Democratic-autocratic military interventions in the Middle East and North Africa

• Applicant: Professorin Dr. Hanna Pfeifer
• Subject Area: Political Science
• Term: Funded in 2018
• Project identifier: Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG) - Project number 404406440

Libya, Syria, Iraq and Yemen are in the middle of internationalised military conflicts, with several states and (transnational) non-state actors being involved as conflict parties. Even though the three cases are very different, they have one aspect in common: both democracies and autocracies have intervened – and they have done so at least partially “on the same side”. This means that these military actions are marked by some form of democratic-autocratic cooperation. This aspect of interventions has attracted very little academic attention so far. Neither do we know why autocracies participate in military interventions, nor how and why democratic-autocratic cooperation takes place. Moreover, the mixed nature of interventions supposedly has an impact on how democracies can justify and legitimise the use of force and intervention into conflicts. Notably, the liberal purposes of interventions are questionable if democracies closely cooperate with autocratic systems like Saudi Arabia in military operations.This project aims to close these research gaps by studying recent interventions in the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) and addressing three questions: How do Arab autocracies legitimise their engagement in and the initiation of external military interventions vis-à-vis international, regional and domestic audiences? How do mature democracies legitimise these interventions vis-à-vis international, regional and domestic audiences, in particular with respect to democratic-autocratic cooperation? How and why does democratic-autocratic cooperation take place in these military interventions? It combines theoretical-conceptual work on autocratic warfare with normative aspects, i.e. the legitimacy of these interventions, and empirical research on the legitimation of recent interventions in the MENA region by Western democracies vis-à-vis domestic and international audiences.

• DFG Programme: Research Fellowships
• International Connection: United Kingdom
• Host: Dr. Stefano Recchia