Global Tensions, Local Wars? The Changing International Politics of Civil Conflict

^{Attendance to this workshop is by invite only, please contact the organizer directly for more information.}

The global order is changing, international tensions are on the rise and there are renewed fears of international confrontation. At the same time, civil wars remain the dominant form of organized political violence. These wars are increasingly internationalized. But what are the patterns of international involvement in civil wars, and how are they changing as the international order changes? How are local actors exercising their own agency and responding to these shifts, and how are they participating in broader international changes? This workshop sets the stage for a project aiming to take stock of these issues.

First, a set of presentations will discuss overviews of trends in which actors support armed groups in civil conflicts, and how (overt vs. covert intervention; escalation in response). Second, country experts will analyze how armed groups respond to and try to navigate, manipulate, and shape these trends, and the narratives around them, to their benefit, focusing on cases that seem to herald major shifts and cases at the interstices of different trends in world order. We aim to better understand today’s conflicts at the intersection of the global and the local.

This is a preliminary workshop for scholars to share their understanding of trends and local responses. It is a first step in a larger project, setting the agenda for more completed work to be presented at a second workshop in summer 2023, and an edited volume.

Workshop Programme

Additional discussion participants : Marie-Joëlle Zahar, Lee Seymour, Alexandra Lamarche, Abdou Rahim Lema Mohamed, Aboubacar Maiga, Marion Zahar (Université de Montréal)

^{Attendance to this workshop is by invite only, please contact the organizer directly for more information.}