines the propensity for host governments and the groups they sponsor to engage in violence in areas that host refugee populations. Drawing on arguments that governments strategically delegate violence to affiliated groups for “plausible deniability” purposes, it argues that, due to concerns over self-settled refugees’ welfare burden as well as the concern that these refugees will choose to live in border areas that are more vulnerable to (or useful for) militant activity, host governments, and their proxies are likely to target violence in areas with more substantial refugee self-settlement. At the same time, it anticipates that host governments will “outsource” this violence to surrogate groups where sizable camp-settled populations are present, due to a heightened risk of suffering international audience costs. Findings from a large-N sample of countries in Africa provide some evidence of the hypothesized outsourcing effect. While the presence of sizable camps alongside large self-settled populations is associated with a reduction in the likelihood of violence by host governments, it significantly increases the likelihood of violence committed by host-aligned proxies.