Getting to the Root of the Issue(s): Expanding the Study of Issues in MIDs (the MID-Issue Dataset, Version 1.0)

• Author: Joshua Jackson,Andrew P. Owsiak,Gary Goertz,Paul F. Diehl
• DOI: http://doi.org/10.1177/00220027221080967
• Published date: 01 August 2022
• Date: 01 August 2022
• Subject Matter: Data Set Feature

Data Set Feature

Journal of Conf‌lict Resolution

2022, Vol. 66(7-8) 1514–1542

© The Author(s) 2022

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DOI: 10.1177/00220027221080967

journals.sagepub.com/home/jcr

Getting to the Root of the

Issue(s): Expanding the Study

of Issues in MIDs (the

MID-Issue Dataset, Version

1.0)

Joshua Jackson, Andrew P. Owsiak

1

, Gary Goertz

2

, and

Paul F. Diehl

Abstract

Because existing issue classif‌ication schemes omit prominent issues (e.g., domestic

armed conf‌lict) or contain signif‌icant within-category heterogeneity, theorizing about

the role of issues in international conf‌lict processes has stagnated. Our project jump-

starts it again, by independently—and systematically—reconceptualizing and gathering

data on f‌ive issues connected to dyadic militarized interstate disputes (MIDs) during the

period 1900–2010: land (borders), maritime (borders), islands, civil conf‌lict, and coups.

After conceptually introducing these issues and embedding them within a larger

framework, we describe and apply our MID-Issue data. These efforts show that (i) the

MID dataset’s issue classif‌ication scheme does not systematically capture our issues, (ii)

events in 37.58% of dyadic MIDs connect to domestic armed conf‌lict—a prevalence

not on the f‌ield’s radar, (iii) some factors promote issue-based international conf‌lict,

but only via indirect channels, and (iv) signif‌icant value even derives from a further

conceptualization of “territorial issues”(broadly def‌ined).

Keywords

militarized interstate disputes, borders, territory, civil conf‌lict, coups, issues

1

University of Georgia, Athens, GA, USA

2

University of Notre Dame, Notre Dame, IN, USA

Corresponding Author:

Andrew P. Owsiak, University of Georgia, Third Floor, Candler Hall, Athens, GA 30606, USA.

Email: aowsiak@uga.edu

From 1963 to 1981, Kenya experienced a rivalry with Somalia. The primary issue

concerned the placement of their mutual land border. Actors legally settled the border’s

status before Kenya’s independence, but as that independence unfolded, ethnic Somalis

in the Northern Frontier District (NFD) demanded to secede from Kenya and join

Somalia, thereby destabilizing the border region (Huth and Allee 2002). Armed Somali

rebels furthered the cause. After they attacked Kenyan government installations, the

Somali government pressed a claim to the NFD and offered support to Somali rebels

operating inside Kenya (MID#1426; Gibler, 2018).

Within the widely used militarized interstate dispute (MIDs)

1

dataset, the issues over

which states f‌ight fall into one of four broad categories: (i) territory, (ii) policy, (iii)

regime, or (iv) other.

2

Using this scheme, scholars typically label the Kenya–Somalia

rivalry “territorial”; the three dyadic MIDs that occur during the rivalry involve

“territorial”issues, while those after the rivalry ends concern “policy”or no demands to

revise the status quo (i.e., “not applicable”). History, however, tells a more nuanced

story. Domestic armed conf‌lict fueled the rivalry signif‌icantly; it justif‌ied the territorial

dispute, encouraged third-party involvement (e.g., Ethiopia), and triggered MIDs

including after the rivalry off‌icially ended in 1981.

The prevalence of domestic armed conf‌lict in the Kenya–Somalia rivalry is in

tension with that issue’s absence in the MID dataset’s issue classif‌ication scheme

(hereinafter, “MID scheme”). Importantly, it is not the only omission. Numerous MIDs

concern maritime issues (Mitchell and Prins, 1999). Broadly speaking, one might

expect these to reside within the MID scheme’s“territory”category; yet maritime

(border) issues fall regularly within each of its four categories. The MID scheme, in

short, contains signif‌icant within-category heterogeneity.

This heterogeneity inf‌luences research in paradoxical ways. For example, although

the MID scheme is central to research on the role of territorial issues in interstate

conf‌lict (e.g., see Huth and Allee, 2002;Vasquez,2009), few schol ars seriously theorize

about or examine its other issue categories, except as a baseline against which to

compare territorial issues (Senese and Vasquez, 2008). Within-category heterogeneity

explains why. Of the MIDs in which states demand to revise the status quo, the vast

majority involve “policy”disagreements (Palmer et al. 2015). All government actions,

however—even territorial aggression—constitute “policies.”Similarly, MIDs that fall

into the “other”category are as war-prone as territorial MIDs, perhaps because many

themselves contain a territorial element (Senese and Vasquez, 2008). Without greater

conceptual development, then, further theoretical and empirical breakthroughs will not

emerge. The within-category noise is too great.

The MID scheme also contains a second limitation: it tracks only issues associated

with demands to revise the status quo. During the period 1900–2010, neither participant

makes such a demand in 22.59% (or 633) of dyadic MIDs. At best, the f‌ield lacks

information about the issues underlying these disputes. At worst, it appears that these

disputes involve no issues, even though states use conf‌lict as a tool to address “issues,”

or subjects of controversy (Randle and Rapp, 1987;Senese and Vasquez, 2008).

Jackson et al. 1515