Civil war A civil war is a war between organized groups within the same nation state or republic , or , less commonly , between two countries created from a formerly united nation state . The aim of one side may be to take control of the country or a region , to achieve independence for a region , or to change government policies . The term is a calque of the Latin " bellum civile " which was used to refer to the various civil wars of the Roman Republic in the 1st century BC . A civil war is a high - intensity conflict , often involving regular armed forces , that is sustained , organized and large - scale . Civil wars may result in large numbers of casualties and the consumption of significant resources . Civil wars since the end of World War II have lasted on average just over four years , a dramatic rise from the one - and - a - half year average of the 1900 - 1944 period . While the rate of emergence of new civil wars has been relatively steady since the mid - 19th century , the increasing length of those wars resulted in increasing numbers of wars ongoing at any one time . For example , there were no more than five civil wars underway simultaneously in the first half of the 20th century , while over 20 concurrent civil wars were occurring at the end of the Cold War , before a significant decrease as conflicts strongly associated with the superpower rivalry came to an end . Since 1945 , civil wars have resulted in the deaths of over 25 million people , as well as the forced displacement of millions more . Civil wars have further resulted in economic collapse ; Somalia , Burma ( Myanmar ) , Uganda and Angola are examples of nations that were considered to have promising futures before being engulfed in civil wars . Formal classification . James Fearon , a scholar of civil wars at Stanford University , defines a civil war as " a violent conflict within a country fought by organized groups that aim to take power at the center or in a region , or to change government policies " . Ann Hironaka further specifies that one side of a civil war is the state . The intensity at which a civil disturbance becomes a civil war is contested by academics . Some political scientists define a civil war as having more than 1000 casualties , while others further specify that at least 100 must come from each side . The Correlates of War , a dataset widely used by scholars of conflict , classifies civil wars as having over 1000 war - related casualties per year of conflict . This rate is a small fraction of the millions killed in the Second Sudanese Civil War and Cambodian Civil War , for example , but excludes several highly publicized conflicts , such as The Troubles of Northern Ireland and the struggle of the African National Congress in Apartheid - era South Africa . Based on the 1000 casualties per year criterion , there were 213 civil wars from 1816 to 1997 , 104 of which occurred from 1944 to 1997 . If one uses the less - stringent 1000 casualties total criterion , there were over 90 civil wars between 1945 and 2007 , with 20 ongoing civil wars as of 2007 . The Geneva Conventions do not specifically define the term " civil war " , nevertheless they do outline the responsibilities of parties in " armed conflict not of an international character " . This includes civil wars , however no specific definition of civil war is provided in the text of the Conventions . Nevertheless the International Committee of the Red Cross has sought to provide some clarification through its commentaries on the Geneva Conventions , noting that the Conventions are " so general , so vague , that many of the delegations feared that it might be taken to cover any act committed by force of arms " . Accordingly the commentaries provide for different ' conditions ' on which the application of the Geneva Convention would depend , the commentary however points out that these should not be interpreted as rigid conditions . The conditions listed by the ICRC in its commentary are as follows : That the Party in revolt against the de jure Government possesses an organized military force , an authority responsible for its acts , acting within a determinate territory and having the means of respecting and ensuring respect for the Convention . That the legal Government is obliged to have recourse to the regular military forces against insurgents organized as military and in possession of a part of the national territory . ( a ) That the de jure Government has recognized the insurgents as belligerents ; or ( b ) That it has claimed for itself the rights of a belligerent ; or ( c ) That it has accorded the insurgents recognition as belligerents for the purposes only of the present Convention ; or ( d ) That the dispute has been admitted to the agenda of the Security Council or the General Assembly of the United Nations as being a threat to international peace , a breach of the peace , or an act of aggression . ( a ) That the insurgents have an organization purporting to have the characteristics of a State . ( b ) That the insurgent civil authority exercises de facto authority over the population within a determinate portion of the national territory . ( c ) That the armed forces act under the direction of an organized authority and are prepared to observe the ordinary laws of war . ( d ) That the insurgent civil authority agrees to be bound by the provisions of the Convention . Causes of civil war in the Collier - Hoeffler Model . Scholars investigating the cause of civil war are attracted by two opposing theories , greed versus grievance . Roughly stated : are conflicts caused by who people are , whether that be defined in terms of ethnicity , religion or other social affiliation , or do conflicts begin because it is in the economic best interests of individuals and groups to start them ? Scholarly analysis supports the conclusion that economic and structural factors are more important than those of identity in predicting occurrences of civil war . A comprehensive studies of civil war was carried out by a team from the World Bank in the early 21st century . The study framework , which came to be called the Collier - Hoeffler Model , examined 78 five - year increments when civil war occurred from 1960 to 1999 , as well as 1 , 167 five - year increments of " no civil war " for comparison , and subjected the data set to regression analysis to see the effect of various factors . The factors that were shown to have a statistically significant effect on the chance that a civil war would occur in any given five - year period were : A high proportion of primary commodities in national exports significantly increases the risk of a conflict . A country at " peak danger " , with commodities comprising 32 % of gross domestic product , has a 22 % risk of falling into civil war in a given five - year period , while a country with no primary commodity exports has a 1 % risk . When disaggregated , only petroleum and non - petroleum groupings showed different results : a country with relatively low levels of dependence on petroleum exports is at slightly less risk , while a high - level of dependence on oil as an export results in slightly more risk of a civil war than national dependence on another primary commodity . The authors of the study interpreted this as being the result of the ease by which primary commodities may be extorted or captured compared to other forms of wealth , for example , it is easy to capture and control the output of a gold mine or oil field compared to a sector of garment manufacturing or hospitality services . A second source of finance is national diaspora s , which can fund rebellions and insurgencies from abroad . The study found that statistically switching the size of a country ' s diaspora from the smallest found in the study to the largest resulted in a sixfold increase in the chance of a civil war . Higher male secondary school enrollment , per capita income and economic growth rate all had significant effects on reducing the chance of civil war . Specifically , a male secondary school enrollment 10 % above the average reduced the chance of a conflict by about 3 % , while a growth rate 1 % higher than the study average resulted in a decline in the chance of a civil war of about 1 % . The study interpreted these three factors as proxies for earnings foregone by rebellion , and therefore that lower foregone earnings encourages rebellion . Phrased another way : young males ( who make up the vast majority of combatants in civil wars ) are less likely to join a rebellion if they are getting an education and / or have a comfortable salary , and can reasonably assume that they will prosper in the future . Low per capita income has been proposed as a cause for grievance , prompting armed rebellion . However , for this to be true , one would expect economic inequality to also be a significant factor in rebellions , which it is not . The study therefore concluded that the economic model of opportunity cost better explained the findings . High levels of population dispersion and , to a lesser extent , the presence of mountainous terrain increased the chance of conflict . Both of these factors favor rebels , as a population dispersed outward toward the borders is harder to control than one concentrated in a central region , while mountains offer terrain where rebels can seek sanctuary . Most proxies for " grievance " - the theory that civil wars begin because of issues of identity , rather than economics - were statistically insignificant , including economic equality , political rights , ethnic polarization and religious fractionalization . Only ethnic dominance , the case where the largest ethnic group comprises a majority of the population , increased the risk of civil war . A country characterized by ethnic dominance has nearly twice the chance of a civil war . However , the combined effects of ethnic and religious fractionalization , i . e . the more chance that any two randomly chosen people will be from separate ethnic or religious groups the less chance of a civil war , were also significant and positive , as long as the country avoided ethnic dominance . The study interpreted this as stating that minority groups are more likely to rebel if they feel that they are being dominated , but that rebellions are more likely to occur the more homogeneous the population and thus more cohesive the rebels . These two factors may thus be seen as mitigating each other in many cases . The various factors contributing to the risk of civil war rise increase with population size . The risk of a civil war rises approximately proportionately with the size of a country ' s population . The more time that has elapsed since the last civil war , the less likely it is that a conflict will recur . The study had two possible explanations for this : one opportunity - based and the other grievance - based . The elapsed time may represent the depreciation of whatever capital the rebellion was fought over and thus increase the opportunity cost of restarting the conflict . Alternatively , elapsed time may represent the gradual process of healing of old hatreds . The study found that the presence of diaspora substantially reduced the positive effect of time , as the funding from diasporas offsets the depreciation of rebellion - specific capital . Other causes . Evolutionary psychologist Satoshi Kanazawa has argued that an important cause of intergroup conflict may be the relative availability of women of reproductive age . He found that polygyny greatly increased the frequency of civil wars but not interstate wars . Gleditsch et al . did not find a relationship between ethnic groups with polygyny and increased frequency of civil wars but nations having legal polygamy may have more civil wars . They argued that misogyny is a better explanation than polygyny . They found that increased women ' s rights were are associated with less civil wars and that legal polygamy had no effect after women ’ s rights were controlled for . Duration of civil wars . Ann Hironaka , author of " Neverending Wars " , divides the modern history of civil wars into the pre - 19th century , 19th century to early 20th century , and late 20th century . In 19th - century Europe , the length of civil wars fell significantly , largely due to the nature of the conflicts as battles for the power center of the state , the strength of centralized governments , and the normally quick and decisive intervention by other states to support the government . Following World War II the duration of civil wars grew past the norm of the pre - 19th century , largely due to weakness of the many postcolonial states and the intervention by major powers on both sides of conflict . The most obvious commonality to civil wars are that they occur in fragile state s . Civil wars in the 19th and early 20th centuries . Civil wars through the 19th century to early 20th century tended to be short ; the average length of a civil war between 1900 and 1944 was one and half years . The state itself was the obvious center of authority in the majority of cases , and the civil wars were thus fought for control of the state . This meant that whoever had control of the capital and the military could normally crush resistance . If a rebellion failed to quickly seize the capital and control of the military for itself , it was normally doomed to a quick destruction . For example , the fighting associated with the 1871 Paris Commune occurred almost entirely in Paris , and ended quickly once the military sided with the government . The power of non - state actors resulted in a lower value placed on sovereignty in the 18th and 19th centuries , which further reduced the number of civil wars . For example , the pirates of the Barbary Coast were recognized as " de facto " states because of their military power . The Barbary pirates thus had no need to rebel against the Ottoman Empire , who were their nominal state government , to gain recognition for their sovereignty . Conversely , states such as Virginia and Massachusetts in the United States of America did not have sovereign status , but had significant political and economic independence coupled with weak federal control , reducing the incentive to secede . The two major global ideologies , monarchism and democracy , led to several civil wars . However , a bi - polar world , divided between the two ideologies , did not develop , largely due the dominance of monarchists through most of the period . The monarchists would thus normally intervene in other countries to stop democratic movements taking control and forming democratic governments , which were seen by monarchists as being both dangerous and unpredictable . The Great Powers , defined in the 1815 Congress of Vienna as the United Kingdom , Habsburg Austria , Prussia , France , and Russia , would frequently coordinate interventions in other nations ' civil wars , nearly always on the side of the incumbent government . Given the military strength of the Great Powers , these interventions were nearly always decisive and quickly ended the civil wars . There were several exceptions from the general rule of quick civil wars during this period . The American Civil War ( 1861 – 1865 ) was unusual for at least two reasons : it was fought around regional identities , rather than political ideologies , and it was ended through a war of attrition , rather than over a decisive battle over control of the capital , as was the norm . The Spanish Civil War ( 1936 – 1939 ) was exceptional because " both " sides of the war received support from intervening great powers : Germany , Italy , and Portugal supported opposition leader Francisco Franco , while France and the Soviet Union supported the government ( see proxy war ) . Civil wars since 1945 . In the 1990s , about twenty civil wars were occurring concurrently during an average year , a rate about ten times the historical average since the 19th century . However , the rate of new civil wars had not increased appreciably ; the drastic rise in the number of ongoing wars after World War II was a result of the tripling of the average duration of civil wars to over four years . This increase was a result of the increased number of states , the fragility of states formed after 1945 , the decline in interstate war , and the Cold War rivalry . Following World War II , the major European powers divested themselves of their colonies at an increasing rate : the number of ex - colonial states jumped from about 30 to almost 120 after the war . The rate of state formation leveled off in the 1980s , at which point few colonies remained . More states also meant more states in which to have long civil wars . Hironaka statistically measures the impact of the increased number of ex - colonial states as increasing the post - WWII incidence of civil wars by + 165 % over the pre - 1945 number . While the new ex - colonial states appeared to follow the blueprint of the idealized state - centralized government , territory enclosed by defined borders , and citizenry with defined rights - , as well as accessories such as a national flag , an anthem , a seat at the United Nations and an official economic policy , they were in actuality far weaker than the Western states they were modeled after . In Western states , the structure of governments closely matched states ' actual capabilities , which had been arduously developed over centuries . The development of strong administrative structures , in particular those related to extraction of taxes , is closely associated with the intense warfare between predatory European states in the 17th and 18th centuries , or in Charles Tilly ' s famous formulation : " War made the state and the state made war " . For example , the formation of the modern states of Germany and Italy in the 19th century is closely associated with the wars of expansion and consolidation led by Prussia and Sardinia , respectively . The Western process of forming effective and impersonal bureaucracies , developing efficient tax systems , and integrating national territory continued into the 20th century . Nevertheless , Western states that survived into the latter half of the 20th century were considered " strong " by simple reason that they had managed to develop the institutional structures and military capability required to survive predation by their fellow states . In sharp contrast , decolonization was an entirely different process of state formation . Most imperial powers had not foreseen a need to prepare their colonies for independence ; for example , Britain had given limited self - rule to India and Sri Lanka , while treating British Somaliland as little more than a trading post , while all major decisions for French colonies were made in Paris and Belgium prohibited any self - government up until it suddenly granted independence to its colonies in 1960 . Like Western states of previous centuries , the new ex - colonies lacked autonomous bureaucracies , which would make decisions based on the benefit to society as a whole , rather than respond to corruption and nepotism to favor a particular interest group . In such a situation , factions manipulate the state to benefit themselves or , alternatively , state leaders use the bureaucracy to further their own self - interest . The lack of credible governance was compounded by the fact that most colonies were economic loss - makers at independence , lacking both a productive economic base and a taxation system to effectively extract resources from economic activity . Among the rare states profitable at decolonization was India , to which scholars credibly argue that Uganda , Malaysia and Angola may be included . Neither did imperial powers make territorial integration a priority , and may have discouraged nascent nationalism as a danger to their rule . Many newly independent states thus found themselves impoverished , with minimal administrative capacity in a fragmented society , while faced with the expectation of immediately meeting the demands of a modern state . Such states are considered " weak " or " fragile " . The " strong " - " weak " categorization is not the same as " Western " - " non - Western " , as some Latin American states like Argentina and Brazil and Middle Eastern states like Egypt and Israel are considered to have " strong " administrative structures and economic infrastructure . Historically , the international community would have targeted weak states for territorial absorption or colonial domination or , alternatively , such states would fragment into pieces small enough to be effectively administered and secured by a local power . However , international norms towards sovereignty changed in the wake of WWII in ways that support and maintain the existence of weak states . Weak states are given " de jure " sovereignty equal to that of other states , even when they do not have " de facto " sovereignty or control of their own territory , including the privileges of international diplomatic recognition and an equal vote in the United Nations . Further , the international community offers development aid to weak states , which helps maintain the facade of a functioning modern state by giving the appearance that the state is capable of fulfilling its implied responsibilities of control and order . The formation of a strong international law regime and norms against territorial aggression is strongly associated with the dramatic drop in the number of interstate wars , though it has also been attributed to the effect of the Cold War or to the changing nature of economic development . Consequently , military aggression that results in territorial annexation became increasingly likely to prompt international condemnation , diplomatic censure , a reduction in international aid or the introduction of economic sanction , or , as in the case of 1990 invasion of Kuwait by Iraq , international military intervention to reverse the territorial aggression . Similarly , the international community has largely refused to recognize secessionist regions , while keeping some secessionist self - declared states such as Taiwan in diplomatic recognition limbo . While there is not a large body of academic work examining the relationship , Hironaka ' s statistical study found a correlation that suggests that every major international anti - secessionist declaration increased the number of ongoing civil wars by + 10 % , or a total + 114 % from 1945 to 1997 . The diplomatic and legal protection given by the international community , as well as economic support to weak governments and discouragement of secession , thus had the unintended effect of encouraging civil wars . There has been an enormous amount of international intervention in civil wars since 1945 that served to extend wars . While intervention has been practiced since the international system has existed , its nature changed substantially . It became common for both the state and opposition group to receive foreign support , allowing wars to continue well past the point when domestic resources had been exhausted . Superpowers , such as the European great powers , had always felt no compunction in intervening in civil wars that affected their interests , while distant regional powers such as the United States could declare the interventionist Monroe Doctrine of 1821 for events in its Central American " backyard " . However , the large population of weak states after 1945 allowed intervention by former colonial powers , regional powers and neighboring states who themselves often had scarce resources . On average , a civil war with interstate intervention was 300 % longer than those without . When disaggregated , a civil war with intervention on only one side is 156 % longer , while intervention on both sides lengthens the average civil war by an addition 92 % . If one of the intervening states was a superpower , a civil war is extended a further 72 % ; a conflict such as the Angolan Civil War , in which there is two - sided foreign intervention , including by a superpower ( actually , two superpowers in the case of Angola ) , would be 538 % longer on average than a civil war without any international intervention . Effect of the Cold War . The Cold War ( 1945 – 1989 ) provided a global network of material and ideological support that perpetuated civil wars , which were mainly fought in weak ex - colonial states , rather than the relatively strong states that were aligned with the Warsaw Pact and North Atlantic Treaty Organization . In some cases , superpowers would superimpose Cold War ideology onto local conflicts , while in others local actors using Cold War ideology would attract the attention of a superpower to obtain support . Using a separate statistical evaluation than used above for interventions , civil wars that included pro - or anti - communist forces lasted 141 % longer than the average non - Cold War conflict , while a Cold War civil war that attracted superpower intervention resulted in wars typically lasting over three times as long as other civil wars . Conversely , the end of the Cold War marked by the fall of the Berlin Wall in 1989 resulted in a reduction in the duration of Cold War civil wars of 92 % or , phrased another way , a roughly ten - fold increase in the rate of resolution of Cold War civil wars . Lengthy Cold War - associated civil conflicts that ground to a halt include the wars of Guatemala ( 1960 – 1996 ) , El Salvador ( 1979 – 1991 ) and Nicaragua ( 1970 – 1990 ) .