Rebel-State Coexistence Dataset
The Rebel–State Coexistence Dataset (1970–2020) systematically tracks periods when armed groups and governments lived in a state of "no war, yet no peace." Unlike traditional conflict datasets that emphasize either open civil war or formal peace agreements, this dataset identifies the many instances where violence faded without resolution and where governments tolerated, coexisted with, or informally accommodated rebels who remained active.
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Covering 445 coexistence periods across 219 armed groups in 25 countries in the Middle East and North Africa, the dataset captures how states and rebels interacted outside the conventional war/peace binary. It distinguishes cases where rebels retained arms and governance capacity, and where regimes strategically allowed such arrangements to persist, rather than eliminating or fully incorporating challengers, ranging from hostile or competitive coexistence, toleration, to more cooperative coexistence. The dataset allows scholars to analyze how such ambiguous arrangements emerge, vary, and endure, shedding light on how governments and rebels interact in the gray zone.
The figure above illustrates the dataset’s coverage for each country. Gray bars indicate periods in which each group was considered "active" according to the Armed Group Dataset (Malone, 2022). Red segments mark years coded as active civil war in the UCDP Armed Conflict Dataset. Blue segments indicate group-years included in the Coex Dataset.
By layering these sources, the visualization highlights the unique contribution of the dataset: capturing the periods where many armed conflicts actually spend the bulk of their time.
The map highlights the geographic reach of the Rebel–State Coexistence Dataset (1970–2020):​​
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Shaded countries indicate the presence of at least one armed group–government coexistence period.
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Darker shading corresponds to a greater number of distinct armed groups captured in the dataset.
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Unshaded countries fall outside the dataset’s scope, either because no qualifying armed group activity occurred or because the coding criteria were not met.
What's included:
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Dataset — as panel of armed group–country–year observations and for coexistence-period level of analysis, capturing:
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Onset, character, and termination of coexistence episodes.
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Type of relationship, ranging from hostile or repressive coexistence to permissive toleration, functional coordination, and collaborative co-governance.
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Shared sovereignty, measuring how much de facto authority was divided or informally delegated between rebels and states.
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Rebel activity during gray-zone periods, including whether groups retained arms, controlled territory, or governed locally.
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Compatibility with major datasets (AGD, UCDP, ACLD, GTD, NSA, RQSI) to facilitate integration with broader conflict, violence, and governance data.
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Narratives — qualitative descriptions of each coexistence period, explaining the historical and political context, the nature of state–rebel relations, and the dynamics that sustained or altered coexistence. These narratives give depth to the coded variables and enable mixed-methods analysis.
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Funding Acknowledgment:
This project has been supported by the APSA Centennial Center, the Smith Richardson Foundation, the University of California Institute on Global Conflict and Cooperation (IGCC), the UCSD Yankelovich Center, and the Institute for Humane Studies (IHS).