Abstract
It is not surprising that legitimate third-party intervention occurs rarely. After the 2011 NATO-led military intervention in Libya, requiring the coordinated effort of three great powers to pass a once-in-a-decade UN Security Council Resolution to use all necessary measures, states searched for more tenable foreign policies. Sponsorship of warring actors in civil wars rose as the favoured foreign policy, simultaneously bearing less in political costs and more in opportunities to influence. With the state not having to participate as an active actor in the civil war and the political consequences of such a controversial policy for governments being significantly reduced, a way into interfering in the internal affairs of other states was found. Despite this turn in policymaking, studies of conflicts explain the recent trend that consistently reached a record high for the past four years on the principal explanation of third-party intervention: bilateral rivalry. Why do states intervene in civil wars if they have no rivals in the civil war? This paper looks at recent proxy wars, where both warring sides receive external support, and uses Comparative Case Analysis to examine the strategies that states employ. The results show that in many cases, states that intervene in civil wars and are rivals with other external actors tend to escalate their efforts to a military intervention. When states intervene in conflicts having other preferences, they tend to abandon their efforts to change the outcome. States use different strategies when engaging in proxy wars that connect with their policy priorities in the conflict. These priorities connect with rivalry but also with other preferences. The QCA confirms this argument and suggests alternative pathways to a proxy war.