Patterns of Cooperation and Conflict in Multiparty Conflict: How Rebel Groups and Resistance Movements Fight Each Other and The Government

Long-standing research on resistance movements suggests that organizational alliances are crucial to oust incumbent regimes. Yet, proliferating movements can also lead to competition and in-fighting. Research on cooperation in multi-party civil wars shows that alliances are often fragile and beset with commitment problems. Rebel organizations thus often fight each other more than their common enemy, the government. Despite these complementary insights, the literatures on social movements and multi-party civil wars have developed largely separately. This paper introduces a novel integrated theoretical framework for cooperation and competition in nonviolent and violent multi-actor conflict. Initially, commonalities (conflict goals, ideological proximity, personal connections, tactical interests) induce cooperation. However, repeated interaction also generates conflict and outbidding. At the same time, emergent cooperative and competitive constellations develop path dependencies whose importance trumps initial commonalities. Drawing on extensive fieldwork in Syria and comparative analysis of armed group interactions in Ethiopia and Myanmar, as well as organizational alliances in the anti-apartheid opposition in South Africa, the paper sheds light on which groups consolidate power, which relationships endure despite conflict, and when rebels and resistance movements can achieve victory. The integrative framework thus offers a more holistic understanding of multi-party conflicts and their resolution, suggesting a surprisingly analogous dynamic of organizational relations for (non)violent organizations.