Pro-Government Militias

Pro-government militias (PGMs) actively participate in conflicts around the world. Yet governments respond to these militant groups in very distinct ways. States openly support some PGMs, maintain covert links with some, and ignore or suppress others. We examine this variation in how governments respond to PGMs, both across and within groups. This project analyzes 8,430 recently declassified documents from the United Kingdom Prime Ministers’ security-based Correspondence Files (1969-1974), which detail the British government’s internal attitudes and behaviors toward these groups in the context of Britain’s “Troubles in Northern Ireland.” We evaluate five of the predominant theoretical explanations that describe how governments understand PGMs: as representing costs to the government; benefits to the government; ideological allies to the government; locally popular forces; or forces the government lacks the capacity to constrain.

Funded by "Emory University Research Committee--Halle Institute for Global Research Award ($29,604), 2021, PI Emily K. Gade