Peacekeepers Abroad: Analyzing the Subsequent Conflict Prospects for Troops Deploying Nations

Abstract

Does contributing troops to UN peacekeeping reduce a state’s propensity for interstate conflict? While existing research examines peacekeeping’s effects on host countries, troop-contributing countries’ own conflict behavior remains understudied. I theorize two mechanisms: costly signaling that credibly communicates peaceful intent, and socialization through UN doctrine and multinational networks that institutionalizes restraint. Using country-year data from 1990 to 2014 and multiple measures of participation, the analysis includes controls for the security environment, including recent conflict involvement, territorial disputes, prior interstate conflict, and intrastate armed conflict. Across ordered logit, logit, and count models, supplemented by extensive robustness checks, matching, selection corrections, fixed effects, and dynamic specifications, greater peacekeeping engagement is consistently associated with lower hostility, lower initiation risk, and fewer disputes. These findings extend conventional wisdom by identifying peacekeeping as both a global public good and domestic risk-reduction strategy, redirecting institutional theory from hosts to senders and clarifying how international engagement reshapes state behavior.