"Regarding the goals of the rebellion, we can distinguish between revolutionary and secessionist civil wars. This dichotomy corresponds to the Uppsala Conflict Project's (UCDP) disrinction between the type of 'incompatability' over which government and rebels are fighting. UCDP codes two types of incompatibility: “government” and “territory” (some conflicts are coded as involving both). In a revolutionary civil war, the incompatibility between government and rebels is over control of the government. The goal of the rebels is to overthrow the incumbent regime and establish themselves as the new government of that nationstate. In a secessionist conflict, the conflict is over territory. The goal of the rebels is not to take over the existing government but to gain independence from it for the population of a particular ethno-regional enclave. In short, their goal is to carve out a second nation from a portion of an existing nation-state's territory..." https://books.google.com/books?id=rSPjCwAAQBAJ&pg=PA3
Maybe I'm beating a dead horse here, but I have seen arguments that the ACW wasn't "really' a civil war--from people who apparently do not realize that there is such a thing as a secessionist civil war.
Maybe I'm beating a dead horse here, but I have seen arguments that the ACW wasn't "really' a civil war--from people who apparently do not realize that there is such a thing as a secessionist civil war.