THIS COLLECTION OF ARTICLES CONSISTS OF THIS SPECIAL ISSUE, AS well as a number of linked articles in other issues of Government and Opposition.Footnote 1 Together, the collection explores the role of ideas in influencing and shaping contemporary processes of state-building after conflict. It does so by analysing the multiple ways in which ideas and ideology play essential roles in understanding the trajectories and governance programmes of political parties that have a history of armed mobilization against the state. The collection therefore focuses on former armed movements that have transformed into political parties, that operate either as ruling parties or opposition parties. We argue that ideas and ideologies are often central to the strategies and internal life of these new parties, yet there is enormous variation among different groups. Sometimes ideologies are used instrumentally yet sometimes they reflect strong normative commitments that may act against strategic goals. At other times, the ideas and visions underpinning former armed movements are flexible and commitment is weak, yet sometimes ideas remain impervious to change, even when there has been a dramatic change of context from an armed movement to political party. This collection of articles examines this variation in the consistency of ideologies of former armed groups over time and suggests avenues through which this variation can be understood. Attention to the ideological underpinnings of former armed groups turned political parties provides novel perspectives on contemporary state-building.
With some important exceptions (Blattman Reference Blattman2009; Sanín and Wood Reference Sanín and Wood2014), much of the scholarly work on post-Cold War armed movements downplays the role of ideas and ideology in favour of arguments that concentrate on structural factors or economic motivations. For many authors (Collier and Hoeffler Reference Collier and Hoeffler2004; Duffield Reference Duffield2001; Fearon and Laitin Reference Fearon and Laitin2003), ideas are important insofar as they may play a useful role in recruitment and mobilization, but they tend not to be analysed as systems of belief setting out alternative visions of state governance. Thus, much of the early literature on post-Cold War armed movements characterizes these movements as non-ideological. On the other hand, the literature on political parties does analyse the role of ideas and ideology and yet political parties that have emerged out of armed conflict are treated as ‘outliers’ and ‘exceptional’. For example, Peter Mair (Reference Mair1984) noted early on that comparative scholars excluded the Irish parties and party system from comparative research because of the distinctiveness of post-civil war partisan alignments. Similarly, contemporary research on post-communist parties and parties in ‘new democracies’ have often explicitly omitted post-civil war as being too different to be examined in light of existing party theory (e.g. Basedau and Stroh 2008; Grzymala-Busse Reference Grzymala-Busse2002; Ishiyama Reference Ishiyama1997, Reference Ishiyama1999). Likewise, the ideological aspects of political parties in the global South are often discounted. While some earlier work did focus on the different facets of political parties in the global South, including organization and ideology (Coleman and Rosberg Reference Coleman and Rosberg1964), much of the scholarship today, particularly on sub-Saharan Africa, tries to explain the non-ideological nature of political parties (Carbone Reference Carbone2007; Carothers Reference Carothers2006) or reduces the discussion of ideology to a discussion of ideas and beliefs about ethnicity (Posner Reference Posner2005).
On the contrary, we argue that it is important to bring ideology into the study of post-conflict comparative politics and that an analysis of former non-state armed movements is a useful lens through which to understand the potential lasting effect of ideas on post-conflict governance. We take ideology to mean a logically coherent belief system that provides a guide to action (Mullins Reference Mullins1972; Putnam Reference Putnam1971; Sartori Reference Sartori1969). It is the way in which a system, such as an individual, a group, or an entire society rationalizes itself (Knight Reference Knight2006: 619). Ideologies provide a framework for action in a range of different areas, for instance, in how war is conducted (Graham Reference Graham2007; Ron Reference Ron2001; Thaler Reference Thaler2012; Ugarriza and Craig Reference Ugarriza and Craig2013), or how resources are distributed in society. We are particularly interested in ideas about the state, and how the state is, or should be, organized. We focus specifically on post-war politics, and thus how ideologies lead to particular ideas about the nature of the state articulated by former rebel political parties.
There are three main reasons why a focus on political parties that were former non-state armed movements can provide valuable insights into the role of ideas in post-war politics. First, many non-state armed groups – or rebel movements – articulate radical ideas of state transformation. These ideas serve strategic goals such as recruitment and coordination, but they also socialize combatants and supporters into a coherent group. Armed groups express more or less coherent narratives about why they are fighting, which typically involves claims against the state, often along with a vision of what kind of state might replace it, or what kind of state reforms are required. In secessionist movements, ideas of radical state transformation are often articulated as a desire for a new state with reformed citizenship and governance practices, sometimes, but not always, defined by the actors themselves in ethnic terms. In many other types of intra-state conflicts, non-state armed movements have sought to establish a radically reconfigured state based on revolutionary principles, liberation ideologies or radical religious interpretations of statehood, which may include demands for inclusion, reformed governance practices and reconstituted state–society relations. These expressions of political imaginaries sometimes serve as a guiding and unifying vision for the movement and also help mobilize supporters and recruits.
Second, after the formal end of hostilities, there is great variation in the extent to which these ideas about a reconstituted or reformed state continue to be articulated and implemented. After conflict has ended, what happens to the ideas and state visions espoused by armed groups? Specifically, the articles in this special issue and wider collection ask whether the ideas of state transformation by armed groups turned political parties were implemented after the end of conflict, or whether these ideas, ideologies and governance ambitions have shifted. Our analysis includes both ruling parties and opposition parties that were previously armed actors since both types of parties have a bearing on state practices and ideas.
Third, the post-war period is a critical juncture in the development of institutions that can provide the foundations for peace and participation. Key questions about the nature of the state and its identity, the deployment of violence, the legitimacy of the state and its institutions are often not entirely resolved, and the ideas and practices that dominate during this critical juncture will have a bearing on what is possible later. Political parties that are former armed movements are crucial actors in state-building processes. Understanding how these parties practise politics in ‘peacetime’, and the extent to which ideas about the state reflect normative commitments, have a bearing on the possibilities of state- and peace-building. Democratic processes often rest on the capacities of political parties to represent citizens and aggregate interests, provide organizational structures for political participation, as well as train political leaders and representatives, so the role of parties is fundamental in post-conflict societies (Curtis and de Zeeuw Reference Curtis and de Zeeuw2009; Reilly Reference Reilly2006). For societies emerging out of war, political parties also often play a decisive role in mediating group conflicts and demilitarizing politics. One can therefore expect that parties can play a decisive role in forwarding political programmes that encourage the transformation of wartime social structures and create more democratic notions of citizenship (de Zeeuw and Kumar Reference De Zeeuw and Kumar2006; Lyons Reference Lyons2005; Reilly Reference Reilly2006), but this is not always the case. Thus, the strength, coherence and commitment to the ideas sustaining former armed movements influence later discourses and practices of the state.
Studying the role of ideas and ideologies espoused by former armed movements turned political parties is timely. To date, there is fairly extensive literature that analyses the process of rebel-to-party transformation (de Zeeuw Reference De Zeeuw2008; Ishiyama Reference Ishiyama2016; Sindre and Söderström Reference Sindre and Söderström2016). These contributions focus on the challenges of transforming from armed movements to political parties, the internal workings of party organizations (e.g. Allison Reference Allison2010; Ishiyama and Batta Reference Ishiyama and Batta2011; Sindre Reference Sindre2016b) and the factors that influence whether and how parties adapt to democracy (Berti and Gutiérrez Reference Berti and Gutiérrez2016; Ishiyama and Batta Reference Ishiyama and Batta2011b; Lyons Reference Lyons2016a; Manning Reference Manning2008). Other work has focused on former armed groups and conflict management, confirming that rebel group inclusion is key to ensuring political stability following a peace settlement (Marshall and Ishiyama Reference Marshall and Ishiyama2016). What is missing, however, is an understanding of what happens to former armed groups over time, either as ruling parties or as opposition parties. Empirically, we know that these parties tend to survive, and yet former rebel parties are often ignored in the political party literature. Given the relatively large number of transitions that have occurred since the end of the Cold War, there are now enough cases from which we can begin to draw conclusions about the ways in which ideas and ideologies underpinning former armed groups have changed over time.
This article proceeds as follows. As a starting point, we situate our study of the ideologies and ideas of former rebel parties in relation to existing literatures on civil wars and armed movements on the one hand, and political parties on the other. Approaching the broad subfield of comparative politics that is party research, we seek inspiration from earlier work which highlights the core functions of political parties, namely that of interest aggregation and of political organizing, where ideas and ideologies are central. We propose a framework for understanding the variation in ideas about the state after conflict through discussing ideological content as well as ideological change and continuity, and we show how these themes are carried forward in the articles in this special issue and collection. Finally, we discuss the effects of ideology in post-war politics, and we propose future directions in this emerging research agenda.
Key questions and review of previous research
That ideology has played a central role in the rhetorical repertoire of rebel groups throughout their struggle is undisputed. Leftist revolutionaries in El Salvador, Colombia and Nepal were inspired by the writings of Ernesto ‘Che’ Guevara and Mao Zedong as legitimizing the armed struggle. Anti-colonial liberation movements featured revolutionary, often leftist, ideas outlining a vision of the social order once liberation had been achieved. Contemporary armed groups such as Islamic State are likewise founded upon ideals of establishing a particular kind of political order. Yet, until fairly recently, ideology has been treated with caution by scholars of rebel group behaviour. Most studies viewed ideology as limited to its instrumental use – as rhetorical devices selected by leaders to enhance their legitimacy or mobilize supporters and fighters (Mampilly Reference Mampilly2011: 77–9; Sanín and Wood Reference Sanín and Wood2014: 213).Footnote 2 Especially as the proclaimed values of a group’s ideology often failed to harmonize with the actual behaviour of armed groups in their interaction with civilians, ideology has not served well as an explanation for variation in the nature of rebel group behaviour. Even so, just from its instrumental purpose it is clear that ideology is important for recruitment and mobilization within armed groups and their supporters.
Civil war studies have also shown that ideology streamlines rebel behaviour. Religion sometimes truncates other strategic goals (Sanín and Wood Reference Sanín and Wood2014), as exemplified by Hamas’s decision to boycott the 1996 elections so as to not be perceived to be compromising on its ‘absolutist ideology’ (Løvlie Reference Løvlie2013: 578). Thomas Hegghammer (Reference Hegghammer2013) demonstrates that specific interpretations of Islam have provided strategic guidance about how and where it is legitimate to fight while Hyeran Jo (Reference Jo2015) posits that variation in how some armed groups seek to build legitimacy, both internally and externally, can in part be explained in light of their religious-ideological positions. Similarly, typologies that distinguish between rebel group goals have been helpful in explaining the changing character of wars over time (e.g. Clapham Reference Clapham1998, Reference Clapham2007; Reno Reference Reno2011). Also, a coherent ideology allows an organization to communicate effectively with its external environment, thus increasing its legitimacy and its competitive advantage with respect to other organizations, which makes them similar to other forms of political organizations such as political parties and social movement organizations.
The mainstream literature on political parties emphasizes ideological polarization to explain party and voter behaviour; however, contemporary literature on political parties in newly democratizing countries tends to argue that parties in these contexts lack clear ideological profiles. Compared to counterparts in established democracies, parties in transitional contexts are commonly poorly organized and weakly rooted in society. They pop up only around election time to attract voters, party branches outside the capital are generally poorly staffed, and internal recruitment is first and foremost driven by patronage (Aspinall and Weiss Reference Aspinall and Weiss2014; Randall and Svåsand Reference Randall and Svåsand2002a, Reference Randall and Svåsand2002b; Ufen Reference Ufen2008). Consequently, voters often make up their minds about which party to vote for based on other, non-programmatic, markers such as identity (ethnic, territorial) and patronage (family and kinship). As Sebastian Elischer (Reference Elischer2012: 643) notes, with few exceptions, political parties in Africa are ‘primarily driven by identity politics rather than programmatic ideas’.
Thus, both the civil war literature, and the political party literature provide some insights into the different ways that ideology can play a role in political mobilization, political behaviour and party and voting behaviour. What is missing is an understanding of how ideology influences former rebel parties’ governance strategies after war.
The most likely parallel to the study of whether and how ideology impacts on former rebel parties’ governance strategies after war is found in the rebel governance literature. While much recent scholarship held that ideology – most often understood as leftist or revolutionary ideologies – had little direct influence on the behaviour of insurgents in their interaction with civilians (e.g. Weinstein Reference Weinstein2007), other contributions have argued that ideology becomes salient when analysing variation in the specific forms of governance provided by armed groups (Arjona et al. 2015; Kasfir Reference Kasfir2005; Mampilly Reference Mampilly2011: 78). Indeed, multiple contemporary case studies of rebel governments argue that their ideological foundations help determine their governance practices and the types of institutions they set up. Alice Wilson (Reference Wilson2016: 183), for instance, argues that the Polisario Front in Western Sahara implemented radical policies such as quotas for women and redistribution of food rations from their position in exile in the Polisario-controlled refugee camps. These governance experiments were derived from their programmatic prescripts. Similarly, Bert Sukyens (Reference Sukyens2015), comparing two rebel groups in India, demonstrates that the governance ideologies of the Naxalites, a Maoist rebel group and the Naga, a secessionist movement, strongly influenced their specific governance practices and the ‘administrative functions of protection taxation and service delivery’ (Sukyens Reference Sukyens2015: 139).
Beyond the battlefield, rebel groups have also sought opportunities to govern via the electoral channel. In Northern Ireland (prior to the Good Friday Agreement), Lebanon and Palestine the main armed groups developed political wings to be able to take part in national and regional-level elections (see Berti Reference Berti2013), without a peace settlement and without demobilizing their armed wings. As a consequence, ‘some armed groups have gained enormous political and decision-making power’ by actively seeking power via democratic mechanisms (Berti Reference Berti2013: 1).
The literatures on rebel governance and on armed groups’ electoral participation draw attention to a potentially rich vein of inquiry, focusing on which factors shape political practices and the conditions under which non-state armed groups decide to adapt and change their organization and mode of political engagement. While ideological moderation and deradicalization of radical leftist parties and religious parties (e.g. Schwedler Reference Schwedler2007; Tezcür Reference Tezcür2010) have received significant scholarly attention by party scholars, this scholarship has not yet paid significant attention to armed political groups and former rebel groups. Studies of ideological change and moderation within radical political parties have tended to focus on explaining whether and how their electoral participation has led them to moderate and rid themselves of illiberal political positions in order to become mainstream parties (e.g. Bermeo Reference Bermeo1997; Brocker and Künkler Reference Brocker and Künkler2013; Kalyvas Reference Kalyvas1996). While such processes of adaptation have underpinned debates about rebel-to-party transformation (e.g. Berti Reference Berti2013; Manning Reference Manning2008; Sindre Reference Sindre2018; Whiting Reference Whiting2018), this subset of political parties raises new questions regarding how and why parties adapt and to what effect.
In recent years, some scholars interested in rebel-to-party transformation and political parties in post-war states have highlighted how wartime ideologies continue to shape how these parties govern. For instance, Mohamed Salih (Reference Salih2003: 18) notes that former African liberation movements turned political parties remain heavily influenced by their conflict experience and the ‘ethos of the liberation ideology’. Benjamin Chemouni and Assumpta Mugiraneza (Reference Chemouni and Mugiraneza2019) explore the ideological project of the Rwandan Patriotic Front (RPF) before and at the time of the genocide through songs and argue that there are continuities between the RPF’s pre- and post-genocide ideological discourses. Discussing former armed movements in South-east Asia and in Namibia respectively, Gyda M. Sindre (Reference Sindre2016a) and Lalli Metsola and Henning Melber (2007) show that the histories of the armed struggle and the associated sacrifices remain central to political discourses and are also reflected in specific policies they propose as they become ruling parties. Such case studies raise new questions about whether and how radical ideas, ideologies and visions for a new political order propagated by these groups during war is carried on into peacetime politics.
Building on these insights, this special issue and wider collection of articles bring forward the debate by emphasizing that it is not only the organizational legacy of former armed movements and which parties are included/excluded from power that are important, but also the types of political actors and their ideas – and thereby political issues – that remain salient after war has ended. A key question is to understand whether and how change, moderation and adaptation are central to how these groups navigate the changing post-war political field. Hence, it is necessary to move beyond viewing ideology as primarily a unifying mobilizational tool within movements and between movements and those they claim to represent in order to rationalize their existence (Knight Reference Knight2006). As Benedetta Berti (Reference Berti2019) notes, ideology also serves to present the image of what constitutes a ‘good society’ and of the chief means of constructing it.
The articles in this collection do two things. First, by moving beyond viewing rebel group inclusion as a purely instrumental part of implementing lasting peace settlements and thus primarily a mechanism for buying off or appeasing the leaders of armed movements, the authors highlight the great variation in the motivations and abilities of formerly armed actors turned political parties in influencing and directly shaping the post-conflict state. As such, in assessing whether and how wartime ideologies and ideas continue to influence their post-war governing strategies, the collection offers new insights into the transformative effects of war on peace, through the lens of former wartime contenders. Second, these articles propose a critically attuned engagement with the transformative agendas of former armed groups and of political parties in post-war contexts in their interaction with other actors and logics.
The role of ideology and ideas of armed groups turned political parties: content, continuity and change
The previous section has shown that while some existing literature on rebel movements has paid attention to ideology and ideas of the state, the extension or modification of these ideas in peacetime has been largely overlooked. Likewise, the literature on political parties has examined the role of ideology, but the specific ideas of former rebel parties has not been sufficiently explored. The articles in this special issue and in the larger collection focus specifically on former rebel parties and seek to understand the extent to which their wartime ideas of the state persist, moderate, or are abandoned.
The contributions that follow show that there is immense variation in terms of ideological commitments and pronouncements among rebel movements, and what happens to former rebels’ ideas of the state after conflict. We emphasize several key aspects. First, there is variation in ideological content. Different armed groups have different ideas about the state. Some groups seek radical transformation of the state, others seek their own state, others seek inclusion or reform. Second, there is variation in terms of ideological continuity. Do the ideas and ideologies fuelling the movement show consistency and stability after conflict? Do radical ideas about state transformation that originally underpinned the armed movement have lasting currency, or do parties adapt or moderate their claims and why? How and why do ideas change? Through single and comparative cases, the articles in this collection illustrate and explain the different factors that lead to continuity or adaptation.
Ideological Content
Ideology means many different things to different scholars (Maynard Reference Maynard2013: 300). As Jonathan Maynard points out in his map of the field, contemporary research on ideology is vast, drawing upon different approaches that sometimes reflect real substantive disagreement (Maynard Reference Maynard2013). According to one approach, ideologies provide the frameworks for people to understand their political worlds and are built from concepts whose content is indeterminate and contested (Freeden Reference Freeden1996 in Maynard Reference Maynard2013: 302). Thus, ideologies are belief systems through which individuals, groups and entire societies rationalize themselves (Knight Reference Knight2006: 619).
We focus on the group level, since we are interested in former rebel parties. For the study of armed movements turned political parties, we follow Francisco Sanín and Elisabeth Wood’s understanding of ideology as a ‘set of more or less systematic ideas that identify a constituency, the challenges the group confronts, the objectives to pursue on behalf of that group, and a (perhaps vague) program of action’ (Sanín and Wood Reference Sanín and Wood2014: 214). Thus, an armed group’s ideology encompasses both a set of beliefs about the world and how the world should be, as well as strategies or ideas about how to create such a world. Ideologies are not easily delineated. They involve beliefs about a range of different fields such as appropriate individual behaviour, the appropriate expression of gender identities, the identity and role of the state, the role of society, the nature of justice, the appropriate distribution of resources, the role of international relations, and so on. The articles in this collection focus on ideas about the state, broadly conceived. Other beliefs are discussed insofar as they affect the state. We therefore treat ideas about the nation, ethnicity, religion and economic organization as central ideologies about state identity and practices (see also Sanín and Wood Reference Sanín and Wood2014), thus departing from authors that consider ideology on a spectrum running from socialism to capitalism (Young Reference Young1982).
Methodologically, it is difficult to observe ideology. Usually, scholars will analyse the political vocabulary of a movement as a sign of its identity and beliefs. This includes the study of political manifestos, programmes, and/or declarations and political speeches (Berti Reference Berti2019; Burihabwa and Curtis Reference Burihabwa and Curtis2019; Sindre Reference Sindre2019, all in this issue; Aalen Reference Aalen2019; Pearce Reference Pearce2018; Reyntjens Reference Reyntjens2016; Straus Reference Straus2015), the analysis of party name changes (Ishiyama Reference Ishiyama2019) or interviews with group leaders and/or members (Özçelik Reference Özcelik2019; Pearce Reference Pearce2018). Scholars also study the discourses through which ideology is both constituted and spread. They may analyse media such as radio, or songs, poetry and music (e.g. Chemouni and Mugiraneza Reference Chemouni and Mugiraneza2018; Lecocq Reference Lecocq2004). Sometimes, scholars focus on political behaviour and practices and identify the ideological commitments that encourage this behaviour (Sprenkels Reference Sprenkels2019; Wilson Reference Wilson2019).
There are several shortcomings in studying ideological content through the political vocabulary and ideas expressed in manifestos, programmes, speeches, interviews and other forms of media. These difficulties apply to both armed movements’ ideological programmes, and political party programmes. It is difficult to determine if language reflects ‘true’ ideological commitment. Party manifestos, for instance, may be written for different target audiences for different reasons, not only as an appeal for votes (Harmel Reference Harmel2018: 230). In the case of armed rebel movements, there are extensive debates about whether rebels are truly committed to the ideas and ideologies that they express, or whether these ideas are used for instrumental and strategic reasons in order to attract recruits, maintain solidarity and cohesion, and prevent defection. Furthermore, in many contexts rebel movements and political parties may come under pressure from external supporters, donors or other actors to present particular narratives, regardless of actual commitment. For some authors, ideologies can be understood as systems of power, to be adopted or discarded depending on when they serve the interest of power (e.g. Althusser Reference Althusser1976). We acknowledge that ideologies include both strategic and normative components, which are sometimes methodologically difficult to distinguish. Nonetheless, we believe that what armed movements and political parties say that they are doing is important, regardless of whether or not they reflect true ‘beliefs’. The true intentions or motivations for adopting or sustaining an ideology are less important than the extent to which these ideas fuel the internal life of the movement, and the degree of coherence around a particular set of ideas.
To assess ideological change or continuity, we need to understand both the wartime ideological content and aspirations articulated by armed movements, as well as their post-war ideas of the state. Three dimensions of ideological content come across as especially important.
First, ideologies produce particular ideas about the boundaries of political community. There are debates about whether nationalism itself is an ideology (e.g. Adams Reference Adams1993; Freeden Reference Freeden1996; Heywood Reference Heywood, A1992), but questions of what constitutes the nation and how this is expressed politically are often central to armed conflict. Some armed movements challenging the state do not agree with established boundaries and seek new political communities. As Sindre (Reference Sindre2019) shows in this issue, the call for self-determination through secession is a prominent feature of some ethno-nationalist armed movements such as the Free Aceh Movement (GAM), the Serb Democratic Party (SDS) in Bosnia Herzegovina, the LTTE in Sri Lanka, and Sinn Féin in Northern Ireland. While Sinn Féin still seeks reunification with Ireland, the parties in Aceh, Bosnia Herzegovina and Sri Lanka have abandoned their claims to separate statehood and instead adopted regionalist positions. Political parties in hybrid no-war-no-peace contexts also make choices about the boundaries and limits of their political community. For instance, Burcu Özçelik (Reference Özcelik2019) shows that the Kurdish Democratic Union Party (PYD) in northern Syria abandoned its pursuit of ethnic secession, and instead articulated demands for a civic non-ethnic autonomous region, despite its Kurdish co-ethnics in Turkey, Iraq and Iran. In other cases, the boundaries of political community are defined in religious as well as nationalist terms. Berti (Reference Berti2019) shows that Hamas built its political claims on the basis of its Sunni Islamist identity and connections to the Muslim Brotherhood, as well as its nationalist struggle. She also shows that Hezbollah’s initial ideological positions rested upon the desire to establish an Islamic state in Lebanon, but this goal was subsequently dropped as Hezbollah started to identify itself as being part of the Lebanese political system. Thus, ideas about the nation, religion and ethnicity and the boundaries of political community are often centrally important to rebel movement ideologies. These ideas may translate into political commitments in favour of secession, or significant autonomy and decentralization, or new forms of political relationships.
Second, ideologies inform ideas about who should govern. It is not only the boundaries of political community that are at stake in conflict, but broader questions about who should be included in governance structures and how they should govern. In many conflicts, armed groups mobilize on behalf of groups that perceive themselves to have been excluded or discriminated against by the existing state (Hutchful and Aning Reference Hutchful and Aning2004; McClintock Reference McClintock1984; Nafziger et al. Reference Nafziger, Stewart and Väyrynen2000). From the African National Congress (ANC) struggle in South Africa to the Zapatistas in Mexico, many armed movements advocate radical reform of the state to allow for full participation in governance structures. In this collection of articles, demands for inclusion and new forms of governance lie at the heart of many of the movements discussed by authors, even in non-secessionist conflicts. For instance, Ntagahoraho Burihabwa and Devon E.A. Curtis (2019) show that the Conseil National pour la Défense de la Démocratie-Forces de Défense de la Démocratie (CNDD-FDD) rebel movement in Burundi has its origins in the systematic exclusion of the Hutu in post-independence political, economic and military structures. In the Western Saharan conflict, Wilson (Reference Wilson2019) shows how Polisario expressed ideas of governance rooted in direct, participatory democracy, whereby refugees would take part in grassroots participatory forums and where ‘committees of the people’ (mainly staffed by women during the conflict) would run public services. In Angola, as in many other anti-colonial struggles, Justin Pearce (Reference Pearce2018) explains how União Nacional para a Independência Total de Angola (UNITA) emerged as an anti-colonial movement, fighting for independence, democracy and equality.
Third, ideologies influence views about how the state should distribute economic resources and deliver public services. This is perhaps the dimension of ideological content that most closely reflects accounts that emphasize ideological classifications ranging from socialism to capitalism. Many armed movements, particularly those with their origins before the end of the Cold War, expressed a commitment to Marxist-Leninism. The ubiquity of Marxist-Leninist ideas has led some authors to discount these ideological pronouncements and see them as a reflection of opportunism and international alliances. Burihabwa and Curtis (Reference Burihabwa and Curtis2019) show, for instance, that the Marxist-Leninist ideas that once animated the CNDD-FDD in Burundi were largely abandoned. In other cases former rebel parties have sought to maintain revolutionary ideas, for instance the Ethiopian People’s Revolutionary Democratic Front’s (EPRDF) ideology of revolutionary democracy in Ethiopia explained by Lovise Aalen (Reference Aalen2019), and the Farabundo Martí National Liberation Front’s (FMLN), continued commitment to a socialist revolution in El Salvador as part of an ‘ideological composite’ described by Ralph Sprenkels (Reference Sprenkels2019). Even in cases where former rebel parties do not have Marxist-Leninist roots, ideas about economic redistribution remain central. For instance, Pearce (Reference Pearce2018) shows that UNITA in Angola retains an emphasis on economic redistribution, expressed as putting the countryside first.
Most armed movements address these three ideological dimensions to some degree. Yet the extent of agreement over ideas about the state within an armed movement is highly variable, which has implications for later continuity and change. Some groups are relatively cohesive, with coherent and far-reaching ideological expression. Examples of relatively cohesive groups include the RPF in Rwanda, as well as the Polisario in Western Sahara. In other cases, different factions of the armed group may express different ideological preferences, and part of the struggle is fought between different movement factions. Internal divisions within the group have an impact on ideological content, as described by Berti (Reference Berti2019), Burihabwa and Curtis (Reference Burihabwa and Curtis2019), Sprenkels (Reference Sprenkels2019) and Aalen (Reference Aalen2019). Relatedly, some ideas are malleable and others are more fixed. The articulation of a group’s ideology may be purposely ambiguous in order to appeal to different audiences and factions. Sometimes the vision of the state comes across as a coherent manifesto, sometimes as a loose and shifting set of ideas, and sometimes as a continually contested terrain. What is clear, however, is that in different cases, ideologies work in different ways. They may be explicit or implicit, and they may be ambiguous or rigidly defined and adhered to. Nonetheless, all of the contributions in this collection show that ideologies inform ideas about political community, participation in governance and economic distribution.
Continuity and Change: Unpacking Moderation
To what extent do the ideas and ideologies fuelling the movement show consistency and stability after conflict? How do they change and why? The subject of ideological change has conventionally focused on radical parties’ moderation process following inclusion into formal electoral politics based on a selected case universe of radical religious parties (e.g. Brocker and Künkler Reference Brocker and Künkler2013; Kalyvas Reference Kalyvas1996; Schwedler Reference Schwedler2007; Tezcür Reference Tezcür2010; Wickham Reference Wickham2004) and/or communist parties.
With its focus on rebel groups turned political parties, this collection expands the scope conditions for understanding the role of ideology in post-war practices of politics. This entails not limiting the perspective to analysing ‘moderation’ – understood as the decrease in importance or complete abandonment of radical political goals and governance practices – but rather focusing on both ideological continuities and change.
Ideology and Governance Practices After War
The respective contributions of Wilson (Reference Wilson2019 – Western Sahara), Aalen (Reference Aalen2019 – Ethiopia), Pearce (Reference Pearce2018 – Angola) and Burihabwa and Curtis (Reference Burihabwa and Curtis2019 – Burundi) all take up the question of whether wartime visions and ideas are put into practice once former rebel groups turned parties get the chance to govern.
While the emergence of authoritarian governance practices by rebel victors has been analysed at length (Aalen and Muriaas Reference Aalen and Muriaas2017; Lyons Reference Lyons2016a, Reference Lyons2016b), Aalen (Reference Aalen2019) points out that little attention has been paid to understanding changes in the overarching ideological underpinnings of such regimes. In her analysis of Ethiopia’s ruling party, the EPRDF, Aalen argues that the ideological framework of ‘revolutionary democracy’ is used to legitimize a range of practices. However, contradictory ideas about the relationship between the centre and the subnational level of politics, primarily ethnic federalism and the developmental state, have led to continued tensions within the regime. Recent protests in Amhara and Oromo regions illustrate the inherent ideological contradiction within the regime, exhibiting the limits of revolutionary democracy as a legitimizing ideology over time.
Burihabwa and Curtis (Reference Burihabwa and Curtis2019) point to similar internal contradictions within the CNDD-FDD in Burundi during its first decade as a ruling party to explain why the party reverted to authoritarian and divisive governance tactics. The authors contest the often-held assumption that African rebel groups are void of ideological commitments, showing that the CNDD-FDD’s ideology was strongly anchored in resistance to the regime, the restoration of democracy and social justice. Yet internal factionalism between different ideational commitments led to tensions, and breakaway groups. The authors argue that those within the CNDD-FDD who had been best placed to put forward an inclusive state-building agenda were side-lined long before the war had ended, and those that remained have used governance strategies more akin to previous pre-war Burundian regimes rather than the wartime CNDD-FDD ideological programme.
Wilson (Reference Wilson2019) identifies a contrasting pattern in her case study of the Polisario Front in Western Sahara in which she highlights continuities between wartime ideological goals and governance practices by the Polisario ruling authority. Her study reveals a distinct pattern of experimentation with radical policies informed by wartime revolutionary ideas that underpinned the movement. An intriguing case of insurgents turned rulers but without military victory and controlling territory outside the designated ‘homeland’, Polisario reveals a dual process of continued experimentation of radical politics and moderation. Some radical policies have enabled and supported subsequent moderation when moderation is understood as adaptation to institutions of liberal democracy. ‘Radicalism and moderation’, Wilson argues, can be overlapping even if partially contradictory processes.
Tracing present-day governance practices by the UNITA party in rural Angola, the successor party of the rebel group that suffered military defeat after a decade-long civil war, Pearce (Reference Pearce2018) shows that there are strong continuities between wartime practices and post-war politics of UNITA, now an opposition party. Pearce’s findings show surprising continuities that fall outside patrimonial logics of party politics. For instance, party branches are staffed by volunteers and unsalaried cadres who dedicate free time to the movement. As such, the UNITA case provides a much-needed critique of common assumptions that African political parties are first and foremost identity-based groups driven by patronage machineries.
The four cases of the EPRDF, CNDD-FDD, UNITA and the Polisario Front represent four different paths of conflict outcomes: rebel victory in Ethiopia, negotiated settlement in Burundi, rebel military defeat in Angola and the peculiar context of governing in exile for the Polisario Front in the refugee camps in Algeria. In all cases the authors point to the challenges of redefining ideological foundations in peacetime but show how post-war governance practices and legitimacy strategies remain informed by foundational ideologies.
Adapting Ideologies and Programmes
A second set of articles in this collection asks whether and how electoral participation impacts on identity and ideological change. Is rebranding important to remain electorally viable? Which aspects of a party’s identity are changed and which ones remain the same?
Electoral logics play an important role in the adaptation of former rebel parties’ ideology. Elections present a significant change in the political environment for former rebels. As several authors have shown, the shift from contestation in the battlefield to contestation at the ballot box is not always an easy transition (Allison Reference Allison2010; Ishiyama and Marshall Reference Ishiyama and Marshall2017; Manning Reference Manning2008; Sindre Reference Sindre2016b). Carrie Manning and Ian Smith (2019) show that of 89.6 per cent of parties formed out of rebel groups have contested at least one election. Using a large-N data set of post-rebel parties and elections between 1990 and 2016, they study the effects of a range of environmental characteristics (e.g. presence of older parties, electoral rules) and organizational endowments such as ideational capital and organizational competencies on electoral performance. They find that the presence of ideologically similar parties has a positive impact on electoral performance, suggesting that well-defined ideological cleavage structures during the war remain politically salient after conflict. Therefore, to understand electoral performance one must understand how ideology interacts with other factors.
John Ishiyama (Reference Ishiyama2019) assesses the question of whether changes in identity, in terms of both image and ideology, positively impact the electoral success of former rebel parties once they engage in political competition. Using an original data set, he asks whether former rebel parties that undergo significant ‘rebranding’ by repackaging their images are more politically successful than parties that have not done so. The article finds that those parties that have repackaged their identities by downplaying their wartime ideological commitments (i.e. by changing their names) fare no better politically than parties that have not repackaged their identities. However, he finds that former rebel parties that have distanced themselves from the war by officially renouncing violence have more positive electoral outcomes.
These findings suggest that renouncing violence and committing to peace is important for explaining post-war electoral success. It also suggests that factors other than electoral success help explain why and how some parties undergo significant rebranding while others do not. The case studies by Berti (Reference Berti2019), Sindre (Reference Sindre2019), Sprenkels (Reference Sprenkels2019) and Mimmi Söderberg Kovacs (Reference Söderberg Kovacs2019) shed further light on the mechanisms that underpin ideological adaptation following entry into electoral politics.
Sprenkels’ (Reference Sprenkels2019) contribution analyses the ideological evolution of the FMLN in El Salvador, a former rebel party that successfully transitioned from opposition party to ruling party after participating in multiple election cycles. While the FMLN has strategically adapted some of its political programmes to broaden its electoral appeal and has become more mainstream, it has also retained many aspects of its revolutionary discourse. Sprenkels finds that the concept of ambivalent moderation provides a lens through which to understand how wartime revolutionary ideas have been moulded as the party has become electorally viable. Ideology, he notes, is subject to constant internal debate revealing an inherent friction between party cadres and leadership – categories that are deeply anchored in the wartime organizational structure of the FMLN.
In another subset of former rebel parties, ethno-nationalist parties, Sindre (Reference Sindre2019) further unpacks the concept of moderation by identifying which aspects of the ideology of former rebel parties contribute to peacebuilding. Continued adherence to narrowly defined goals of ethno-nationalism, she argues, will counter long-term efforts for reconciliation. Ethno-nationalist parties such as the Tamil National Alliance (TNA), the Serb Democratic Party (SDS) and the Aceh Party, which form the basis for her comparative study, originally waged war to establish new states based on ethnically defined citizenships. Moderation in these contexts, Sindre notes, should not be limited to analysing whether or not the parties adapt to electoral politics, but also take into account the extent to which they adopt more inclusive programmatic profiles and policies. Sindre shows that, having been wartime contenders, these parties have also invested significant resources in peace negotiations and/or peace agreements. Yet, there is variation in the extent to which the parties remain anchored in wartime cleavages that uphold ethnic divisions, which can in part be explained by the nature of the party system and the levels of interparty competition.
Also focusing on identity-based movements, Berti’s (Reference Berti2019) contribution outlines a different logic of ideological adaptation tracing the discourse and shifts in the programmes and profiles of Hamas and Hezbollah over time. Ideological continuity and coherence in terms of issue profiles and discourse are important to retain legitimacy both internally and among voters. At the same time, both parties have had to respond to changes in the context within which they mobilize and garner electoral support. For instance, while Hamas continues to frame its role as a public service provider in relation to building an Islamic state, by 2017 its official stance on sharia law had been downplayed and its general stance on the role of an Islamic state more ambiguous. As Berti notes, the parties have had to ‘rethink and sharpen their state-building visions and aspirations’.
In contrast to the above cases, Söderberg Kovacs (Reference Söderberg Kovacs2019) focuses on a negative case, the RUFP in Sierra Leone, a party that has been unable to make itself relevant to the post-war electorate. The inability to renew its ideological outlook and adapt its image and programme to post-war realities are key to explaining its failure at the ballot, she argues, while the composition of the party membership helps explain the continued commitment to a wartime revolutionary ideology. Much of the more clientelistically oriented membership deserted the party after the war, and most remaining members were ideological hardliners, motivated by the party’s wartime ideology and unwilling to instigate change or party rebranding.
What we can draw from this discussion is that while former rebel parties undergo some sort of image repackaging and rebranding to adapt to the new context of post-war politics, this does not necessarily entail a deradicalization or moderation. Former rebel parties tend to invest resources in reinterpreting and reframing wartime ideologies without rejecting them, in such a way that allows for a maximization of political expedience ahead of elections.
Conclusions: ideological effects and implications for governance
If ideologies are malleable, at least to some extent, and if former rebel parties repackage and rebrand their ideas to suit their new post-war contexts, then are ideologies simply subsumed under other logics of politics? The articles in this collection suggest a co-constitutive relationship, where ideologies interact with other logics. Thus, ideologies play a role in shaping electoral, patrimonial and state-building logics but they are also shaped by them. The connection between former rebel parties’ ideological claims and commitments and these other logics of politics help us understand governance practices in post-war contexts.
As the articles in this collection show, former rebel parties demonstrate a range of different governance practices. Often these practices resonate with the claims made by rebels about the state during the war, while sometimes they do not. Practices vary on a number of different axes. Governance practices may be more hierarchical or consensual, authoritarian or democratic, exclusive or inclusive, centralized or decentralized, personalized or bureaucratized. The role of coercion is particularly prominent in some cases, and less so in others.
It is beyond the scope of this article to unpack these governance practices, and further research is necessary to untangle the relationships between ideologies and their effects on governance. Nonetheless, the articles in this collection suggest that in addition to electoral logics, at least two other political logics may influence, and be influenced by, former rebel parties’ ideologies. First, patrimonial logics continue to play an important role in many post-war environments. Kinship, patronage and reciprocity often help shape the relationship between the rulers and the ruled. In these cases, loyalties remain highly personalized. Typically, if patrimonial forms of governance characterize pre-war political structures, they also structure the internal governance of rebel insurgents, as well as the nature of post-war governance (Burihabwa and Curtis Reference Burihabwa and Curtis2019; de Waal Reference De Waal2009; Reno Reference Reno2011). Former rebel party governance may display different forms of patrimonialism – for instance, developmental patrimonialism by the RPF in Rwanda (Booth and Golooba-Mutebi Reference Booth and Golooba-Mutebi2012), a revitalization of clientelism by the FMLN in El Salvador (Sprenkels Reference Sprenkels2019) and the manifestation of cartel state structures in Timor Leste. Ideologies thus connect to practices and structures shaped by the pre-war context and by the armed struggle in contentious and ambiguous ways. Future research is needed to help better understand the mechanisms through which these interactions occur.
Second, ideological commitment and pressures for change interact with other state-building logics to produce specific governance practices. As described above and shown in the collection of articles, former rebel parties often express visions of state reform. Yet these visions do not necessarily translate into concrete state transformation programmes even when former rebels become ruling parties. In part, this is because former rebel parties encounter other types of state-building logics. For instance, in many post-conflict contexts international actors play prominent roles in promoting projects and initiatives that reflect their own views about the requirements of state-building. From the late 1990s the prevailing international orthodoxy was that peacebuilding and state-building went together (Chandler Reference Chandler2017; Curtis Reference Curtis2013), and thus significant donor funds went towards realizing a particular vision of state-building which did not necessarily correspond to the vision articulated by former rebels. More recently, international state-building programmes are increasingly being questioned and reconsidered, in part due to their failure in Iraq, Afghanistan, the Democratic Republic of the Congo and elsewhere. These failures can be at least partly attributed to the fact that the state-building programmes promoted by international actors did not take into account existing political structures and political aspirations of former rebel parties and other groups. As the articles in this collection suggest, understanding these connections is an important emerging area of academic inquiry.
Many different factors influence the ways in which former rebels govern in peacetime. Pre-war political and economic structures, the way in which conflict ended, the continuation of wartime cleavages in society, the party system, internal party organizational dynamics, the domestic political landscape and international support are all important in different contexts and may open and close off different governance alternatives. This collection of articles points to former rebel parties’ ideologies as an important component, and the articles help us understand the different ways that ideology works in different contexts. We show that there is great diversity in terms of the ideological content expressed by rebels when they are fighting, and the types of claims that they make vis-à-vis the state. In peacetime, these ideological commitments interact with other political logics, including electoral, patrimonial and state-building logics to produce new forms and strategies of governance, and new ideological trajectories. The resulting ideas and practices may show signs of continuity with prior claims about the state or may rest upon new state visions.
Commentators sometimes lament the fact that groups that may have criticized structures of exclusion, injustice and exploitation in wartime do not maintain ideals and practices of inclusion, justice and fairness when they govern. While it is true that the practices of governance often fail to live up to their promises, this does not necessarily mean that such visions are completely abandoned. The articles in this collection take a more nuanced view and argue that it is necessary to understand former rebels’ agendas and visions on their own terms, and the political environment that former rebel parties are embedded within, in order to assess what happens to these ideas over time. Only then can we understand why certain pathways are chosen over others, and what implications this may have on peace, social justice and democracy.
Acknowledgements
The articles in this special issue and collection were discussed and developed in two workshops organized by the editors of this special issue. We are grateful to the Philomathia Foundation, which funded the first workshop in January 2017 and to Government and Opposition for its generous support to host a writers’ workshop at Emmanuel College, Cambridge in September 2017. Our greatest thanks go to all the authors, speakers and participants who contributed to this research project. We would also like to thank Lars Svåsand, Carrie Manning and John Ishiyama for their comments on this introductory article, and the editors at Government and Opposition for their suggestions and guidance. Parts of this research were also funded by Gyda Sindre’s grant from the European Union’s Seventh Framework Programme under Marie Curie grant agreement no. 608695 and the Research Council of Norway through the FRIPRO Mobility Grant, project no. 240110.
