What Happens When a Victorious Rebel Loses State Power? A Comparative Analysis of FSLN (Nicaragua) and TPLF (Ethiopia)

While the literature on civil war shows that rebel victories lower the risk of renewed conflict, it hardly explains how victorious rebels behave decades later when ousted from power. To examine this, I use a comparative analysis of the Tigray People's Liberation Front and the Sandinista National Liberation Front. The TPLF is a rebel group in Ethiopia that seized state power in 1991 through military victory and then dominated for three decades. After losing federal power in 2018, it returned to war in 2020. In contrast, the Sandinista National Liberation Front (FSLN) also took control through military victory. However, after losing Nicaragua's 1990 elections, it handed over power and, later, returned to power through electoral resurgence. Despite these similar historical trajectories, the literature reveals divergent outcomes. Specifically, when insurgent rulers fully monopolise and unify coercive authority into a single national army, losing power means losing control over organised force, raising the costs of returning to war. Conversely, if coercive power remains regionally concentrated in an autonomous parallel command, being ousted leaves this capacity intact and lowers mobilisation costs. Therefore, postwar peacebuilding requires more than removing potential spoilers and implementing DDR for losers; it requires reconfiguration of the victors' coercive military organisation.