Little is known about how transitions in the government of mediators affect conflict dynamics and resolution. To address this shortcoming, we study executive turnovers of mediators during ongoing interventions in civil war. Mediation effectiveness is largely driven by (trustworthy) information provision and sharing. Changes in mediators’ leaderships have the potential to undermine this, lowering mediation performance. Using data on civil conflicts in 1946–2017, we find robust support for this argument. This research sheds light on a previously neglected factor in conflict resolution that is of particular interest to practitioners and policymakers.

对于调解人政府的过渡如何影响冲突的动态和解决方案，人们知之甚少。为了解决这一缺陷，我们研究了正在进行的内战干预期间调解员的行政人员流动情况。调解的有效性在很大程度上取决于（可信赖的）信息的提供和共享。调解员领导的变化有可能破坏这一点，从而降低调解绩效。使用1946年至2017年的内战数据，我们找到了对此论点的有力支持。这项研究揭示了以前在解决冲突中被忽略的因素，这是从业者和政策制定者特别感兴趣的。