A Tale of Two States, An Analysis of Yemen’s Civil War

Abstract

The purpose of this study is to examine the feasibility of peace for the Yemen civil war. This war which is considered to be the worst humanitarian crisis of century erupted in 2014 when Houthi forces seized Sana’a after a short confrontation with the Hadi government. Later on, many foreign forces such as Saudi Arabia and Iran joined the two sides, turning it into a proxy war. The fighting is still going on today and no end seems to be in sight. In order to do the study, first the conflict in Yemen is analyzed. Using several resources from Farsi, Arabic and English media and by applying discourse analysis, this study shows that this war has been a lose-lose-lose game so far. Everybody lost; the Houthis, the Hadi government and the people. afterwards, by applying the logic of game theory and contract theory, this study shows that peace is the Pareto-Nash solution for the main two sides. It, however, is not the optimum solution for the foreign intervenors; since they are already benefiting from the war. Moreover, based on contract theory it is shown that this peace can only be achieved if a neutral yet influential power broker comes in.