In the context of international bargaining, standard models predict that a shift in military power can cause preventive war because it changes the relative bargaining position between states. We find that shifts in military power are not the only cause of war under commitment problems and that...

The present paper explicitly models the principal-agent relationship between a democratic population and its elected representative within a standard war bargaining setup. I find that the specific structure of this relationship and the problems resulting from it help overcome information...

We document an increase in the scoring probability from penalties in soccer, which separates the time period before 1974 significantly from that after 1976: the scoring probability increased by 11%.We explain this finding by arguing that the institution of penalty-shooting before 1974 is best...

We study how norms can solve distributional conflict inside a clan and the efficient coordination of collective action in a conflict with an external enemy.We characterize a fully non-cooperative equilibrium in a finite game in which a self-enforcing norm coordinates the members on efficient...

Conflict parties are frequently involved into more than one conflict at a given time. In this paper the interrelated structure of conflictive relations is modeled as a conflict network where opponents are embedded in a local structure of bilateral conflicts. Conflict parties invest in specific...

Mission-level data strongly suggests that peacekeeping operations offer a path toward conflict reduction. Recently available spatially disaggregated intra-mission data tells a more complex story. Peacekeepers are deployed, within missions, to where violence strikes, and they can prevent...

This paper empirically investigates the effects of Anti-Open Grazing Laws (AOGLs) on herder-farmer conflicts in Nigeria. The laws, enacted as a response to escalating violent conflicts over fertile land resources between herders and farmers, aimed to reduce clashes by prohibiting livestock...

We examine the link between violent attacks of the Islamic extremist group Boko Haram, forced migration, and the empowerment of women in host communities. We find positive effects of distant attacks on the economic well-being of women, their use of modern contraceptive methods, and rejection of...

Using multiple waves of Statistics Canada's Canadian Community Health Survey (CCHS) linked with the Longitudinal Immigration Database (IMDB), as well as the Uppsala Conflict Data Program (UCDP)/ International Peace Research Institute in Oslo (PRIO) Armed Conflict Dataset, we examine the effect...

This paper studies a contest in which players with unobservable types may form an alliance in a pre-stage of the game to join their forces and compete for a prize. We characterize the pure strategy equilibria of this game of incomplete information. We show that if the formation of an alliance is...