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Abstract

This chapter examines the various ways that paramilitary violence intersects with contemporary international security issues. Understanding how militias affect fragile states as well as human rights and democratization is the focus of this chapter. Militias, while seeking to fill political, economic, and social gaps, undermine state stability and individual protections of many citizens. These detrimental aspects of paramilitary violence, in turn, threaten international peace and stability.

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Notes

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    Fund for Peace, 2018 Fragile State Index (Washington, DC: Fund for Peace, 2018), 7. The one exception is North Korea, which does have a militia operating in its country, but it is formally integrated within the nation’s armed forces as a reserve force.

  5. 5.

    Ibid., 30–36. URL: http://fundforpeace.org/fsi/wp-content/uploads/2018/04/951181805-Fragile-States-Index-Annual-Report-2018.pdf.

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    Roudabeh Kishi. “Gender-Based Violence and Women’s Political Participation.” ACLED, July 2, 2017. URL: https://www.acleddata.com/2017/08/02/gender-based-violence-and-womens-political-participation/.

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  29. 29.

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  30. 30.

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  31. 31.

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  32. 32.

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  33. 33.

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Kan, P.R. (2019). Militias and State Stability. In: The Global Challenge of Militias and Paramilitary Violence. Palgrave Pivot, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-13016-9_3

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