Predicting the Decline of Ethnic Civil War: Was Gurr Right and For the Right Reasons?

The study finds that ethnic civil wars have indeed declined since the mid-1990s, supporting Ted Robert Gurr's projections. The authors demonstrate that this pacifying trend is associated with increased government accommodation, specifically through the granting of group rights, power-sharing, and democratization, which reduce the probability of conflict onset. Additionally, regional autonomy and peacekeeping operations are found to significantly increase the likelihood of conflict termination. Out-of-sample predictions show that a theory-driven model based on accommodative politics far outperforms a simple time-trend model in predicting the actual decline of ethnic conflict from 2000 to 2013.

• The incidence of ethnic civil war increased until the mid-1990s but has been declining since that point, confirming the turning point identified by Ted Robert Gurr.
• Global trends since the 1970s show a steady decrease in the share of the population that is politically excluded, a decline in discrimination, and a dramatic increase in power-sharing arrangements.
• Certain accommodative policies significantly reduce the risk of new ethnic civil war onsets: inclusion in power-sharing regimes and democratization are statistically significant, while the granting of group rights also dampens risk.
• The granting of regional autonomy and the implementation of peacekeeping operations are primary drivers for the termination of ongoing ethnic civil wars.
• Simulations indicate that accommodation can substantially lower conflict probabilities over a decade: democratization reduces risk by 27%, inclusion by 20%, and the ending of discrimination by 15%.
• A theory-driven model based on accommodative politics accurately predicted the decline of ethnic civil war between 2000 and 2013, whereas a simple trend-extrapolation model vastly over-predicted the amount of conflict.

APA

Cederman, L.-E., Gleditsch, K. S., & Wucherpfennig, J. (2016). Predicting the Decline of Ethnic Civil War: Was Gurr Right and For the Right Reasons? Peace Research Institute Oslo. https://cdn.cloud.prio.org/files/fec4ec95-709a-4025-946e-c0e2e97f31a6/Predicting the decline of ethnic civil war Was Gurr right and for the right reasons.pdf?inline=true

Chicago

Cederman, Lars-Erik, Kristian Skrede Gleditsch, and Julian Wucherpfennig. Predicting the Decline of Ethnic Civil War: Was Gurr Right and For the Right Reasons? Peace Research Institute Oslo, 2016. https://cdn.cloud.prio.org/files/fec4ec95-709a-4025-946e-c0e2e97f31a6/Predicting the decline of ethnic civil war Was Gurr right and for the right reasons.pdf?inline=true.

Wikipedia

{{cite report |last1=Cederman |first1=Lars-Erik |last2=Gleditsch |first2=Kristian Skrede |last3=Wucherpfennig |first3=Julian |title=Predicting the Decline of Ethnic Civil War: Was Gurr Right and For the Right Reasons? |publisher=Peace Research Institute Oslo |date=21 July 2016 |url=https://cdn.cloud.prio.org/files/fec4ec95-709a-4025-946e-c0e2e97f31a6/Predicting the decline of ethnic civil war Was Gurr right and for the right reasons.pdf?inline=true |access-date=23 October 2026 |via=Climate Insights Directory}}

BibTeX

@techreport{cederman2016predicting, author = {Cederman, Lars-Erik and Gleditsch, Kristian Skrede and Wucherpfennig, Julian}, title = {{Predicting the Decline of Ethnic Civil War: Was Gurr Right and For the Right Reasons?}}, institution = {Peace Research Institute Oslo}, year = {2016}, month = jul, url = {https://cdn.cloud.prio.org/files/fec4ec95-709a-4025-946e-c0e2e97f31a6/Predicting the decline of ethnic civil war Was Gurr right and for the right reasons.pdf?inline=true}, urldate = {2026-10-23}, note = {Indexed by Climate Insights Directory} }