Going Abroad: Transnational Solicitation and Contention

by Ethnopolitical Organizations1

Victor Asal2

University at Albany, State University of New York

Justin Conrad3

University of North Carolina at Charlotte

Peter White4

University of Maryland, College Park

Abstract

Existing literature on contentious political movements has generally focused on domestic political activity. Using the new Minorities at Risk Organizational Behavior-Middle East dataset (MAROB-ME), which contains organization-level data for 104 ethnopolitical organizations in the Middle East and North Africa, we analyze the decision of both violent and nonviolent organizations to engage in political activity transnationally. Among the results, we find that diaspora support is associated with transnational non-violent protest, while foreign state support and domestic repression increase the use of transnational violence. The most robust finding, however, is that participation in the domestic electoral process consistently reduces the likelihood that an organization will engage in any political activity abroad.

Word count: 13,800

1 The authors would like to thank the following individuals for their support and helpful guidance during the development of this manuscript: Michael Hanmer, Will Moore, Amy Pate, Todd Sandler, James Walsh and Jonathan Wilkenfeld.2 vasal@albany.edu3 justinconrad@uncc.edu4 pbwhite@umd.edu

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A consistent theme in the contentious politics literature is that contentious behavior is a difficult

undertaking.5 If domestic contention is difficult, there is every reason to think that coordinating

and executing contentious behavior abroad is even harder.6 Indeed, if we examine violent

contention in the form of incidents of terrorism — the type of political activity for which there is

probably the best quantitative data for both transnational and domestic activity — it becomes

apparent that there is a great deal more domestic terrorism than transnational terrorism.7 In a

recent study which differentiates transnational from domestic terrorism in the Global Terrorism

Database (GTD),8 Enders, Sandler, and Gaibulloev9 identified 12,862 transnational terrorist

incidents out of 66,383 total — or less than 20% of all incidents. Going abroad is costly, and

many political organizations simply do not have the resources to do so, even if they wanted to.10

This raises the question: which organizational factors or aspects of an organization's domestic or

transnational political environment make it more or less likely to be active abroad? More

specifically, how do different factors separately impact the choice to solicit external support or to

use violent or nonviolent contention abroad?

We argue that much of the variance in transnational activity by political organizations

can be explained as a function of two primary concepts: opportunity and threat. Some factors

increase the probability of organizations engaging in transnational activity because they offer

resources or other opportunities that can strategically benefit the organization’s cause at home.

We contend that foreign state support, diaspora support, and the ideological positions of 5Support for this research was provided by the National Science Foundation through Award #0826886 and by the Science and Technology Directorate of the US Department of Homeland Security (grant number 2008-ST-061-ST0004) through the National Consortium for the Study of Terrorism and Responses to Terrorism (START). All views expressed in this article are those of the authors and not of the agencies supporting the research. See Lichbach 1995a, 1995b, 1998; Meyer 2004; Tarrow 1998; and Tilly 2003.6 Tarrow 2005.7 LaFree and Dugan 2007.8 START 2011.9 Enders, Sandler, and Gaibulloev 2011.10 Bob 2005.

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organizations make certain types of transnational activity particularly attractive. On the other

hand, in line with Keck and Sikkink11, the domestic political environment may be such that the

organizations are “pushed” into transnational activity. We argue that political repression and

state violence targeted towards organizations, as well as competition with other political

organizations, raise the likelihood that organizations will pursue their cause internationally.

There is a well-developed literature on transnational terrorist activity12 and nonviolent

transnational activity in the social movements literature.13 There is also a range of work on non-

contentious transnational organizational behavior, focusing on non-governmental organizations,

human rights, and other activist groups,14 and international and regional organizations.15 While

these two segments of the literature do an admirable job of explaining the structural and

organizational drivers of specific types of transnational activity, as well as aspects of

organizational design and resultant efficacy and dysfunction, there are gaps in our understanding

of transnational organizational behavior. Specifically, there is a lack of theory coupled with

broad-based empirics that examines the impact of organizational and environmental threats and

opportunity factors on why strategically-minded political organizations choose to engage in

specific kinds of transnational politics: soliciting external support, engaging in non-violent

contentious politics abroad, and engaging in transnational violence. This gap in the literature can

be explained partly by limitations in cross-national data on political organizations. Quantitative

analysis of transnational terrorism has focused primarily on state-level factors,16 and the two

most prominent datasets for studying transnational terrorism, the GTD and ITERATE,17 are

11 Keck and Sikkink 1998.12 Enders and Sandler 2006.13 See Keck and Sikkink 1998; and Tarrow 2005.14 See Schmitz 1999; Cooley and Ron 2002; Mihr and Schmitz 2007; and Bob 2010.15See Abbot and Snidal 1998; Koremenos et al 2001; Barnett and Finnemore 2004; Lipson 2007; Checkel 2005.16 Enders and Sandler 2006.17 Mickolus 1982.

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focused on terrorist incidents, rather than the organizations perpetrating them. There is a parallel

limitation in the human rights literature, where, with a few recent exceptions,18 there is generally

a dearth of quantitative data on the organizational behavior of nonviolent activists.

Using the Minorities at Risk Organizational Behavior-Middle East dataset (MAROB-

ME), which contains yearly organization-level data for 104 ethnopolitical organizations in the

Middle East and North Africa, we can compare the impact of different opportunity and threat

factors on transnational activity by both violent and nonviolent organizations. While this data is

limited in the sense that it only pertains to ethnopolitical organizations in the Middle East and

North Africa, it does allow us to extend the research on transnational political behavior by

examining the impact of important variables on the different strategy choices at the

organizational level of analysis. We are aware of no large-N study of social movements that

takes this organizations-focused perspective. At the same time, it is important to note that when

it comes to political violence and the export of political violence transnationally, the Middle East

and North Africa is often an outlier — an issue that we will discuss later in this paper.

In the following section, we outline our expectations regarding the effects of different

types of threats and opportunities on transnational solicitation of support, non-violent contention,

and violent contention. We then derive a series of testable hypotheses. In the third section, we

outline our empirical strategy and describe the MAROB-ME data. The fourth section contains a

discussion of our results, including discussions of statistical and substantive significance. We

conclude with thoughts on the implications of our results, as well as suggestions for further

research.

Types of Transnational Activity

18 See Krain 2012; and Murdie and Bhasin 2011.

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As the literature on transnational activism suggests,19 and as the MAROB-ME data illustrate,

engaging in political activity abroad is less likely than doing so at home, but it is not an

insurmountable hurdle for many organizations. Not all external political activity, though,

presents the same challenge to an organization, and we distiniguish between two broad types of

activity (see Table 1): solicitation and contention, and then within contention, both violent and

non-violent activity. We believe that contentious politics should present a related but different

challenge than soliciting support. Lobbying abroad, like lobbying at home is a “…more routine

form of political challenge”20 than contention and, just like political activity in a domestic

context,21 protests and violence should be more challenging than “regular politics”

internationally. The descriptive statistics from the MAROB data support this expectation with

more than 59% of the organizational-years in the dataset seeing organizations engaged in the

transnational solicitation of support (see Table 2), which is defined as maintaining a foreign

office or meeting with foreign officials or organizations. At the same time, it is clear from the

data that transnational contention is rare. Less than four-percent of the organizational-years in the

data have an organization engaged in transnational protest activity (acts of symbolic resistance or

demonstrations), and slightly less than eight-percent have organizations engaged in transnational

violence (targeting security personnel, non-security government personnel, or civilians).

We argue that specific organizational and structural factors increase the probability that

an organization will solicit external support and/or engage in violent and nonviolent contention.

Sending representatives abroad to talk to NGOs, diaspora supporters, or foreign governments is a

potentially resource-intensive activity, but it does not demand the kind of commitment, time, or

19 See Keck and Sikkink 1999; Della Porta and Tarrow 2005; and Poloni-Staudinger 2008.20 Meyer and Minkoff 2004, 1470.21 See Tarrow 1998; and Meyer and Staggenborg 1998.

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planning as transnational contention.22 All transnational contention is difficult, but we argue (and

the descriptive statistics also suggest) that transnational violence is easier than transnational

nonviolent contention (i.e., protest). Our expectation in this regard is driven by the fact that

terrorist acts do not generally require a large number of people to carry them out, whereas non-

violent contentious politics, public demonstrations in particular, often require large numbers of

participants and/or supporters. Crenshaw,23 discussing terrorism as a “weapon of the weak”

addresses this issue when she points out that “terrorism is attractive because it is a relatively

inexpensive and simple alternative, and because its potential reward is high.”24 Similarly,

Weinstein25 finds that weak, “opportunistic” insurgent organizations are more likely to use

indiscriminate violence to coerce their populations because they are unable to secure voluntary

support. Given that transnational contention takes place far from an organization’s natural

recruitment pool and that violence can have a “powerful impact with minimal resources,”26 from

a collective action perspective,27 the intuition is clear: transnational violence should be easier,

because it requires fewer resources, and fewer people need to coordinate around and reconcile

their "free riding" incentives vis-á-vis the "public good" of contention.

Our central argument is that when an organization encounters limitations or threats to

their domestic political opportunities, they will be more likely to go abroad.28 However, when

subjected to such threats, the organization will be most likely to solicit external support and

engage in transnational violence rather than non-violent protest because these activities require

the mobilization of fewer individuals. We expect that an organization’s focus will shift to non-

22 Tarrow 2005.23 Crenshaw 1981.24 Crenshaw 1981, 387.25 Weinstein 2006.26 Pearlman 2011, 78.27 I.e., Olson 1965.28 In line with Keck and Sikkink 1998.

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violent contention when the transnational political opportunity structure is particularly amenable

to mass mobilization on behalf of the organization, such as when they have a politically active

diaspora. In contrast, more narrowly focused supporters, such as foreign states, should provide

the kind of resources that may be particularly amenable to violent activity. In either case,

external support provides organizations with additional opportunities to engage in costly

transnational political behavior.

Overall, however, we expect a lower probability of engaging in these transnational

activities if the organization is formally engaged in the political process at home. Involvement in

elections, for example, leads the organization to view the domestic political environment as less

threatening. Participation in the political process in an authoritarian or semi-authoritarian context

— which is particularly relevant to the region on which our data is focused — strongly suggests

cooptation29 and likely involves government efforts to prevent the organization from engaging in

transnational activism. And even within the context of democracies, Saideman, Lanoue,

Campenni, and Stanton30 find that more inclusive electoral systems reduce the overall probability

of ethnic protest and rebellion.

The above discussion contains within it an implicit assumption that political

organizations are, for the most part, strategically-minded, instrumentally rational actors. In other

words, we have highlighted the “logic of consequences” in organizational decision-making, as

March and Olsen refer to the approach. 31 However, while much of our theoretical framework is

clearly derived from a rational choice perspective, we do not frame our analysis in opposition to

non-rational choice theories. Indeed, in our analysis, we explicitly acknowledge that since

29 Gandhi 2008.30 Saideman, Lanoue, Campenni, and Stanton 2002.31 March and Olsen 1998.

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organizations face varying levels of grievances and are motivated by different types of

ideologies, the identity and norms of an organization should also have an important impact on

their behavior. However, there is an important body of work whose contributions we do not

incorporate directly into our analysis — such as those highlighting how history and normative

frameworks;32 organizational "pathologies;"33 and international socialization pressures34 can

influence the decisions that organizations make. We see our findings as being complementary to

this body of literature and believe that future research should examine how the "logic of

appropriateness"35 may serve as a lens through which organizations view the threat and

opportunity drivers of transnational contention. However, empirical constraints preclude us from

examining these perspectives here.36 Below, we discuss our specific expectations of how

organizational and structural factors may influence ethnopolitical organizations' expected utility

of engaging in the three forms of transnational political activity.

OPPORTUNITIES

One important reason why organizations choose to engage in transnational political activity is to

capitalize on opportunities and resources likely to strengthen their effectiveness at home. We

argue that foreign state support and diaspora support both create incentives for transnational

activity, though they have stronger effects on certain types of activity. We also argue that having

32March and Olsen 1998, 954-5.33 See Barnett and Finnemore (2004, Ch. 1) for a discussion of suboptimal behavior in international organizations as a result of "bureaucratic culture."34 Checkel 2005.35 March and Olsen 1998.36 The MAROB data provides impressive breadth of coverage across the Middle East and North Africa and a high level of detail for observable organizational characteristics and behavior and the domestic and international structure in which these organizations operate, which makes it particularly well-suited to test our threats and opportunities framework. This data is not well-suited, however, to testing the role of socialization and normative frames in organizational behavior. In-depth organizational narratives or discourse analysis may provide a better route approach to these questions

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a primarily religious ideology increases the potential benefits from transnational activity, while a

separatist ideology reduces them.

Foreign State Support

Domestic political organizations which receive support from foreign sources have long been

thought to enjoy an advantage over other organizations, as such support leads to a “disparity in

capabilities.”37 From a simple resource-based perspective, the costs of engaging in various

foreign political activities should be reduced ceteris paribus when an organization receives

external support. Foreign states also have powerful incentives to see the organizations they

support engage in transnational political activities to further their own interests.

At a minimum, such activities should include, but should not be limited to, solicitation of

support abroad. There is an important conceptual difference between the solicitation of external

support and its actual receipt. An organization may ask for funds and technical support from a

foreign sponsor, but the sponsor need not provide it. Inversely, a sponsor may seek out an

organization to whom they wish to provide funds and technical support for their own ends

without the organization having first asked. Thus, we do not believe that it is a tautology to say

that we expect that organizations which receive foreign support are more likely to ask for foreign

support.38

Further, while we expect that solicitation of external support is comparatively less

resource-intensive than transnational contentious politics, it is not without costs. Projecting an

organizational presence abroad implicitly requires a certain level of financial and logistical

resources. Such activity should be a less costly endeavor if an organization already receives

assistance from foreign sources. We also anticipate that the receipt of foreign support in one year 37 Regan 2002.38 This distinction between asking for, and receiving, support is supported by the MAROB-ME data. The pair-wise correlation coefficient of an external support-seeking binary indicator and one of foreign support is only .305.

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will motivate the organization to maintain a foreign presence close to the source of that support

in order to lobby for further support or, at a minimum, ensure the continued flow of support at

extant levels in the next. Foreign support should be associated with continued external

solicitation. Indeed, the complicated network of foreign state-support for political organizations

and insurgencies during the Cold War made such solicitation almost inevitable.39

In terms of contentious politics, as the literature suggests,40 foreign sponsors may have an

acute interest in generating instability in other states, which can be accomplished at a relatively

low cost (to the sponsoring state) through non-violent or violent contention by sponsored

organizations. Indeed, scholars have provided overwhelming evidence of an empirical link

between foreign state support and the use of violence. Outside financing has been shown to

increase the durability and impact of insurgencies,41 prolong civil wars,42 and increase the

survivability of terrorist organizations.43 Elbadawi and Sambanis44 demonstrate that foreign

intervention in ethnically-based conflicts, in particular, is likely to increase the duration of such

conflicts. Although much of this research focuses on domestic forms of contention, they all

assume that foreign state support reduces the costs of coordinating political and military

activities by increasing organizational capabilities and resources.

But why might state support increase the probability of organizations engaging in these

activities abroad? Assuming that foreign sponsors want the organization that they are supporting

to succeed in their political goals, extraterritorial mobilization may bolster their chances.45 In

particular, transnational advocacy and transnational militant activities offer the advantage of

39 Because solicitation, and even contention abroad, may be an artifact of the Cold War, we control for this possibility in our empirical analysis.40 See Byman et al. 2001; Hovil and Weker 2005; Conrad 2011.41 Byman et al. 2001.42 See Regan 2000; and Regan 2002.43 Carter 2012.44 Elbadawi and Sambanis 2000.45 Salehyan 2009.

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putting the organization beyond “any one state’s legal, political and coercive reach,”46 and allows

the organization to draw on human and material resources that may not be available in their

home state. Indeed, the Bahrain Freedom Movement was able to use Iranian backing to maintain

a foreign presence from which they were able to publically critique Bahrain's Sunni-dominated

government outside the reach of its security services.47 Furthermore, this foreign presence

allowed the organization to more easily publicize acts of repression against Shi'ites in Bahrain

through sympathetic NGOs,48 and to also meet with British government officials .49

Recent work has also focused on the link between foreign state support and transnational

terrorism, as interstate disputes increase incentives for terrorist organizations and their state

sponsors to launch attacks abroad.50 Iranian support of Lebanese Hezbollah allowed that group to

pursue such violent foreign action as the 1992 attack on the Israeli Embassy in Buenos Aires,

which killed 29 people, and the 1994 attack on the Asociación Mutual Israelita Argentina in the

same city, which killed 84. In both cases, it is probable that Iranian support was integral to

Hezbollah’s ability to use violence abroad.51 Additionally, Hezbollah's capacity to fire missiles

into Israel during the 2006 Hezbollah-Israel conflict was due primarily to Iranian technical

support.52 Accordingly, we expect that foreign state support provides organizations with

increased opportunity to engage in all political activity abroad, but that the effect will be greater

for violent activity.

46 Salehyan 2009, 34.47 Darwish 1999, 84.48 Stork 1997, 66.49 Louër 2008, 53.50 See Conrad 2011; and Findley, Young, and Piazza 2012.51 Norton 2009,78-7952 Cordesman 2006; Katzman 2010; Norton 2009, 138.

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Hypothesis 1: Ethnic political organizations which receive support from a foreign state will be

more likely to solicit external support and engage in contentious activities abroad. This effect

will be greater for violent contentious politics than non-violent.

Diaspora Support

Support from the diaspora or close kindred groups is expected to increase an organization’s

resource base. While living abroad, many ethnic communities continue to identify with their kin

and maintain participation in political affairs at home.53 An example of this phenomenon has

been the continued financial and political support of the Western European Kurds for Kurdish

separatists in the Middle East.54 As with state support, sponsorship by the diaspora serves to

increase the resources and capabilities of recipient organizations.

Solicitation is a natural activity that should be correlated with diaspora support, as

backing from the wider ethnic community gives an organization a resource advantage in

establishing foreign offices and making foreign contacts. Indeed, the organizations may find that

conducting their business abroad is more efficient, since the organization’s home government

may restrict their domestic political activities.55 Diaspora support has resulted in increased aid for

Palestinian groups and has facilitated fundraising activity that might not be possible in the home-

country environment for groups such as Hamas.56 Similar to the logic behind the expected effect

of foreign state support, we expect that diaspora support will motivate organizations to maintain

presences abroad in order to cultivate and maintain that support. Diaspora support can also

provide opportunities for launching non-violent protest abroad, such as through the establishment

53 See Sheffer 1994; Albert et al. 2001; Shain and Barth 2003; and Sheffer 2003.54 Gurr 2000, 91. See also Levitt and Dehesa 2003,; and Brand 2006.55 Salehyan 2007.56 Sheffer 2006; Berman 2003, 8.

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of media outlets and advocacy campaigns, or through public support of domestically banned

political organizations.57 For this reason, we expect that diaspora support will be particularly

likely to increase non-violent transnational contention.

Of course, some segment of the diaspora may also support the more violent activities of

these organizations. Diaspora support has been especially important in the areas of propaganda

and financial support for violent insurgencies.58 There is a strong argument that diaspora support

should increase violence in the home country and we believe the same logic should also apply to

violence abroad. 59 Indeed, some members of the Palestinian diaspora have explicitly supported

the PLO, Hamas, and other militant organizations in transnational terrorist campaigns and cross-

border raids.60 And in some cases, members of a diaspora may carry out the violence themselves,

as was the case with the March 2005 London suicide attacks , which were carried out by British

members of the South Asian Muslim diaspora on behalf of a transnational militant organization.

We do not expect, however, that the impact of diaspora support should be as large on violence

abroad because the potential costs of supporting transnational violence are higher than

supporting violence in the home country. Indeed, diasporas are likely to support violence in their

home (and not host) country precisely because they “do not suffer the consequences of violence,

nor are they in day-to-day contact and accommodation with ‘the enemy.”61 Additionally,

supporting violent contention abroad is much more likely to lead to backlashes and repercussions

against the diaspora, as they may be viewed as supporters (or perpetrators) of violence that now

threaten other communities.62 We therefore expect that diaspora support increases the likelihood

of transnational activity, but that the effect will be greater for non-violent activity.57 Adamson 2006.58 See Byman 2001; and Wayland 2004.59 Salehyan 2009.60 Byman 2001, 3, 41, 88; see also Berman 2003, 15.61 Collier et al. 2003, 74. 62 Lickel et al. 2006; and Disha et al. 2011

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Hypothesis 2: Ethnic political organizations which receive support from their ethnic diaspora

will be more likely to solicit external support and engage in contentious activities abroad. This

effect will be greater for non-violent contentious politics than violent.

Separatist Ideology

If an ethnopolitical organization espouses its ideology transnationally, it is likely that there are

potential international sponsors or "constituents" whose preferences are close to the group's. This

represents a more favorable transnational political environment for the organization — they are

more likely to receive support63 and are better able to market themselves abroad — and thus, they

should be more likely to do so.64 Additionally, employing an inclusive transnational ideology

means that the organization is more likely to have what Salehyan, Gleditsch, and Cunningham65

term, a "transnational constituency," which is receptive to their appeals or willing to mobilize on

their behalf. This should lead to the group seeing more opportunities for support-seeking and

taking advantage of those opportunities. Also, a transnational ideology may represent an

effective use of "global issues frames"66 and serve to open up the political opportunity space for

the group by including more "conscience constituents,"67 who may not share the group's

ethnicity.

Given this logic, we expect less transnational activity from groups espousing a separatist

ideology. An ideology that advocates for the creation of a separate state for an ethnic group

should exert a broadly negative effect on the likelihood of an ethnopolitical organization

63 In their 2011 article, Salehyan, Gleditsch, and Cunningham, (hereafter SGC), find that rebel organizations that hold a transnational ideology, including a religious or Marxist ideology, are much more likely to receive external support.64 See Tarrow 2005; and Bob 2005.65 SGC 2011.66 Tarrow 2005.67 McCarthy and Zald 1973, 1977.

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soliciting external support or engaging in transnational contention, because as a potential

marketing tool,68 it is inherently narrow (except within the context of a diaspora community,

which we discuss above).

Our logic is driven by Bob's69 insight that social movements are competing in a global

"marketplace" for foreign support and Saideman's70 and Davis and Moore's71 findings that

transnational support for ethnic groups in conflict is primarily driven by co-ethnic ties between

sponsoring states and potential recipients. We extrapolate from this that a publically espoused

ideology focusing only on creating a new state for an ethnic group will have limited appeal for

those who are not members of that ethnic group.72 Assuming that the separatist ethnopolitical

group is a strategic actor, the group will focus its appeals on states or organizations where its

ethnic group has significant influence, which likely represents a more limited population of

potential sponsors than those with a particular political or religious orientation. We expect, then,

that groups with a separatist ideology will be less likely to solicit external support, because they

will have fewer opportunities to do so. It should be noted that there are findings in the civil war

literature that separatist conflicts tend to last longer or be more resistant to peaceful resolution, 73

and this suggests that the parties to these conflicts would more readily seek outside resources

given the exhausting nature of the conflicts. However, we believe that the severity of such

conflicts will compel separatists to either limit their foreign appeals to only coethnics — a more

68 Tarrow 2005.69 Bob 2005.70 Saideman's 2001, 2002.71 Davis and Moore 1997.72 This assumption is not without challenges — for example Brysk (1996) finds that indigenous groups in Latin America have been able to leverage their identity into effective solicitations of outside support.73 See Toft 2003; Fearon 2003; and Walter 2009.

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probable source of support,74 given resource constraints — or to resort to a more compelling

transnational ideology.75

Relatedly, we expect to see less transnational contention by separatist groups, both

violent and non-violent, because such organizations will have difficulty in attracting "conscience

constituents"76 to their banner, thereby limiting their capacity abroad. Since transnational

contention is intended partly to raise awareness among potential supporters, we also expect fewer

incentives for transnational contention because separatist groups will anticipate that such efforts

will have a smaller impact, given the inherently limited appeal of their message. They will

choose to expend their resources elsewhere across all types of transnational activity.

Hypothesis 3: Ethnic political organizations which primarily espouse a separatist ideology will

be less likely to solicit external support or engage in violent or non-violent contentious politics

than non-separatist organizations.

Religious Ideology

In examining the role of ideology on the decision to engage in political behavior abroad,

we also focus on religion, given its particular salience in the Middle East and North Africa.77

Like purely separatist organizations, religiously-minded groups may choose to only make claims

regarding religion that pertain to their home state or their ethnic group, but a broader religious

ideology potentially gives them access to a wider transnational ideological base.78 In line with

scholars of social movements who emphasize the importance of framing as a mechanism of

74 In line with Saideman 2001, 2002; and Davis and Moore 1997.75 In line with Bob 2005.76 McCarthy and Zald 1973, 1977.77 See, for example, Hourani 1991 and Kepel 2003.78 Tarrow 2005.

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contentious politics and of the growth of social movements,79 we believe that ethnic grievances

can be framed in religious terms which serve to give them a meaning that is compelling and

comprehensible to a broader audience of potential supporters.80

Furthermore, transnational religious networks can assist in the dissemination of new

tactics and technologies for contention81 — including new violent strategies, such as suicide

bombing.82 Broadly, we conceive of religious ideology as not being exogenously assigned to

groups, rather we assume, in line with Chandra83 and Posner84 that actors possess multiple

identities which can be activated strategically. We see a religious ideology as one such identity.

With our emphasis on identity as a variable, we focus on its instrumental and strategic use rather

than its driving or shaping organizational activity.85 Beyond support-seeking, we expect

religious ideology to be associated with more violent than non-violent contention, because

religious organizations are better able to demand extreme sacrifices from their members, and

subsequently, are more likely to engage in violence than non-religious organizations.86

Hypothesis 4: Ethnic political organizations which espouse religious ideologies will be more

likely to solicit external support and engage in contentious politics abroad than non-religious

organizations. This effect will be greater for violent activity than non-violent.

79See Snow and Benford 1988; Tarrow 1994; McAdam 1996.80 See also Bob 2005, 2007.81 Tarrow 1994, Ch. 12.82 Horowitz 2010.83 Chandra 2004.84 Posner 2005.85 For work on the capacity of identity and norms to shape organizational behavior and capacity, see, for example, Lipson 2007; Paris 2003; Hurd 2008.86 Iannaccone and Berman 2006.

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THREATS

Beyond the opportunity drivers of transnational activity, organizations may also engage in

transnational activity if they encounter significant domestic threats. We argue that targeted and

general repression by the state directly threatens an organization and its constituents, increasing

the probability that they will consider taking their fight abroad. Direct conflict with other

organizations also indicates an increased level of competitiveness in the political marketplace,

which gives the organization an incentive to distinguish itself by engaging in activity elsewhere.

Finally, insomuch as engagement in the domestic political process contributes to the relative

long-term security of an organization, participation in elections reduces the benefits of

transnational activity.

Participates in Elections

A traditional political opportunity structure87 or resource mobilization perspective88 might

anticipate that electoral activity would be strongly associated with a more open political

environment, making it easier for organizations to mobilize abroad. The literature that focuses

specifically on transnational contention, though, finds that external contention is actually related

to a closed domestic opportunity structure.89 Keck and Sikkink90 call this the “boomerang effect,”

and they argue that organizations are most likely to work to create transnational ties and solicit

external support internationally when “channels between domestic groups and their governments

are blocked or hampered… [and] …where the target is a state’s domestic policies or

behavior….”91 Generally, we expect that organizations that are involved in elections have less of

a need to go abroad, because they are not as constrained or threatened in their local political

87 Tarrow 1994.88 See Tilly 1978; and McAdam 1982.89 See Della Porta and Tarrow 2005; and Poloni-Staudinger 2008.90 Keck and Sikkink 1998.91 Keck and Sikkink 1998, 14.

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context as other organizations might be. And while some Middle Eastern ethnopolitical

organizations, such as Hezbollah, which are active internationally, are involved in elections,92 we

do not believe that this is a pattern among ethnopolitical organizations in the region.

However, in the Middle East and North Africa (MENA), it is important to qualify the

direct tie that is often made between open political environments and electoral activity. For many

countries in the region, rather than indicating an open political environment, electoral activity

captures the effective "channeling" and management of political opposition by "competitive

authoritarian" regimes.93 In such cases, the regimes will likely couple elections with coercive

attempts to block non-state actors' access to outside resources and expertise. A recent example of

this can be seen in Egypt, where the post-Mubarak military regime has allowed opposition

parties, such as the Muslim Brotherhood, to compete in elections, but has also clamped down on

foreign democracy activists and those Egyptians believed to be connected with them.94 Another

mechanism through which electoral politics in a non-democratic context can draw organizations

away from external political activity is by offering organizations an avenue to power (and the

related spoils of office-holding).95

While elections are thus not a reliable identifier of an open political environment in the

region, there are other reasons to assume that organizations involved in elections will be less

likely to go abroad. Electoral campaigning requires a major investment of resources even in fully

democratic countries,96 and may be even more expensive for the candidates in countries that are

92 Norton 200993 See Gandhi 2008; and Levitsky and Way 2010.94 Londono, Ernesto and William Wan. 2/5/2012. "Egypt names Americans charged in NGO probe; Sam LaHood among those facing criminal charges." The Washington Post. http://www.washingtonpost.com/world/egypt-to-prosecute-americans-in-ngo-probe/2012/02/05/gIQAQRderQ_story.html?tid=pm_pop. Accessed 7/15/2012.95 See Lust 2009; and Magaloni 2006.96 See Golden and Chang 2001; and Sussman and Galizio 2003.

19

not fully democratic.97 We expect that organizations involved in electoral politics will have less

to invest in external activity and thus should be less likely to do so.

Because of resource costs, and an increased likelihood of cooptation, we expect that in

MENA during the period covered by our data (1980-2004),98 ethnopolitical organizations that

run candidates for office will be less likely to engage in transnational activity. In line with the

literature's accounts of incumbent machinations in the lead-up to elections in authoritarian

contexts,99 we expect this effect to be even stronger in election years.

Hypothesis 5: Ethnic political organizations which engage in electoral politics will be less likely

to solicit external support and engage in contentious politics abroad. This effect will be stronger

in electoral years in which the organization puts forward candidates for office.

General and Targeted Repression

Conversely, political repression and state violence pose direct threats to an organization’s

existence and its ability to pursue its cause. While much of the literature on the impact of

repression and discrimination on political mobilization and dissent suggests that discrimination

does not have a substantive impact, others have argued that it is a key factor.100 There is a

growing body of work, however, which uses different measures of discrimination, and suggests

that governmental discrimination and repression against ethnic groups indeed leads to increased

mobilization and violence.101 The literatures on nonviolent transnational activism and on

transnational terrorism and insurgency both suggest that repression at home will lead to

97 See Lust 2009; and Mietzner 2007.98 According to the Polity IV data, only two countries in our data can consistently be categorized as democracies: Israel and Cyprus. (Marshall and Jaggers 2010).99 See, for example, Magaloni 2006.100 See Collier and Hoeffler 2004; Fearon and Laitin 2003; and Gurr 2000.101 See Cederman, Wimmer, and Min 2010; and Regan and Norton 2005.

20

mobilization abroad.102 While the logic of violent and nonviolent contention is rarely examined

in a synthetic fashion,103 both literatures suggest that repression should act as an impetus for

organizations to be active outside of their borders.104 Crenshaw, for example, argues that because

they faced challenging and oppressive opponents at home, Palestinian organizations were

motivated to launch terrorist attacks abroad,105 and Bob106 cites similar motivations for the

transnational activity of the Ogoni of Nigeria. As discussed earlier, Keck and Sikkink make

perhaps the most well-known theoretical argument about this dynamic in their description of the

"boomerang effect."107 While Keck and Sikkink108 explore the repression/discrimination driver of

transnational contention by nonviolent organizations, Bob109 and Arqiuilla and Ronfeldt110 point

out that the same logic should apply to violent organizations as well. Furthermore, discrimination

and repression against the constituent group can be seen as both a motivator to seek outside

support but also a tool for soliciting that support. Indeed, Kurdish activists claiming to represent

Kurds discriminated against and repressed in a variety of countries in the Middle East have for

years sought refuge and support from external sources, and have had particular success in

international fundraising .111 Thus, we expect government discrimination against ethnic groups

will make it more likely that organizations identifying with these groups will pursue

transnational political activity broadly.

102 See Abadie 2004; Bob 2005; Feldmann and Perala 2004; Keck and Sikkink 1998; Piazza 2006; Tarrow 2001; and Walsh and Piazza 2010.103 Exceptions include Arquilla and Ronfeldt 2001.104 See Bob 2005 ;and Keck and Sikkink 1998.105 Crenshaw 1981.106 Bob 2005.107 Keck and Sikkink 1998, 14.108 Keck and Sikkink 1998.109 Bob 2005.110 Arqiuilla and Ronfeldt 2001.111 Gurr 2000, 91.

21

Hypothesis 6a: Ethnic political organizations claiming to represent an ethnic group that is

subjected to higher levels of discrimination or repression by their home government are more

likely to solicit external support and engage in contentious politics abroad.

What the literature has not addressed to date, though, is if there is likely to be a difference

between the effects of repression of an ethnic group in general and violence directed specifically

at an organization representing that ethnic group. We believe that there are important differences

between these two types of repression. While general repression of the constituent group creates

an incentive for broad mobilization, which is then impacted by the opportunities and resources of

the organization,112 the same is not necessarily true of targeted state violence against the

organization, which may elicit a narrower response. External nonviolent mobilization is

comparatively difficult,113 and we this to be the case because it requires a greater number of

committed activists than violent contention. Thus, if state violence against an organization —

rather than the constituent group — pushes an organization to mobilize abroad, we expect that

the effect should be larger on violent contention than on other kinds of transnational contention.

Hypothesis 6b: Ethnic political organizations which are subject to targeted violent state

repression are more likely to solicit external support and engage in contentious politics abroad.

This effect will be greater for violent activity than nonviolent.

Interorganizational Conflict

Finally, threats may arise not only from governments, but from other political

organizations. We expect that groups that are experiencing even low levels of conflict with other

112 Gurr 2000.113 Tarrow 2005.

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organizations will be more likely to seek external support, because of exacerbated security

concerns. Additionally, conflict between sub-state actors will be indicative of a weak state

environment in which ethnic groups and sub-state organizations are analogous to states in an

anarchic interstate system.114 Thus, concerns for their own security will drive them to do

whatever they can to increase their probability of survival — this will include seeking outside

aid.

In terms of transnational contention, we expect that inter-organizational conflict will

encourage an ethnopolitical organization to engage in transnational violence, because of a desire

to distinguish themselves from the groups with which they are implicitly competing. Mannes et

al have argued that inter-organizational competition was one of the elements that drove

Hezbollah to transnational attacks, conditional on the intensity of the competition.115 Our

expectations regarding the impact of inter-organizational conflict is also is informed by the

"outbidding" logic found in terrorism literature, whereby a group engages in higher levels of

violence in order to set itself apart as being more capable of pursuing the constituent group's

goals in the eyes of their domestic audience.116 We expect a similar, but weaker, effect to exist

for non-violent transnational contention, given that it represents activity that indicates to the

target audience the organization's commitment, but it does less to mark the organization as a

"zealot"117 than violent activity.

There is likely a certain threshold of inter-organizational conflict which makes

transnational activity infeasible. In other words, a high degree of inter-organizational conflict has

the potential to threaten an organization’s existence so acutely that the organization will focus all

114 Posen 1993.115 Mannes et al 2008, 42.116 See Bloom 2005; and Kydd and Walter 2006.117 Kydd and Walter 2006.

23

of its resources on confronting the immediate threat at home. But we assume that most conflict

between organizations does not reach this threshold, making transnational activity strategically

beneficial to the organization in cases of such competition.118

Hypothesis 7: Ethnic political organizations which are engaged in inter-organizational conflict

are more likely to solicit external support and to engage in contentious politics abroad. This

effect will be greater for violent activity than nonviolent.

Data

The primary dataset that we use to test our hypotheses is the Minorities at Risk-Organizational

Behavior Dataset-Middle East (MAROB), which includes organization-level, yearly data for

ethnically-based political organizations in the Middle East and North Africa from 1980-2004. In

order to test our hypothesis for the effect of ethnic group-level political discrimination, we also

use data from the Minorities at Risk (MAR) project. The use of these data presents both

challenges and opportunities given the hypotheses being tested.

A key strength of the MAROB data is that its unit of analysis is the organization-year.

Given that our theory is about the strategic decisions of organizations and is informed by the

broader social movements literature, this makes it a particularly appropriate dataset. Further, the

MAROB data contains a broad range of specific behavioral and structural variables that map

closely onto our hypotheses, eliminating the need to use ill-fitting proxy variables in our models.

Essentially, by relying on organizational data, we limit the number of strong assumptions

required to move from theory building to empirical testing and avoid a possible ecological

fallacy — extrapolating organizational-level characteristics from country-level or ethnic group-118 The data supports this assumption. In the ordinal variable measuring severity of inter-organizational conflict, less than 3% of observations are coded at the highest level of inter-organizational conflict — “protracted, large-scale interorganizational violence.”

24

level data. We are unaware of any other dataset that provides the same opportunity to examine a

range of transnational strategy choices by political organizations who are engaged in either

violence, nonviolent protest or traditional politics (the only comparable dataset, NAVCO 1.1.,

looks at campaigns and not organizational years, and it only includes major campaigns that relate

to secessions, regime change, or occupations).119

Despite these strengths, it is important to note possible limitations of the data: while the

dataset includes a broad representation of organizations and ethnic groups in the region,120 results

obtained from our empirical tests may not be generalizable outside of the region. When it comes

to political violence and the export of political violence across national boundaries, the Middle

East and North Africa is a particularly unique region. Indeed, cross-national analysis of terrorism

demonstrates that in recent years, the Middle East has played host to the greatest number of

deadly terrorist attacks.121 At least when it comes to terrorism and, more specifically,

transnational terrorism, it is important to recognize that the Middle East is an outlier and we need

to be careful of generalizing our conclusions until further data is available.

Also, given that our analysis is limited to ethnically-based political organizations,

generalization to social movements more generally should be done cautiously. We also make use

of the ethnic group-level MAR data in order to test our hypothesis regarding the effect of state

discrimination and repression against the broader ethnic group. And while MAR has come under

criticism for possible selection bias,122 we do not feel that our use of the data in testing

Hypothesis 6a is vulnerable to this criticism, given that all of our hypotheses are about the

119 Chenoweth and Stephan 2011.120 The MAROB-ME data includes organization-year observations on almost 120 ethnopolitical organizations representing 22 ethnic groups. (APW)121 Lafree et al. (2010, 633) note that from 1970-2006, the Middle East saw a greater number of fatal terrorist attacks than any other region; however, they note that it loses its first-place status when the analysis excludes post-2003 attacks in Iraq. See also Enders and Sandler 2006; Campos and Gassebner 2009.122 Fearon 2003.

25

behavior of ethnopolitical organizations that have already been mobilized, not the potential for

various ethnic groups to form organizations.

Dependent Variables

All of our hypotheses are concerned with the effect of various organizational characteristics and

aspects of the domestic and transnational political opportunity structure on three organizational

behaviors: soliciting external support and engaging in either violent or non-violent transnational

contention. To correspond to these three behaviors, we developed three dependent variables from

the MAROB-ME data. We operationalized soliciting external support by turning to one of the

"organizational strategy variables" in the data, which measures the degree to which an

organization "maintains...foreign offices, or…the leadership meets with foreign officials or

foreign organizations."123 We collapsed this ordinal scheme into a binary variable, because we

are interested in the organization's basic decision to solicit external support. For transnational

contention, we collapsed MAROB’s ordinal scheme measuring the scale of organizational

protest activity outside its country of origin into a binary variable coded as 1 if the group

organized any protests outside its home country. This can include acts of symbolic resistance like

a walk-out or sit-in, or formal demonstrations, including large scale protests. We followed a

similar logic for transnational violence, deriving a binary variable coded as 1 if the organization

engaged in any political violence outside of its home country in a given year. While our binary

coding schemes do not allow us to examine variation in the scale or frequency of activity by

organizations, they are appropriate for our purposes given that we are concerned with an

ethnopolitical organization's decision to go abroad, not the scale of their activity once they have

123 Asal, Pate, and Wilkenfeld 2008, hereafter "APW."

26

made that decision.124 In all of our models, we advance the dependent variables one year to

account for possible endogeneity.

Independent Variables

H1 predicts that an organization is more likely to solicit external support or engage in

contentious politics abroad when it receives support from a foreign state. To test this hypothesis,

we included in our models a binary indicator coded as 1 if the organization received either

financial, humanitarian, military, or political support125 from a foreign state in a given year. H2

makes a similar prediction regarding the effect of diaspora support, and accordingly we include

MAROB's binary indicator for diaspora support.

Regarding ideology, H3 predicts a negative effect across the models for separatism. We

included in our models a binary indicator coded as 1 if the organization's primary political

grievance is related to "creating a separate state for the group or revanchist change in border of

state." It should also be noted that MAROB codes branches of organizations located abroad and

that have a large measure of independence as separate organizations,126 and that these branches

are often capable of independent transnational action. It is therefore necessary to address the

question of how to treat the "separatist" ideology of such organizations. In line with the MAROB

coding, the "home" branch of the organization was allowed to be coded as separatist, whereas

foreign branches were not, because the foreign branch, based in another country, is not

advocating for separation from the country in which they are based. In the context of our

124 Nonetheless, we analyzed the same models presented below, but kept the ordinal versions of the dependent variables. The results are largely comparable to those presented here. The most notable difference is that when analyzing levels of activity rather than the decision to engage in a specific activity, state violence targeting the organization has a positive and significant effect in all three cases (as opposed to only on the use of transnational violence). Additionally, diaspora support has a significant and positive effect on violence in one-tailed tests.125 The MAROB coding considers "political support" to include election or ceasefire monitors or the mediation of talks between the organization and its home state government (APW).126 In the MAROB data, there are only Palestinian organizations that fit into this category.

27

hypotheses, we are interested in capturing the negative impact on transnational activity of a

separatist ideology in its domestic context — rather than the impact of a group in one country

advocating for a separate homeland in another country — which inherently invokes international

actors. An example of this is Fatah's branch in Lebanon, though it supports a separate Palestinian

homeland from Israel, it is not coded as "separatist," because they do not desire an independent

homeland from Lebanon.127 To code Fatah-Lebanon as separatist and then run our models with

this coding scheme could introduce a problem of tautology: we would be measuring the impact

on transnational activity of having the primary goal of going abroad to found a new state.

Conversely to the expected impact of a separatist ideology, H4 predicts that an

organization is more likely to solicit external support or engage in contentious politics abroad

when it ascribes to a religious ideology. To test this hypothesis, we include in our models

MAROB's binary indicator of whether the organization espouses an ideology which emphasizes

the "incorporation of religion into public life"128 in a given year. Given the regional focus of the

data, we believe that this variable captures Islamism primarily.

H5 predicts that an organization will be less likely to solicit external support or engage in

contentious politics abroad when it participates in electoral politics and that this effect will be

stronger in election years. To test this hypothesis, we included in our models a trichotomous

indicator of electoral activity, coded as 1 if the organization "has members in office or has

announced intention to run members for office," but it is not an election year, and coded as 2 if

the organization "has members running for office and it is an election year."129

To test the effect of ethnic group-level repression and discrimination suggested by H6a,

we include in our models the "Political Discrimination Index" from the MAR data. The index

127 If it did argue for a separate Palestinian state in Lebanon, then it would be coded as separatist.128 APW.129 APW.

28

measures the degree of political discrimination that the home state government has subjected the

ethnic group to in a given year and contains a 0-4 coding scheme that covers ranges of state

behaviors towards the group, ranging from an absence of discrimination to "formal exclusion

and/or recurring repression."130 H6b predicts that organizations subjected to targeted, violent

repression by the home government will be more likely to go abroad for support or to engage in

contentious politics. Accordingly, we add to our models a binary variable indicating whether or

not the organization was subjected to lethally violent repression in a given year.131

H7 predicts that inter-organizational conflict will increase an organization's propensity to

seek external support and to go abroad to engage in contention. We therefore include in our

models a binary indicator from the MAROB data that is coded as 1 if the organization is engaged

in conflict with another non-governmental actor in the state in a given year.132

Methodology and Results

Given that our dependent variables are dichotomous, logistic regression is the standard approach.

However, while solicitation abroad occurs frequently in the dataset, both types of contention

abroad account for a relatively small number of observations. Table 2 displays the frequency

distribution of each of the dependent variables in the full MAROB dataset. As King and Zeng133

have pointed out, logistic regression may underestimate the probability of a binary event

occurring when the event is especially rare in the population. To account for this potential bias of

the conventional logit approach, we also analyze the contention models (protest and violence)

using rare events logistic regression with prior correction. The results of both the logit and rare

events logit analyses are included in Table 2. As the table indicates, there are no substantial 130 APW.131 APW.132 APW.133 King and Zeng 2001a; 2001b.

29

differences in the results of the two approaches, so we are comfortable interpreting empirical

support for our hypotheses based on the results of the standard logistic regressions.134

Additionally, while a multinomial logistic regression provides a seemingly attractive

option for modeling the unordered strategy choice of organizations, we feel that such an

approach is ill-advised, given the large number of strategy choices that would need to be

modeled. Specifically, given that there is no a priori reason to assume that in a given year an

organization cannot engage in more than one type of transnational activity, we would need to

include not only four "choices" (each transnational activity plus a base category of no activity),

but would also need to include each possible combination of two of the three choices as well as

all three being pursued in a given year (eight possible choices). Given the rarity in the data of an

organization pursuing more than one type of transnational activity in one year — let alone three

types — it is unlikely that the data would support such a model. We do, however, address the

possibility that the decisions to engage in different types of activity are not independent of each

other in bivariate probit model, discussed in the section below.

Our first two hypotheses expect positive relationships between external support (foreign

state and diaspora) and all of our dependent variables. The results in Table 3 indicate that foreign

state support significantly increases the probability of solicitation, non-violent, and violent

contention, while diaspora support only significantly influences non-violent contention. We also

hypothesized that foreign state support will have a greater effect on violent than non-violent

contention. This is indeed the case, as foreign state support increases the probability of violence

by six percentage points, while it increases the probability of protest by three percentage

points.135 State support therefore influences violence to a greater degree, which suggests that our

134 In all models, standard errors are clustered by organization.135 Based on predicted probabilities when all other independent variables are set at their observed values (see Hanmer and Kalkin 2013).

30

general logic regarding the comparative ease of violence is supported vis-á-vis foreign state

support. It is plausible, however, that the effect of foreign state support may be an artifact of the

Cold War, and that this drives the observable effect on our dependent variables. In robustness

checks, we analyzed models controlling for the Cold War, and the results indicate that the effect

of state support on solicitation and the use of non-violent and violent contention is still

significant and in the expected direction.

Similarly, we expect that diaspora support will have a positive effect on each of our

dependent variables, and that the effect will be greater for non-violent contention. The results

suggest, in fact, that diaspora support only has a significant effect on the use of transnational

non-violent contention. While our hypothesis is not supported regarding solicitation or violent

activity, our broader expectation regarding the suitability of a politically active diaspora to

increasing non-violent contention is supported. Diaspora support seems to have no impact on

either solicitation or the use of violence. Taken together, it appears that foreign state support is

useful to engage in any transnational political activity, while diaspora support is critical to the

decision to protest abroad.

Our next set of hypotheses outline expectations about the role of organizational ideology

on the decision to solicit support or engage in contentious politics abroad. Specifically, we

expect separatist organizations to be less likely to engage in any of the three activities, while we

expect religious organizations to be more likely to do so. The results in Table 3 partially confirm

our expectations about separatist organizations. They are less likely to solicit external support

and less likely to engage in violence abroad, while such an ideology does not significantly affect

the use of transnational non-violent contentious politics. Religious ideology, however, does not

have a significant effect on solicitation or violence, but decreases the probability of protest.

31

Of all the independent variables included in our models, the most consistent observed

effect is that of organizational participation in elections, which, in line with our expectation, is

negatively associated with solicitation, non-violent and violent contention abroad. This provides

strong support for Hypothesis 5, as the variable is significant and negative across each dependent

variable. While our test is limited to the MENA, it should be emphasized that we do not believe

that cultural or historical factors idiosyncratic to the region are driving this result. Rather, we

believe that it is the high proportion of authoritarian regimes which employ elections and

legislatures as a mechanism of control and management of the opposition.

Conversely, when the state actively uses violence against an organization, or when the

ethnic group associated with the organization suffers from political discrimination, the

organization will be more likely to solicit support and engage in violence abroad, and the effect

is greatest for transnational violence in both cases. The use of violence against the organization

and political discrimination both have a significant effect on solicitation and violence.

Repression of the organization and repression of the ethnic group writ large are therefore both

strongly associated with the decision to use violence. Taken together, the results for Hypotheses

6a and 6b provide support for our expectations regarding the comparative ease of transnational

violence as a response to domestic repression.

Finally, we expect that conflict with other organizations should make organizations more

likely to engage in all political activities abroad. The coefficients are significant and positive for

solicitation and violence, indicating that inter-organizational conflict positively predicts these

activities. This finding partially supports our hypothesis, and accords with the literature on

outbidding. On the other hand, the effect of inter-organizational conflict on protest is significant

32

and negative. Domestic political conflict with other organizations, therefore, decreases the

probability of non-violent contention specifically.

Having identified the statistical relationships between the various organizational and

structural factors and our three dependent variables, we now turn to a substantive interpretation

of our results. We calculated predicted probabilities from our models by fixing variables of

interest at theoretically important values and holding the other independent variables at their

observed values in line with the recommendations of Hanmer and Kalkin.136

Tables 4 through 7 list predicted probabilities derived from the models. Below each

probability is a 95% confidence interval around the prediction. We interpret those predictions

where the confidence interval encompasses 0 as being statistically indistinguishable from 0.

Table 4 displays the probabilities that an organization will solicit support given various levels of

political discrimination, participation in elections, and foreign state support. It is first important

to note from the confidence intervals, that all predictions are greater than 0. Beyond this basic

finding, the substantive effect of each variable is rather stark: an organization participating in

elections during an election year, and representing an ethnic group that does not experience

political discrimination, on average, has a 0.15 probability of solicitation if it does not receive

foreign state support. If that same organization receives foreign state support, the probability

more than doubles, to 0.32. Based on these characteristics, the most likely type of organization to

solicit support abroad is an organization that receives foreign state support, does not participate

in elections, and whose ethnic group is systematically repressed (0.88 probability).

Table 5 displays the probabilities that an organization will engage in non-violent protest

abroad based on varying electoral participation, diaspora support and foreign state support.

Unlike solicitation, protest is a rare event, so the probabilities overall are much lower, with most

136 Hanmer and Kalkin 2013.

33

of them statistically indistinguishable from 0 at the 95% confidence level. With this caveat, it is

clear that diaspora support combined with foreign state support and a lack of participation in the

electoral process has a large substantive effect on the decision to protest abroad (0.31

probability). The greatest substantive effect here is the presence of diaspora support; this is fully

in line with our theoretical expectation that diasporas are particularly amenable to providing the

"bodies" necessary for transnational mobilization. Organizations not participating in elections

are, on average, five times more likely to use non-violent contention when they are supported by

their diaspora community. It is clear then, that in certain contexts, diaspora support is a crucial

determinant of transnational protest activity.

Finally, Tables 6 and 7 display the probabilities that an organization uses transnational

violence. Table 6 varies political discrimination, electoral participation, and foreign state

support, while Table 7 substitutes inter-organizational conflict for foreign state support. Like

protest, transnational violence is a very rare event and so the probabilities are low (or

indistinguishable from 0) in many cases. Notably, in every case, electoral participation makes the

probability of violence almost non-existent in line with our expectations on the effect of electoral

behavior in a non-democratic context. This suggests that electoral participation in the Middle

East-North African context has a very robust pacifying effect on transnational violence. On the

other hand, organizations not participating in elections are increasingly likely to use violence

abroad as discrimination increases. At its peak, political discrimination against these groups

leads to a 0.05 probability of violence. Further, in every case, the probability of violence at least

doubles if the organization is supported by a foreign state.

As Table 7 demonstrates, among the most dangerous organizations are those which are

embroiled in conflict with other political organizations, do not participate in elections, and whose

34

ethnic constituents experience systematic repression. On average, these organizations have a

15% chance of engaging in violence outside their country in a given year. Organizations that are

subject to the same effects regarding constituent group repression and electoral activity, but who

receive foreign support, are slightly more likely (17% chance) to engage in transnational

violence in a given year. In all cases, reducing the level of repression, involving the organization

in elections, removing foreign support, or ending inter-organizational conflict significantly

reduces the probability of transnational violence.

Interestingly, across our explanatory variables, there seems to be a strong similarity

between violence and solicitation. This was not something that we had considered theoretically

before conducting our analysis (and we thank one of our anonymous reviewers for pointing out

the importance of these results). Indeed, protest and solicitation are only similar when it comes to

the negative impact of participation in elections and the positive impact of foreign state support.

Violence and solicitation, on the other hand, are similar in their relationship to every variable.

This finding is both surprising and counter-intuitive. We believe this is a finding that demands

more investigation, but as we have previously argued, one possibility is that external protest is

harder to maintain and conduct in some ways than both violence and solicitation, given the larger

number of participants needed. Additionally, we might see similar trends for these two activities

if groups most often solicit support with the specific intention of committing violence.

Sensitivity Analysis

We have already analyzed our hypotheses with both logit and rare events logit models in

an effort to identify any potential bias in the data-generating process. It is possible, however, that

the decision to solicit support abroad, or the decision to use non-violent or violent contention

35

abroad are not independent of each other. After all, some organizations engage in more than one

type of behavior in the same year (though this is rare in our data). Still, we might expect that

each of these decisions is interrelated, which would mean that the error terms in each of our logit

models are correlated, and the probabilities of each dependent variable, therefore, would be

jointly distributed. To account for this possibility, we re-estimated our models as bivariate

probits, pairing each of the dependent variables, and the results are listed in Table 8.

In the first column of Table 8, we assume that solicitation and non-violent protest are

jointly distributed, though the results of each individual probit are nearly identical to the original

logit models. Foreign state support, elections, repression, political discrimination, and inter-

organizational conflict continue to drive solicitation, while protest continues to be a function of

foreign state, diaspora support and participation in elections. Religious ideology significantly

affects protest, but this finding is not consistent in the other model that includes protest. Inter-

organizational conflict increases the probability of solicitation while decreasing the probability

of protest (though weakly so). In the second column, we analyze the joint effect of our

independent variables on solicitation and violence, and once again the results are comparable to

our original analysis. Finally, the model analyzing both protest and violence (third column) also

produces results similar to those we presented earlier. The correlation parameter (ρ), however is

insignificant here, indicating that the errors are not correlated, and the models of protest and

violence can be safely estimated independent of each other.

Conclusion Previous literature on transnational contention and advocacy has focused attention at the state

level. Our analysis has examined a wide range of factors at the organizational level thought to

influence the decision to engage in transnational politics. We have found evidence to support our

36

expectation that transnational protest is the most difficult activity for organizations to engage in,

with transnational violence and transnational solicitation being relatively easier. Our analysis has

also clarified the relationship between various organizational and structural factors and the

choice to engage in politics abroad. Our results suggest that diaspora support is a key driver of

non-violent transnational contention, while foreign state support, diaspora support, and inter-

organizational conflict all predict the use of violence. Religious ideology seems to discourage the

use of non-violent contention abroad, while a separatist ideology discourages solicitation and

violence. Finally, supporting much of the literature on social movements, we find that

incorporating organizations into the political process has a strong negative effect on all types of

transnational political activity — though our regional focus means that our finding largely

pertains to participation in systems that are not fully democratic. Conversely, discrimination

against the ethnic group at home is associated with a greater likelihood of the organization

turning to violence and solicitation in other countries.

These results offer important advances in our current understanding of transnational

political activity, and perhaps most importantly, transnational violence. Key predictors of

violence include foreign state support, inter-organizational conflict, political discrimination, state

repression, and electoral exclusion. However, given the regional restriction of our analysis and

the fact that the Middle East is an outlier in terms of transnational violence, we encourage the

collection of more organizational data in order to identify possible policy implications.

Our analysis suggests many areas for future research, since little empirical work has

tested transnational political hypotheses at the organizational level. While the logic behind most

of our hypotheses is supported, some of the specific results demand more attention. For instance,

we expected diaspora support to influence non-violent protest more than the other types of

37

political behavior but to still influence solicitation and violence, yet we find no significant

relationship between diaspora support and those activities. Anecdotally, there are plenty of

examples of diasporas contributing to violent transnational campaigns. But with the data at hand,

we find no such relationship. Our data only focuses on organizations in the Middle East and

North Africa, and while we expect our findings to hold across regions, the quantitative data is

simply not available at present. However, the history of some organizations outside of MENA do

suggest that these findings are likely to have wider applicability. For example, the Liberation

Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) in Sri Lanka received prolonged foreign state support from India,

but when India and the LTTE turned on each other, diaspora support was an important resource

for the Tigers, who were able to conduct transnational attacks in India.137 The solicitation of

external support was also a major component of LTTE's portfolio of activity. Indeed, Byman

notes that by 1998 the Tigers were represented in 54 countries.138

We have also limited our focus to ethnopolitical organizations, yet there are other types

of political organizations which might behave differently in the absence of ethnic motivations.

Future work might also synthesize our broad findings with theories that emphasize the role that

normative framing plays in organizational behavior — to what degree does the "logic of

appropriateness"139 serve as a lens through which organizations interpret their domestic and

international threats and opportunities? In-depth organization narratives may provide a fruitful

approach in this regard — complementary to our large-N results. Such future inquiries,

combined with the results presented here, may allow us to better grasp the strategic decisions of

political organizations to engage in politics abroad.

137 Byman 2001, 47, 10, 98.138 Byman 2001, 44.139 March and Olsen 1998

38

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