Rebel groups rely on civilians to achieve victory in civil conflict. The public's attitudes determine their ability to realize key aims, such as extracting vital information, coercing support, and mobilizing new fighters. However, numerous strategic considerations encourage rebels to use violence against civilians. More so, rebel groups also face battlefield losses and political setbacks that can damage their reputation among non-combatants. I explore how rebels navigate the tension that results from these dynamics in this dissertation. Overall, I argue that rebels influence the public's attitudes using intentional messaging and violence. My theory suggests rebel media can effectively shape how the public perceives an organization and be used to distract from bad behavior or losses to the government. It can also justify and contextualize attacks that might otherwise be considered offensive. However, I argue that tactical considerations still restrain rebel behavior and that they generally attempt to conduct violence when the payoffs are high and the costs are relatively low.I argue in the first empirical chapter that civilians partly rely on rebel propaganda to inform their beliefs about a conflict. This is because credible information about a conflict's warring parties and their attributes is difficult for civilians to obtain, as misinformation, rumors, and selective news coverage are common in civil conflicts. Rebels understand this and provide ostensible evidence that indicates their organization is strong relative to the government in their media outlets. I expect civilians to update their beliefs partly based on this information due to their information disadvantage. I estimate a difference-in-differences model that exploits the sudden introduction of a rebel group's radio station between two representative survey waves and demonstrate that exposure to rebel media can increase perceptions of a group's strength.I explore the functional use of propaganda in the second empirical chapter. Specifically, I argue that rebels use media to distract their supporters from tactical setbacks and to refute narratives of the conflict that are unfavorable to them. By deploying messaging approximate to events that could cause reputational harm, rebels attempt to reshape public perceptions of their organization. Consistent with this, I show that rebel groups in Syria respond to battlefield losses by publishing more propaganda. Additionally, I demonstrate through two case studies that rebels provide evidence of military strength while losing territory to the government and information about their governance activities when targeting civilians. The third empirical chapter examines the logic that rebel groups employ when deciding whether to conduct violence. I specifically examine the use of terrorism during religious holidays. I argue multiple incentives exist that encourage violence on these days. For example, attacks on holy days allow terrorists to signal their religiosity and impose extra terror on their targets. Rebels can decrease possible blowback from their own supporters for violating these days by framing their violence as divinely inspired in official propaganda. Governments understand these days are triggers for violence though and increase security surrounding them. However, their ability to do this is limited by the length of the holiday due to resource constraints and practical concerns. I demonstrate that the probability of an attack occurring on holidays that last a few days or less is lower than on non-holidays and provide evidence this is because state security is at its peak. I also show that holidays that last weeks have a higher likelihood of witnessing a terror attack than non-holidays, which I argue is because they are more difficult to protect and still provide payoffs to terror groups.This dissertation consequently broadly investigates how rebel groups attempt to influence the public during civil conflict through both propaganda and violence. I argue throughout that rebels are calculating actors that seek to maximize their ability to use violence while minimizing possible sanctions for that behavior. In doing so, I demonstrate propaganda meaningfully affects civilian attitudes. More so, I provide evidence that rebels understand the benefits of propaganda and attempt to use it to their advantage. However, I also show that tactical choices made by the government can limit the behavior of rebel groups, influencing their ability to benefit from propaganda.
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