ABSTRACT
Across its multiple wars and military governments, Sudan established a system of rule that embraced perpetual crisis. Civil wars in southern Sudan spread to the Two Areas in 1987, with the state outsourcing counter-insurgency operations to militias. These central characteristics of power competition and factionalism within this system were amplified once oil production began in 1999, financing a peace agreement signed in 2005 with the principal rebel movement in southern Sudan, the Sudan People's Liberation Movement/Army. When South Sudan seceded in 2011, Sudan lost three-quarters of its oil reserves, which led to the removal of Bashir in April 2019 amid widespread demonstrations against worsening economic conditions and misgovernment. Hopes that a fully civilian government would steer Sudan out of its intersecting crises were dashed in June 2019, when the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces massacred civilians at the main protest camp in Khartoum.
