How do third parties influence the escalation and prevention of ethnic conflicts? The basic assumption of this research is that causality is complex and generally there are different paths for the same outcome. Using a Fuzzy Set approach and data from 27 intrastate disputes I point out two alternative paths to conflict prevention. The first one accounts for the conditions for successful mediation and shows that states and international organizations able to credibly threaten sanctions and to provide incentives for cooperation display a higher rate of success in the prevention of violence. The second path shows that costly signals in support of the insurgents reduce the probability of civil war, if third parties are endowed with high capabilities. The contribution of this paper is twofold: first, it unravels the multiple paths leading to conflict prevention and second it evaluates the effects of conjunctural causation in the field of intrastate disputes.
