An article by Prof Monica Duffy Toft published this month gives insight into counter insurgency tactics that could help governments facing different forms of uprising by Islamist and nationalist groups.

The article, co-authored by Toft and Yuri Zhukov from the University of Michigan, appears in the American Political Science Review (Vol 109, No 2, May 2015). They also wrote an opinion piece for The Washington Post’s Monkey Cage, called “Why Islamist insurgents are so difficult to coerce,” in which they explain the findings of their research.

With the backdrop of renewed debate in the United States over the appropriate counterinsurgency response to the world’s struggle with rising violence from both nationalist and Islamist movements, their insights are particularly valuable.

“We found that Islamist and nationalist rebels respond differently to coercion. While selective attacks outperform indiscriminate ones in deterring nationalist rebels, the technology of government violence [e.g. drone strikes] has little effect on the resolve and capabilities of Islamists.”

The central question of the study was: Are Islamist insurgencies more difficult for governments to coerce than nationalist ones? The authors approached this by examining whether Salafi-Jihadi rebels behaved differently on the battlefield and were more resilient in the face of government coercion.

They have summarised their findings into a concise Blavatnik School of Government Research Insight that clearly sets out their key findings from the study and recommendations for governments and other stakeholders in dealing with Islamist insurgencies.