| This qualitative study seeks to investigate and identify the conditions under which non-state armed groups (NSAGs) transform into non-violent political parties by looking at the FMLN, the ANC, GAM, and Hezbollah cases.;It identifies democracy, the characteristics of NSAGs, legitimacy, state strategies of dealing with NSAGs, benefits and limits of political inclusion and, the role of external actors and the support base to be of particular importance. The cases are analyzed using qualitative methods backed by descriptive statistics with data from Freedom House, Polity IV, and the Global Terrorism Database. Furthermore, key factors are identified and analyzed over time: democracy, civil liberties, and political rights, whether the NSAG had a support base, whether there was an external democracy promoting actor involved, whether that external actor supported the state or the NSAG, and whether there were non-democracy promoting actors.;The results suggest that in the case of autocracies or anocracies, external actors can have a tremendous positive impact regarding the level of political openness and the chances of an inclusive peace negotiation. Furthermore, three of the cases analyzed became democracies after the peace negotiations. Moreover, three out of four NSAGs took the opportunity to become non-violent political parties and disarmed when it arose. The results suggest that democracies lower the likelihood and frequency of political violence and that external actors promoting democracy in unstable states can have a positive effect. The case of Hezbollah, however, suggests that weak states, even democracies, are vulnerable to manipulation and may be at risk of transforming into autocracies. |
