CDF Formation as a Delegation Problem Sample Clauses

CDF Formation as a Delegation Problem. ‌ In order to answer the question of why only some incumbents resort to CDFs, I start by considering a most straightforward possibility — namely, that CDFs can in principle hurt COIN just as much as they can facilitate it. If so, we may get to observe fewer instances of counterproductive CDFs if governments are able to anticipate their performance with some accuracy and choose not to form them in the first place. Medical treatment of a disease might provide a useful everyday analogy. If physicians are able to recognize patients in whom the treatment is contraindicated, its administration to those in whom it is not should produce consistently positive effects — assuming, of course, that the treatment is effective in the first place. In theory, it is not difficult to conceive of ways in which CDF effectiveness may be undermined. When CDF personnel have ample reason to xxxxx on assigned duties or defect to the insurgent side, we may reasonably suppose that CDF deployment in such cases may prove to be at best ineffective and at worst counterproductive. Historically, anecdotal evidence suggests that CDFs may have ample reason to want to xxxxx in their duties or consort with the enemy (e.g. see XxXxxx 1966, 228; Xxxxxx 1994, 97). Since CDFs tend to have only rudimentary training and may be poorly armed, personnel may xxxxx to avoid armed confrontation with rebels in which they have no chance of winning. Furthermore, since civilian compliance is an important determinant of political outcomes in civil wars, insurgents want to punish harshly anyone who cooperates with the state. As a result, thanks to their visibility, CDFs are often subjected to brutal insurgent reprisals in which entire families are executed in order to deter further collaboration with the incumbent. Because the state is likely to harshly punish overt non-compliance as well, CDFs may have strong incentives to covertly defect to the rebel side while maintaining the pretense of compliance with assigned duties. At the same time, incumbents may find it difficult to detect such defections in a timely manner due to CDFs’ geographical remoteness and relative autonomy from central authorities. Unsurprisingly, then, instances of CDF shirking, collaboration with insurgents, and outright defection are not hard to find. Thus, the U.S.-backed Self-Defense Corps in Vietnam often proved no match for the insurgent Viet Cong (VC) forces due to being lightly armed and poorly trained. In consequence, these units we...