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Territorial Threat and the Decline of Political Trust in Africa: A Multilevel Analysis

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Polity

Abstract

Theorists of international conflict argue that territory is an unusually salient issue to states and, by extension, their publics. Comparing competing insights from the “rally-round-the-flag” literature and those derived from theories of the state, I examine which theory best explains the effects of external threats to territory on levels of domestic trust. Using information from twenty-eight Afrobarometer surveys of sixteen different countries between 1999 and 2004, I assess the relationship between external threat and political trust using cross-sectional, multilevel models. The results challenge the rally effect hypothesis and suggest that government approval moderates the effect of territorial threat on trust. These findings demonstrate the salience of territorial issues domestically and generate novel insights about approval and trust in Africa.

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Notes

  1. John A. Vasquez, The War Puzzle Revisited (New York: Cambridge University Press, 2009).

  2. Ibid., 348–49.

  3. See Marc L. Hutchison and Douglas M. Gibler, “Political Tolerance and Territorial Threat: A Cross-National Study,” Journal of Politics 69 (2007): 128–42.

  4. Marc J. Hetherington, Why Trust Matters: Declining Political Trust and the Demise of American Liberalism (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 2005); Kenneth Newton, “Social and Political Trust,” in Oxford Handbook of Political Behavior, ed. Russell J. Dalton and Hans-Dieter Klingemann (New York: Oxford University Press, 2007).

  5. Matt Ridley, The Origins of Virtues: Human Instincts and the Evolution of Cooperation (New York: Viking, 1997); Newton, “Social and Political Trust.”

  6. Stephen Knack and Philip Keefer, “Does Social Capital Have an Economic Payoff? A Cross-Country Investigation,” Quarterly Journal of Economics 112 (1997): 1251–88; Eric Uslaner, The Moral Foundations of Trust (New York: Cambridge University Press, 2002); Newton, “Social and Political Trust.”

  7. See Hetherington, Why Trust Matters.

  8. Charles Tilly, Coercion, Capital, and European States, AD 9901990 (Cambridge, MA: Basil Blackwell, 1990); Jeffrey Herbst, “War and the State in Africa,” International Security 14 (1990): 117–39; Douglass C. North, Structure and Change in Economic History (New York: W.W. Norton, 1981).

  9. Michael Bratton, Robert Mattes, and E. Gyimah-Boadi, Public Opinion, Democracy, and Market Reform in Africa (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2005); Michelle T. Kuenzi, “Social Capital and Political Trust in West Africa,” Afrobarometer Working Paper No. 96 (2008).

  10. Pierre Englebert, State Legitimacy and Development in Africa (London: Lynne Reinner Publishers, 2000).

  11. The Afrobarometer is a regional survey project measuring political, economic, and social attitudes in over a dozen sub-Saharan African countries. One of the many goals of the Afrobarometer project is to allow for the systematic comparison of African attitudes across countries and over time. This collaborative project is currently coordinated by the Center for Democratic Development in Ghana, the Institute for Democracy in South Africa, and the Institute for Empirical Research in Political Economy in Benin. The survey data is publicly available and can be accessed at www.afrobarometer.org.

  12. Paul D. Senese and John A. Vasquez, The Steps to War: An Empirical Study (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 2008); Michael P. Colaresi, Karen Rasler, and William R. Thompson, Strategic Rivalries in World Politics: Position, Space, and Conflict Escalation (New York: Cambridge University Press, 2007).

  13. Paul R. Hensel, “Interstate Rivalry and the Study of Militarized Conflict,” in New Directions in the Study of International Conflict, Crises, and War, ed. F. Harvey and B. Mor (London: Macmillan, 1998); Steven L. Quackenbush, “Territorial Issues and Recurrent Conflict,” Conflict Management and Peace Science 27 (2010): 239–52.

  14. Jaroslav Tir and Paul F. Diehl, “Geographic Dimensions of Enduring Rivalries,” Political Geography 21 (2002): 263–86; John A. Vasquez and Christopher S. Leskiw, “The Origins and War Proneness of Interstate Rivalries,” Annual Review of Political Science 4 (2001): 295–316.

  15. Toby J. Rider, “Understanding Arms Race Onset: Rivalry, Threat, and Territorial Competition,” Journal of Politics 71 (2009): 693–703.

  16. Paul R. Hensel, “Charting a Course to Conflict: Territorial Issues and Interstate Conflict, 1816–1992,” Conflict Management and Peace Science 15 (1996): 43–73; John A. Vasquez and Marie T. Henehan, “Territorial Disputes and the Probability of War, 1816–1992,” Journal of Peace Research 18 (2001): 57–90; Paul D. Senese and John A. Vasquez, “Assessing the Steps to War,” British Journal of Political Science 35 (2005): 607–33; Senese and Vasquez, The Steps to War.

  17. Brandon Valeriano and John A. Vasquez, “Identifying and Classifying Complex Interstate Wars,” International Studies Quarterly 54 (2010): 561–82.

  18. Vasquez, The War Puzzle Revisited; Senese and Vasquez, The Steps to War.

  19. John A. Vasquez, The War Puzzle (New York: Cambridge University Press, 1993); Vasquez, The War Puzzle Revisited; Senese and Vasquez, The Steps to War.

  20. Vasquez, The War Puzzle; Vasquez, The War Puzzle Revisited.

  21. Vasquez, The War Puzzle; Vasquez, The War Puzzle Revisited; also see James D. Fearon, “Domestic Political Audiences and the Escalation of International Disputes,” American Political Science Review 88 (September 1994): 577–92.

  22. Paul Huth, Standing Your Ground (Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 1996).

  23. John R. Zaller, The Nature and Origins of Mass Opinion (New York: Cambridge University Press, 1992); Richard A. Brody, Assessing the President: The Media, Elite Opinion, and Public Support (Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press, 1992); Kenneth A. Schultz, Democracy and Coercive Diplomacy (New York: Cambridge University Press, 2001).

  24. Douglas M. Gibler, “Bordering on Peace: Democracy, Territorial Issues and Conflict,” International Studies Quarterly 51 (2007): 509–32.

  25. Hutchison and Gibler, “Political Tolerance and Territorial Threat.”

  26. John E. Mueller, War, Presidents, and Public Opinion (New York: Wiley, 1973); Samuel Kernell, “Explaining Presidential Popularity,” American Political Science Review 72 (1978): 506–22; Lee Sigelman and Pamela J. Conover, “The Dynamics of Presidential Support During International Conflict Situations,” Political Behavior 3 (1981): 303–18; John R. Oneal and Anna Lillian Bryan, “The Rally 'Round the Flag Effect in U.S. Foreign Policy Crises, 1950–1985,” Political Behavior 17 (1995): 379–401; William D. Baker and John R. Oneal, “Patriotism or Opinion Leadership? The Nature and Origins of the Rally 'Round the Flag Effect,” Journal of Conflict Resolution 45 (2001): 661–87; Matthew A. Baum, “The Constituent Foundations of the Rally-Round-the-Flag Phenomenon,” International Studies Quarterly 46 (2002): 263–98.

  27. Mueller, War, Presidents, and Public Opinion; Kernell, “Explaining Presidential Popularity.”

  28. Brody, Assessing the President; Baker and Oneal, “Patriotism or Opinion Leadership?”; Baum, “The Constituent Foundations of the Rally-Round-the-Flag Phenomenon”; Douglas M. Gibler, “Outside-In: The Effects of External Threat on State Centralization,” Journal of Conflict Resolution 54 (2010): 519–42.

  29. Mueller, War, Presidents, and Public Opinion; Kernell, “Explaining Presidential Popularity.”

  30. Brody, Assessing the President; Bradley Lian and John R. Oneal, “Presidents, the Use of Military Force, and Public Opinion,” Journal of Conflict Resolution 37 (1993): 277–300; Oneal and Bryan, “The Rally 'Round the Flag Effect in U.S. Foreign Policy Crises”; Patrick James and Jean-Sebastian Rioux, “International Crises and Linkage Politics: The Experiences of the United States, 1953–1994,” Political Research Quarterly 51 (1998): 781–812; Baker and Oneal, “Patriotism or Opinion Leadership?”; Baum, “The Constituent Foundations of the Rally-Round-the-Flag Phenomenon.” Several studies have also found no direct evidence of rally effects following international crises. See Giacomo Chiozza and Hein E. Goemans, “Peace Through Insecurity: Tenure and International Conflict,” Journal of Conflict Resolution 47 (2003): 443–67; Giacomo Chiozza and Hein E. Goemans, “Avoiding Diversionary Targets,” Journal of Peace Research 41 (2004): 423–43.

  31. Terrence L. Chapman and Dan Reiter, “The United Nations Security Council and the Rally 'Round the Flag Effect,” Journal of Conflict Resolution 48 (2004): 886–909.

  32. Hutchison and Gibler, “Political Tolerance and Territorial Threat.”

  33. This is one important difference between the rally-round-the-flag literature and the research on diversionary theories of war, which employ cross-national designs.

  34. Jaroslav Tir, “Territorial Diversion: Diversionary Theory of War and Territorial Conflict,” Journal of Politics 72 (2010): 1–13.

  35. Hutchison and Gibler, “Political Tolerance and Territorial Threat”; Marc L. Hutchison, “Territorial Threats, Mobilization, and Political Participation in Africa,” forthcoming in Conflict Management and Peace Science 28 (2011).

  36. Max Weber, “The Profession and Vocation of Politics,” in Political Writings, ed. Peter Lassman and Ronald Speirs (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1994). For a more detailed discussion of the Weberian perspective on state building, see Cameron M. Thies, “Conflict, Geography, and Natural Resources: The Political Economy of State Predation in Africa,” Polity 41(2009): 465–88.

  37. Tilly, Coercion, Capital, and European States; Herbst, “War and the State in Africa”; North, Structure and Change in Economic History. Tilly and North assert that the state offers protection from outside threats or rivals in return for tax revenue.

  38. Vasquez, The War Puzzle, Chapter 4.

  39. Vasquez, The War Puzzle; Vasquez, The War Puzzle Revisited.

  40. Hetherington, Why Trust Matters; Newton, “Social and Political Trust.”

  41. Englebert, State Legitimacy and Development in Africa; Newton, “Social and Political Trust.”

  42. Newton, “Social and Political Trust,” 344; also see Mark E. Warren, Democracy and Trust (New York: Cambridge University Press, 1999).

  43. James A. Stimson, Tides of Consent: How Public Opinion Shapes American Politics (New York: Cambridge University Press, 2004); Hetherington, Why Trust Matters.

  44. See Jack Citrin, “Comment: The Political Relevance of Trust in Government,” American Political Science Review 68 (1974): 973–88; Jack Citrin and Donald Philip Green, “Presidential Leadership and the Resurgence of Trust in Government,” British Journal of Political Science 16 (1986): 431–53.

  45. Stimson, Tides of Consent; Hetherington, Why Trust Matters.

  46. See Newton, “Social and Political Trust.”

  47. Kenneth Newton, “Trust, Social Capital, Civil Society, and Democracy,” International Political Science Review 22 (2001): 201–14, at 203.

  48. Knack and Keefer, “Does Social Capital Have an Economic Payoff?”; Uslaner, The Moral Foundations of Trust; Newton, “Social and Political Trust.”

  49. Newton, “Social and Political Trust,” 34.

  50. Stimson, Tides of Consent.

  51. Stimson, Tides of Consent; Hetherington, Why Trust Matters.

  52. Hetherington, Why Trust Matters.

  53. Ridley, The Origins of Virtues; Newton, “Social and Political Trust.”

  54. Paul R. Abramson, Political Attitudes in America: Formation and Change (San Francisco: W.H. Freeman, 1983); Newton, “Trust, Social Capital, Civil Society, and Democracy”; Newton, “Social and Political Trust.”

  55. Newton, “Trust, Social Capital, Civil Society, and Democracy,” 205.

  56. Patrick James and John R. Oneal, “The Influence of Domestic and International Politics on the President's Use of Force,” Journal of Conflict Resolution 35 (1991): 307–32; Baker and Oneal, “Patriotism or Opinion Leadership?”; Chapman and Reiter, “The United Nations Security Council and the Rally 'Round the Flag Effect”; John R. Oneal and Jaroslav Tir, “Does the Diversionary Use of Force Threaten the Democratic Peace? Assessing the Effect of Economic Growth on Interstate Conflict, 1921–2001,” International Studies Quarterly 50 (2006): 755–79.

  57. Vasquez, The War Puzzle Revisited; Tir, “Territorial Diversion”; Huth, Standing Your Ground; also see Brody, Assessing the President; Zaller, The Nature and Origins of Mass Opinion.

  58. Baker and Oneal, “Patriotism or Opinion Leadership?”.

  59. Georg Simmel, Conflict (Glencoe, IL: The Free Press, 1955); Lewis A. Coser, The Functions of Social Conflict (Glencoe, IL: The Free Press, 1956); Arthur A. Stein, “Conflict and Cohesion: A Review of the Literature,” Journal of Conflict Resolution 20 (1976): 143–72.

  60. One concern in linking theories of territorial conflict to political attitudes in Africa, however, is the potentially confounding effect of the “African Peace” phenomena. According to Douglas Lemke, interstate conflict occurs at a significantly lower frequency in Africa than would be expected using traditional predictors. While studies of African conflict should consider this unique regional context, the “African Peace” does not adversely affect the ability to assess the relationship between territorial conflict and political trust. As Cameron Thies points out, although interstate conflict is lower than expected, the “threat of interstate conflict is still present in sub-Saharan Africa.” And the critical question here is not the frequency of territorial conflict relative to other regions but rather how such conflict affects domestic behavior and attitudes. The relative infrequency of such conflicts does not invalidate the claim that territorial disputes differ from non-territorial disputes in their influence on levels of trust. See Douglas Lemke, Regions of War and Peace (New York: Cambridge University Press, 2002); Thies, “Conflict, Geography, and Natural Resources,” 487.

  61. The following countries are included in my sample (survey years): Botswana (1999, 2003), Cape Verde (2002), Ghana (1999, 2002), Kenya (2003), Lesotho (2000, 2003), Malawi (1999, 2003), Mali (2001, 2002), Mozambique (2002), Namibia (1999, 2003), Nigeria (2000, 2003), Senegal (2002), South Africa (2000, 2002), Tanzania (2001, 2003), Uganda (2000, 2002), Zambia (1999, 2003), Zimbabwe (1999, 2004).

  62. The Afrobarometer uses large nationally representative samples. The sampling error of these surveys is ±3 percentage points. The Afrobarometer relies on standardized questionnaires with certain questions customized, including ethnic groups and political parties, to the particular country being administered.

  63. Bratton et al., Public Opinion, Democracy, and Market Reform in Africa.

  64. Ibid.

  65. Citrin and Green, “Presidential Leadership and the Resurgence of Trust in Government.”

  66. Bratton et al., Public Opinion, Democracy, and Market Reform in Africa.

  67. The question on presidential approval was not included in either the 1999 Ghana or 2000 Nigeria survey. Therefore, I used the average approval score for the legislature and local government to measure government satisfaction for those respondents.

  68. Hetherington, Why Trust Matters.

  69. Newton, “Trust, Social Capital, Civil Society, and Democracy,” Newton, “Social and Political Trust.”

  70. Citrin and Green, “Presidential Leadership and the Resurgence of Trust in Government”; Hetherington, Why Trust Matters.

  71. Newton, “Trust, Social Capital, Civil Society, and Democracy.”

  72. Faten Ghosn, Glenn Palmer, and Stuart Bremer, “The MID3 Data Set, 1993–2001: Procedures Coding Rules, and Description,” Conflict Management and Peace Science 21 (2004): 133–54.

  73. Vasquez, The War Puzzle Revisited.

  74. For example, to generate a five-year event count for a survey administered in 1999, disputes from 1994 to 1998 are included.

  75. Ronald Inglehart, Modernization and Postmodernization (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1997); Mark Peffley and Robert Rohrschneider, “Democratization and Political Tolerance in Seventeen Countries: A Multi-level Model of Democratic Learning,” Political Research Quarterly 56 (2003): 243–57; Bratton et al., Public Opinion, Democracy, and Market Reform in Africa.

  76. Monty G. Marshall and Keith Jaggers, Polity IV Project: Political Regime Characteristics and Transitions, 18002002 (Integrated Network for Societal Conflict Research [INSCR] Program, 2002). Available from www.cidcm.umd.edu/inscr/polity.

  77. John R. Oneal and Bruce M. Russett, “The Classical Liberals Were Right: Democracy, Interdependence, and Conflict, 1950–1985,” International Studies Quarterly 41 (1997): 267–93.

  78. Daniel N. Posner, “Measuring Ethnic Fractionalization in Africa,” American Journal of Political Science 48 (2004): 849–63.

  79. Christopher J. Anderson and Aida Paskeviciute, “How Ethnic and Linguistic Heterogeneity Influence the Prospects for Civil Society: A Comparative Study of Citizenship Behavior,” Journal of Politics 68 (2006): 783–802.

  80. Wonbin Cho, “Ethnic Fractionalization, Electoral Institutions, and Africans’ Political Attitudes,” Afrobarometer Working Paper No. 66 (2007).

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  82. Douglas A. Luke, Multilevel Modeling, Quantitative Applications in the Social Sciences (Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage Publications, 2004).

  83. Stephen W. Raudenbush, Anthony S. Bryk, Yuk Fai Cheong, Richard Congdon, and Mathilda du Toit, HLM 6. Hierarchical Linear and Nonlinear Modeling (Chicago: SSI Inc., 2004).

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  85. Gary King, Christopher J.L. Murray, Joshua A. Salomon, and Ajay Tandon, “Enhancing the Validity and Cross-Cultural Comparability of Measurement in Survey Research,” American Political Science Review 97 (2003): 567–84.

  86. Luke, Multilevel Modeling.

  87. See Inglehart, Modernization and Postmodernization; Peffley and Rohrschneider, “Democratization and Political Tolerance in Seventeen Countries.”

  88. Hutchison and Gibler, “Political Tolerance and Territorial Threat”; Hutchison, “Territorial Threats, Mobilization, and Political Participation in Africa.”

  89. Brody, Assessing the President, Chapter 3.

  90. Brody, Assessing the President; Hetherington, Why Trust Matters.

  91. Bratton et al., Public Opinion, Democracy, and Market Reform in Africa, 35.

  92. The correlation between trust in the army and trust in the courts is 0.45.

  93. Huth, Standing Your Ground.

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The author thanks Doug Gibler, Brian Krueger, Kristin Johnson, and the reviewers and Editor of Polity for their helpful comments and suggestions on earlier versions of this paper. He would also like to thank the participants at the Program for the Research Academy Conference on Territory, Rivalry, and Domestic Politics held at the University of Alabama, especially John Vasquez and Cameron Thies.

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Hutchison, M. Territorial Threat and the Decline of Political Trust in Africa: A Multilevel Analysis. Polity 43, 432–461 (2011). https://doi.org/10.1057/pol.2011.3

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