STRATEGIC ANALYSIS

Gambling with Violence: State Outsourcing of War in Pakistan and India

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  • March 2020
    Volume: 
    44
    Issue: 
    2
    Book Review

    Yelena Biberman offers a new framework for understanding why and how states ‘outsource’ war to local non-state actors despite the risks of forfeiting the state’s monopoly over violence. Specifically, she explores state and non-state alliances in counter-insurgencies in India and Pakistan. Taking a qualitative approach, Biberman argues that ‘state-nonstate alliances are balance-of-interests bargains’ wherein the ‘state seeking to shift the local balance of power in its favor may enlist activists if it can cultivate social or ideological ties with them’

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