"Double Delegation: An Exploration and Construction of the UN Private Security Contractor Database" Abstract: Does the United Nation’s (UN) use of private security contractors (PSC) implicitly degrade the UN’s authority? Moreover, how extensive is the UN’s use of PSCs, and is there a way to measure that? While many have broadly argued over the merits of this practice and whether it is useful for the UN, all discuss the need to understand whether the UN uses a substantially significant number of PSCs across its various missions. In addressing these gaps in the literature, I develop a theory of the double delegation of authority that shows how the UN’s extensive use of PSCs diminishes its authority across the global domain and in the states the UN operates in. After constructing and proving the importance of acknowledging double delegation, I then constructed a novel database intended to expand what we know about how often the UN uses PSCs. My search started with NexisUni and the most extensive list of PSC names ever created, in a search modeled after Avant & Neu (2019). While my research uncovered a treasure trove of information regarding the UN’s liberal use of security contractors, more needs to be done to make this practice as transparent as possible.
“Conflict Grids and Peacekeeping: A Quasi-Experimental Search for Peace” Abstract: When, and more importantly where, do United Nations (UN) peacekeepers (PKs) keep the peace? Many have examined whether peacekeepers prevent violence against civilians, often with country-level aggregate data that fails to consider the geospatial effects of violence dispersion and assumes peacekeepers are spread evenly inside a country’s borders. This article finds that broadly, PKs are successful in reducing violence against civilians, but that the analysis must be further scrutinized before more definitive causal claims can be made. Using the ACLED’s violence data combined with the RADPKO data on UN peacekeeper movement, I employ a spatially disaggregated model analyzing when and where peacekeepers reduce violence against civilians. With a matching model designed to emulate an experimental design and a negative binomial regression, I maximize causal inference while also utilizing a data set containing twice as many years as the next largest analysis.
"Peacekeeping Effectiveness - A Measure of All the Measurements" Abstract: Are third-party peacekeepers effective at reducing violence and establishing peace producing regimes? This puzzle emerged with the end of the Cold War, as peacekeeping operations have increased exponentially in turn with the fall of the Soviet Union. Broadly speaking, those who have studied the effectiveness of peacekeeping at reducing violence in both the short and long term have come to conflicting conclusions. My article examines the roots of these conflicting results through a methodological literature review of the available quantitative articles on United Nations peacekeeping operations. This paper shows that the literature as a whole is marred by endogeneity and theoretical issues. This paper concludes that the research shows peacekeeper effectiveness in certain subsections but is underdeveloped in others. It is oftentimes impaired by methodological and terminological inconsistencies and needs to get past many of these issues before it can make more definitive causal claims about peacekeeping effectiveness.