Foreign Interventions into Civil Wars: The Effect of Multi-National Companies on Third State Decision to Intervene in Civil Wars

Operating at the intersection of International Relations and Conflict Studies, research on the motivational aspects of foreign interventions in civil wars has uncovered a variety of explanations. However, studies taking economic factors into account treat trade relationships and natural resources as having a uniform influence on potential interveners. Investigating explicitly relational factors between two states, this study introduces corporate actors into the equation. Harnessing the realist school of thought in International Relations, realists emphasize state competition and a focus on Foreign Direct Investments on political decision-making. Four hypotheses are brought forward to test the relevance of Foreign Direct Investments in general, as well as specifically the energy industry (uranium), manufacturing industry (oil) and defense industry (arms). Using UCDP data on foreign military interventions and armed, dyadic relationships between civil war countries and potential interveners serve as units of analysis. Binary logit random-effect models show that existing bilateral FDI instock as well as oil and uranium demand increase the likelihood of interventions in the post-Cold War era. Arms sales have a significant effect, but their effect size is only marginal.