Herman Wieselgren’s research while affiliated with Uppsala University and other places

The International Criminal Court (ICC) was founded to end impunity for war crimes, such as violence against civilians, but its legitimacy as an impartial institution is often questioned. Previous research has suggested that even though the ICC gets involved in the worst atrocities, investigations and prosecutions are influenced by political interests. We show that member state interests are critical already at the selection stage of initiating preliminary examinations. We theorize that incentives and drivers of ICC involvement move through two pathways. On the one hand, the Prosecutor seeks to maintain public legitimacy through performance; it does so by getting involved in the worst situations and thereby meeting the expectations on the Court as outlined in the Rome Statute. On the other hand, states can refer situations to the ICC as a way of managing their own domestic military challengers; the Prosecutor seeks to maintain cooperation from member states by examining such situations, even if the crimes are less severe. These pathways to examinations matter because state-referrals are more likely to move to investigations. We examine this argument through a global analysis, covering the period 2002–2019, using a multinomial regression model for the two pathways. Our findings support these claims. We also provide additional qualitative descriptions of how domestic challenges have clearly preceded self-referrals by governments in all cases but one. By differentiating the two pathways, we accommodate conflicting claims about the politicization of ICC involvement versus attention to the most severe situations.

Previous research suggests that wartime sexual violence by rebel groups should generally be committed between rather than within ethnic groups. Since rebels can mobilize through and draw support from coethnic civilian networks, they should be less prone to commit sexual violence against their ethnic brethren. Moreover, ethnic divisions between groups are argued to spur inter-ethnic sexual violence as a strategy of war. Yet, much remains to be tested empirically. A major hindrance has been the lack of data on sexual violence that captures the ethnic identities of victims. This issue is circumvented by geocoding occurrences of sexual violence from the SVAC dataset and intersecting these with geographic patterns of ethnic settlement. Interestingly, the results show no indication of restraint in coethnic areas. They also indicate that mixed areas with both coethnic and non-coethnic civilians are more likely to experience sexual violence than entirely non-coethnic areas. Investigaciones anteriores sugieren que la violencia sexual en tiempos de guerra por parte de grupos rebeldes generalmente debería cometerse entre grupos étnicos y no dentro de ellos. Dado que los rebeldes pueden movilizarse a través de redes civiles coétnicas y obtener el apoyo de estas, deberían ser menos propensos a cometer actos de violencia sexual contra sus hermanos étnicos. Además, se argumenta que las divisiones étnicas entre grupos estimulan la violencia sexual interétnica como estrategia de guerra. Sin embargo, aún queda mucho por comprobar empíricamente. La falta de datos sobre la violencia sexual que capten las identidades étnicas de las víctimas ha sido un obstáculo importante. Este problema se evita mediante la geocodificación de los casos de violencia sexual del conjunto de datos sobre la violencia sexual en los conflictos armados y mediante su intersección con los patrones geográficos de asentamiento étnico. Curiosamente, los resultados no muestran ningún indicio de moderación en las zonas coétnicas. También indican que las zonas mixtas con civiles coétnicos y no coétnicos tienen más probabilidades de sufrir violencia sexual que las zonas totalmente no coétnicas. Une recherche antérieure laisse à penser que les violences sexuelles perpétrées en temps de guerre par des groupes rebelles devraient généralement être commises entre groupes ethniques plutôt qu’au sein d’un même groupe ethnique. Les rebelles, pouvant se mobiliser grâce aux réseaux civils de leur ethnie et obtenir le soutien de ces derniers, devraient être moins enclins à commettre des violences sexuelles à l’encontre de leurs frères ethniques. De plus, on estime que les divisions ethniques entre les groupes stimulent les violences sexuelles entre les ethnies en tant que stratégie militaire. Toutefois, beaucoup reste à tester empiriquement. L’absence de données sur les violences sexuelles enregistrant l’identité ethnique des victimes constituait un obstacle majeur. Le géocodage des occurrences de violence sexuelle émanant de l’ensemble des données SVAC et leur recoupage avec les modèles géographiques de peuplement ethnique ont permis de contourner ce problème. Curieusement, les résultats ne montrent aucune indication de retenue dans les zones coethniques. Ils indiquent également que les zones mixtes, peuplées à la fois de civils de la même ethnie ou non, ont davantage de probabilité de connaître des violences sexuelles que celles qui sont entièrement peuplées d’ethnies différentes.