Toward a Theory of Conflict Behaviour in Latin America

Abstract

There are at least two major ways to approach the study of domestic conflict behaviour. One might seek to explain such conflict by reference to the structures and processes internal to the nation-state, or one might look outside the nation for international influences that combine with internal conditions. The fruitfulness of staying within the nation only has been brought into question by the ambiguous findings of a series of quantitative cross-national studies in their attempt at explaining domestic conflict behaviour. These studies have been conducted by authors such as Rudolph Rummel (1964, 1965) ²; Bruce Russett (1964); Ivo and Rosalind Feierabend (1966); Ted Gurr (1965, 1966, 1967); Raymond Tanter (1965); Raymond Tanter and Manus Midlarsky (1967). These studies seek to explain various kinds of domestic conflict behaviour by referring to attributes and processes within the nation. Characteristics such as poor demographic conditions; low levels of technology; relative deprivation; value aspirations, expectations and capabilities, as well as internal control measures have been used to explain domestic conflict behaviour such as turmoil and internal war. A problem characterising some of these studies is their inability to explain high magnitudes of conflict. For example, Rummel asserts that his predictor variables (e.g. poor demographic conditions) have some success in accounting for a lack of or for low levels of domestic conflict behaviour, 1946–59 and 1955–57 across 66 and 69 nations respectively.

Acknowledgements are due to the National Science Foundation (GS, no. 1041) and the Carnegie Corporation for support of the Comparative International Processes project at Northwestern University. Thanks are due to Chadwick F. Alger and Harold Guetzkow of Northwestern University; Hayward Alker, Yale University; Douglas Bury, Case Western Reserve University; J. D. Singer, University of Michigan; W. Deutsch, Harvard University; and W. Cody Wilson, Advanced Research Projects Agency, for helpful comments on the paper; to Ted Gurr of Princeton for the use of his conflict behaviour data; to Robert Beattie, David Cooper, and Susan Healy for research assistance. The paper is dedicated to Miss Healy, who was killed in a plane crash 27 March 1967.