Masaryk university

1.3Research Challenges and Contribution to the Field

There are two major problems with the study of armed conflicts. First, the changeable nature of armed conflicts; that is, there is no consensus how to classify internal armed conflict due to the variable nature of warfare. Conflict can change its character, and the goals and objectives of the belligerents change, and so the object of research may change continuously.

The second issue is connected to how internal armed conflict has been studied. Research in this field requires going beyond disciplinary boundaries. Research requires different methods, different ontological and epistemological perspectives than traditional studies of conflict, for example, of World War II.

This study aims to address these problems by advancing a model that shows how to solve them. Theories of armed conflict are very well developed in explaining conditions under which conflicts can occur. The research design of this dissertation, which is represented in the methodological section below, creates a model of how to study armed conflicts that last over two decades and have not been resolved yet. That model can be applied to other internal armed conflicts in other regions, as, for example, to former Yugoslavia.

In addition my argument contributes to improving our understanding of conflicts in one of the most dangerous regions of the world – the South Caucasus. It presents five “analytical categories” of conflicts: ethnic, ideological, political, economic, and strategic/territorial conflict. Analytical categories help us to classify the different types of internal armed conflict. What makes the study’s typology valuable is that it does not pivot on naming a conflict, but enables us to put these different categories next to each other and observe how they complement each other.

Accordingly, my argument allows us to capture the complex lifecycle of a conflict in a structured way and focus our analysis on the issues at stake to proceed further in the analysis and to examine to what extent the conflicts in the Caucasus region actually are about ethnicity. The research focuses on an assessment of the extent to which ethnicity is merely a convenient common dominator to mobilize ethnic groups in the struggle over resources, land, or power.

It is an unfortunate fact that armed conflicts are a reality of international relations.

Practical politics as well as theories of international relations must study them. It is the only way to develop an appropriate framework for the prevention of armed conflicts and to detect early warning signs prior to their eruption. The proposed project represents original research and its expected outcomes are especially useful for the development of international relations theory. The study can shed considerable light on the significance of the different aspects in conflict dynamics and illustrate their change in time. Finally, the project outcomes will also serve as a valuable contribution to the prediction and prevention of conflicts for the international community, especially because conflicts in the studied area are particularly dangerous and contain a high potential for escalation.

1.4Data Collection

Understanding the correlation of actions of conflict parties, levels of analysis, and theoretical approaches requires extensive and systematic empirical investigation. As this research seeks to advocate a more balanced and dynamic approach to the processes of conflict transformation in selected case studies, triangulation of sources helps to eliminate the problem of biased data. It also allows us to capture wider spatiotemporal contexts and processes within evolving conflict policies and actions. This dissertation is based on multiple sources, including both primary and secondary materials, such as official documents from the relevant Ministries of Armenia, Azerbaijan, and Georgia, scholarly literature, media reports including newspapers, surveys, and interviews, and direct observation in the field during my study visits at Ilia State University in Tbilisi (2010). During this visit I collected data from the University library and interviewed some leading experts in the field. My research at the Baylor University, Texas (2012) and Free University Berlin (2013) contributed to my collection of considerable data, including Russian and English language documents and publications. 

Conducting research decades after the armed conflict took place involves caution in measuring and evaluating the narratives about the causes of escalation. How “true” are the stories told? In reality, involved conflict parties believe in their versions of events, which inevitably include possible mistaken assessments about how the conflict evolved. One of the biggest challenges in this research was the reliability of data from primary and secondary sources. Armed conflicts in Abkhazia, South Ossetia, and Nagorno-Karabakh are usually politicized; one can hardly find unbiased analyses. Furthermore, it is very hard to verify the data, especially on events that took place more than twenty years ago. None of the Armenian, Azerbaijan, and Georgian ministries provide enough statistical and analytical resources on socioeconomic developments in Abkhazia, South Ossetia, and Nagorno-Karabakh, especially during the 1990s. The data from these breakaway republics are also unrealizable and serve different political agendas. In this respect, there is a huge lack of systemic information. Rumors and myths during the violent phase of the conflicts have also contributed to the increasing mistrust between conflict parties. For this reason, triangulation of sources – checking different versions of the same events in newspapers, documents, and archives – is an important step in getting closer to the truth. This research also employs interviews with some experts in the region conducted in 2010, including those that were published in the press, which shed some light on local perceptions.

On the one hand, the position, decisions, and activities of conflict parties are derived from the available primary sources, which serve as a good starting point to understanding the issues at stake for each conflict party. However, when it comes to verification of reliability of information, comparative analysis is used: data from the Abkhazian, Ossetian, Armenian, Azerbaijani, Russian, and Georgian sources are crosschecked. In some case when such verification was not possible, the author indicates and quotes the names of sources and documents. Including literature from English-speaking scholars achieves greater objectivity. Addressing perceptions of conflicting parties and the nature of dichotomies among them helps to uncover the impact of collective memory on the evolution of mutual relationships and the sequence of events. In this regard, the study of issues at stake, concrete events, and claims aims to shed light on the nature of armed conflict in selected case studies.

Qualitative examination of the main Georgian and Russian-language newspapers from the region allows us to assess the way in which conflict escalation processes have been portrayed by primary conflict parties. Heterogeneous materials for this study draws upon the most relevant sources that are essential for the key objectives of this research.