Unwelcome Neighbors: Shared Ethnicity and International Conflict During the Cold War

This article assesses the role of ethnic demographics and domestic ethnic rebellion in promoting international conflict. Three of the variables introduced examine dyads within which a common ethnic group exists. These variables are coded to distinguish the presence of a trans-border ethnic group that exists as a majority in both states; a majority in one state and a minority in the other; or a minority in both states. The pooled dataset, which covers the years 1951–1991, is analyzed using different types of data to account for both broad and narrow conceptions of ethnicity. The results indicate a strong and significant increase in dyadic conflict when two states share an ethnic group and an ethnic majority exists in at least one of the states. Ethnic rebellion is also found to significantly harm interstate relations when an ethnic diaspora is involved. Associations found between ethnicity and international conflict are most pronounced when international disputes involve fatalities.     

The Democratic Peace Through the Lens of Culture, 1820–1989

This article examines the extent to which cultural similarity vitiates the relationship between joint democracy and the incidence of interstate war. Previous empirical findings which suggest that cultural/normative explanations of the democratic peace are more robust than institutional/structural ones invite an analysis of the impact of broader cultural factors on the relationship between joint democracy and war involvement. The author suggests several ways that cultural factors might mitigate the democratic peace phenomenon and conducts a multivariate logistic analysis of state dyads from 1820 to 1989 to test the main query. Of the cultural variables, religious similarity within dyads is associated with a decreased likelihood of war onset, while both ethnic and linguistic similarity have the opposite effect. Democratic dyads, on average, have higher religious similarity levels than nondemocratic dyads, which, ostensibly, might play a role in reducing conflict within democratic dyads. However, the findings clearly demonstrate that although cultural factors are significant correlates of war they do not vitiate the impact of joint democracy on war. It appears that where a pair of states share a common democratic political culture it exerts a conflict dampening impact that overrides ethnic, linguistic, or religious factors.     

Intergovernmental Organization Memberships: Examining Political Community and the Attributes of International Organizations

Why are states jointly members in certain intergovernmental organizations (IGOs) but not others? Despite the proliferation of IGOs and renewed interest in this topic, we lack systematic research to answer this question. Our theory of political community explains why dyads of states are likely to be common members in particular types of IGOs. We analyze and compare functionalist and Deutschian communitarian perspectives about IGO memberships. We test our theory using newly available data on IGO mandates and institutional structure, which allows us to make specific predictions about the types of IGO to which dyads become members. We show that dyads that are economically dependent, and/or democratic and enjoying enduring peace, are more likely to join those IGOs that possess high levels of institutional structure. Militarized interstate conflicts reduce the likelihood of states sharing membership in common IGO, but not substantially, whereas development and alliances also increase IGO memberships between states. Trade ties, however, are the most important determinant of joint membership between states in the most institutionalized IGOs, which is congruent with security communities.     

Avant-garde or Supplement? Advisory Bodies of Transnational Associations as Alternatives to the League's Minority Protection System, 1919–1939

This exegesis focuses on the work of minority committees of transnational associations in the interwar period. Most of their members considered the League system to be inefficient and supported the establishment of non-state alternatives, which included private investigations on the spot, publicity for specific problems of minorities, and attempts to reconcile representatives of ethnic minorities with those of the majority. Members of non-involved states were pre-destined especially to act as neutral moderators. Only those in close contact with League officials avoided being misused by political forces that did not seek reconciliation but border revision. They learnt that the League rules looked inadequate from the outside but turned out to be useful in coming to applicable solutions once they started their own alternative methods. Their publications and investigative journeys turned out to deepen the problems, whilst their reconciliation work became an appreciated supplement of the League system.     

External Intervention in Ethnic Conflict

Recently, ethnicity has received greater attention from international conflict scholars. This study explores a new aspect of how ethnic composition of states and the power of ethnic kin affect external state interventions in ethnic conflicts. Here it is hypothesized that states with dominant ethnic groups but still-significant ethnic minorities are expected to be more prone to intervention in ethnic conflict than states without one of these two characteristics. A new measure is proposed to capture such variation in ethnic composition more precisely. Looking at large-N panel data, it is found that ethnically fractionalized states with dominant ethnic groups are indeed the most likely to intervene in ethnic conflicts. Additionally, the power of the embattled ethnic kin minority, as determined by its settlement patterns in the host state, also increases the likelihood of intervention. Traditional variables like proximity and capability retain statistical significance. However, ethnic variables have the strongest effects on interventions in ethnic conflict.     

Tau-b or Not Tau-b: Measuring the Similarity of Foreign Policy Positions

The pattern of alliances among states is commonly assumed to reflect theextent to which states have common or conflicting security interests. For the past twenty years, Kendall's τ b has been used to measure the similarity of nations' "portfolios" of alliance commitments. Widely employed indicators of systemic polarity, state utility, and state risk propensity all rely on τ b . We demonstrate that τ b is inappropriate for measuring the similarity of states' alliance policies. We develop an alternative measure of policy portfolio similarity, S , which avoids many of the problems associated with τ b , and we use data on alliances among European states to compare S to τ b . Finally, we identify several problems with inferring state interests from alliances alone, and we provide a method to overcome those problems using S in combination with data on alliances, trade, UN votes, diplomatic missions, and other types of state interaction. We demonstrate this by comparing the calculated similarity of foreign policy positions based solely on alliance data to that based on alliance data supplemented with UN voting data.     

Conflicts between east European states and minorities in an age of democracy

Conflict between dominant and subordinate ethnic groups in eastern Europe has greatly complicated efforts to build stable and just democratic systems in the region. Leaders of new states as well as rulers whose authority extends from the communist era have attempted to create political systems where competition is clearly along ethnic lines. Polarisation and violence have resulted from the manipulation of ethnic feeling, but there are also a range of factors which have encouraged majority and minority representatives to show mutual restraint at crucial moments.

The internationalisation of East European nationality disputes and the gradual acceptance by a number of states of group rights to stand alongside individual ones, have cooled down a number of disputes and possibly forestalled new ones. But the national question will be a troubling one for many still‐fragile democracies unless strong external incentives are offered which encourage states to conciliate internal minorities and estranged neighbours.     

Interstate Relations,Perceptions, and Power Balance: Explaining China’s Policies Toward Ethnic Groups, 1949–1965

Why do multi-ethnic states treat various ethnic groups differently? How do ethnic groups respond to these state policies? We argue that interstate relations and ethnic group perceptions about the relative strength of competing states are important—but neglected—factors in accounting for the variation in state-ethnic group relations. In particular, whether an ethnic group is perceived as having an external patron matters a great deal for the host state's treatment of the group. If the external patron of the ethnic group is an enemy of the host state, then repression is likely. If it is an ally, then accommodation ensues. Given the existence of an external patron, an ethnic group's response to a host state's policies depends on the perceptions about the relative strength of the external patron vis-à-vis the host state and whether the support is originating from an enemy or an ally of the host state. We present five configurations and illustrate our theoretical framework on the eighteen largest ethnic groups in China from 1949 to 1965, tracing the Chinese government's policies toward these groups, and examine how each group responded to these various nation-building policies.     

Islam in Southeast Asia: The Challenge of Radical Interpretations

This article addresses three questions. The rise of radical Islamic movements in Southeast Asia, the links between Jemaah Islamiyah (JI) and al-Qaeda, and the challenge to Southeast Asian states from JI. Desker gives an overview of radical Islamic organisations in Southeast Asia resorting to violence, and their reciprocal connections and ties to the global al-Qaeda network. These organisations and their actions draw attention to the interplay between transnational non-state actors, postcolonial states and regional integration processes in the Association of South-East Asian Nations (ASEAN). Desker points out the fragility of postcolonial states challenged by religious, ethnic and linguistic groups promoting separatist or transnational agendas. As new states protective of their sovereignty and the primacy of their national identities, the ASEAN members generally have pursued individual national interests in confronting such transnational actors. As such the ASEAN member-states have not relied on their multilateral relationships, highlighting the erosion of the ASEAN security community after the Cold War. The original version of this paper was prepared for the Regional Outlook Forum organized by the Institute of Southeast Asian Studies, Singapore on 7 January 2003.     

Rape as terror: The case of Bosnia

When ethnic minority parties are excluded from government coalitions, are group attributes such as religion related to the groups’ use of political violence? We argue that extremist factions within minority groups make use of divergence in religion to mobilize support for violent action when the group is excluded from government. Thus, we posit that while religion per se is not a source of violence, extremist elements of ethnic minorities, whose religion differs from the majority, may use religious divergence to mobilize group members to perpetrate terrorism. Specifically we test the hypotheses that extremist factions of an excluded group will be more likely to carry out terrorist attacks when the group's members belong to a different religion as well as when they belong to a different denomination or sect of a religion than the majority. To test these propositions, we use data on ethnic minority party inclusion in government coalitions, ethnic minority group religion, and the Global Terrorism Database (GTD) by matching perpetrators with ethnic groups for all democracies, 1970–2004.     

Transnational Transmitters: Ethnic Kinship Ties and Conflict Contagion 1946–2009

Previous research has proposed that ethnic conflict may spread across borders. Although the importance of transnational ethnic groups is often emphasized, the processes through which contagion may take place remain unspecified. The present study presents a context for more precise analysis of contagion. Further, it identifies distinct processes through which contagion is likely to occur within this context. It is argued that when an ethnic group engages in violent conflict in one state, kin in a nearby state may be inspired to rebel because the outbreak of conflict renders ethnic bonds and similar conditions salient. These bonds and similarities become even more salient when the kin group has opportunities and willingness to mobilize for rebellion. Statistical analysis employing unique global data covering 1946–2009 supports this argument. These results indicate that kinship ties matter for contagion and identify some of the conditions which amplify the effects such ties have for contagion.     

Religious Institutionalism: A Domestic Explanation for External Support of Rebel Groups

ABSTRACT

What motivates state support for rebel groups? The literature on state support for rebel groups has made critical developments. In particular, scholarship has shed light on the impact of religious identity links. Less work, however, examines the level of religious institutionalism in external states. I argue that the impact of religious links is conditional on the extent to which religion is institutionalized in the external state. Religiously institutionalized states allow domestic religious forces more space in the political arena, which increases pressure on state leaders to support co-religious rebel groups. Using statistical analysis, I find that the interaction of religious institutionalism and religious links affects the likelihood of support. When an external state and rebel group have religious links, and the external state has a high level of religious institutionalism, the likelihood of support is high. In contrast, without a high level of religious institutionalism in the external state, religious links do not increase the likelihood of support. The relationship is driven by cases where the external and target states do not share a religion. This article contributes to existing literature by moving beyond transnational religious links and focuses on how religious institutionalism increases domestic pressure to support co-religious rebel groups.     

Islam and politics in Europe and in Asia: Comparative reflections

This article compares the role of religion, and of Islam in particular, in politics in Europe and in South and South East Asia. It starts out with the policy dilemmas facing France, Europe's most secular country that also has Europe's largest immigrant Muslim community. After long debates nation-wide Muslim organisation is now sponsored by the state in order to strengthen moderate Islam in France. In contrast, explicit Christian parties are in decline in most of Europe. Those who are still electorally successful are Christian mostly in name only and have turned into centre-right conservative people's parties instead. Religious discourse in politics has hence vanished almost entirely in Europe. In difference in Asia Islamic opposition parties have managed to set increasingly the political agenda in the majority Islamic states. In those countries with an Islamic minority their public religious agitation serves to strengthen their ethnic minority identity. Meaningful bi-continental dialogue needs to be aware of this discrepancy in religious politics.     

Online Political Debate,Unbounded Citizenship,and the Problematic Nature of a Transnational Public Sphere

Citizenship has always been a dynamic notion, subject to change and permanent struggle over its precise content and meaning. Recent technological, economic, and political transformations have led to the development of alternative notions of citizenship that go beyond the classic understanding of its relationship to nation states and rights. Civil society actors play an important role in this process by organizing themselves at a transnational level, engaging with issues that transcend the boundaries of the nation state and questioning the democratic legitimacy of other transnational actors such as international and corporate organizations. They also allow citizens to engage with “unbounded” issues and to construct a transnational public sphere where such issues can be debated. It is often assumed that the Internet plays a crucial role in enabling this transnational public sphere to take shape. Empirical analysis of discussion forums and mailing lists developed by transnational civil society actors shows, however, that the construction of such a transnational public sphere is paved with constraints. To speak of a unified transnational public sphere is therefore deemed to be problematic. It cannot be seen or construed without taking into account the local, the national, and enforceable rights in order to materialize the ideas and hopes being voiced through civil society.     

The Homegrown Threat: State Strength,Grievance, and Domestic Terrorism

Scholars maintain that, similar to insurgency, terrorist violence is precipitated by both relative deprivation and state weakness. Yet aggrieved minority groups within a country should turn to terrorism when they are weak relative to the state rather than strong. Empirical evidence shows minority group discrimination and fragile political institutions to independently increase domestic terror attacks. But it remains unclear whether grievances drive domestic terrorism in both strong and weak states. Using data from 172 countries between 1998 and 2007, we find that for strong states the presence of minority discrimination leads to increased domestic terrorism, while for weak states the presence of minority discrimination actually leads to less domestic terrorism. Consequently, increasing state capacity may not be a panacea for antistate violence, as nonstate actors may simply change their strategy from insurgency or guerrilla warfare to terrorism. Efforts to reduce terrorist violence must focus on reducing grievance by eliminating discriminatory policies at the same time that measures to improve state capacity are enacted.     

Holding Out for Concession: The Quest for Gain in the Negotiation of International Agreements

This study examines partition's success in ending old and preventing new ethnic conflicts. Opponents of partition often claim that partition only invites (further) conflict by its inability to divide existing multiethnic countries in ways satisfying to all concerned ethnic groups. In contrast, proponents of partition argue that partition is the only ethnic conflict solution that provides ethnic separation, an element that is key if conflict prevention is of concern. By separating the belligerent groups, partition provides safety and a decrease in the need for interaction between groups that do not get along. When domestic and international violence is considered, partition's consequences largely depend on the timing of partition. In cases of partitions resulting from ethnic secessionist conflicts, there is a widespread continuation of serious domestic conflict but its frequency does decrease significantly, to a level that can be considered "normal." Internationally, dyads made up of violently partitioned countries avoid militarized conflict in more than one-third of the cases. In cases of peaceful (i.e., preventative) ethnic partitions, domestic conflict starts up in about half of the cases, but despite the significant increase in its frequency, the frequency remains "normal." Internationally, dyads made up of peacefully partitioned countries avoid militarized conflict almost completely. Accordingly, peaceful ethnic partitions produce dyads that are significantly less likely to engage in militarized conflicts and wars than dyads emerging from violent ethnic partitions. Contrary to some expectations, partitions do not create overwhelmingly nondemocratic countries; however, in cases of violent ethnic secessions, democratic institutions do not exhibit significant pacifying effect on subsequent domestic conflict. Important caveats notwithstanding, the overall results indicate that peaceful ethnic partitions have conflict management potential.     

International Cooperation,Spoiling, and Transnational Terrorism

Do interstate relations influence the sources and targets of transnational terrorism? A considerable body of recent research suggests that the answer to this question is yes, and that one state may sponsor terrorist attacks to weaken the bargaining positions of other states. We suggest, in contrast, that positive or cooperative actions invite terrorist attacks from a different source: nonstate groups wishing to spoil interstate cooperation that they oppose. We assess this argument with a dyadic dataset using monthly data on transnational terrorist attacks and cooperative and noncooperative actions between states. Our results suggest that spoiling in response to interstate cooperation is an important determinant of transnational terrorism.     

The Center-Periphery Cleavage Revisited: East and Central Europe from Postcommunism to Euroscepticism

The article examines the evolution of Eastern and Central European party systems from the previous communist/anticommunist conflict to the emergent division between pro-EU and Eurosceptic forces and puts forward a revised view of the traditional center-periphery cleavage in six countries: Poland, Hungary, the Czech Republic, Slovakia, Bulgaria, and Romania. The first part addresses the question of “stateness” and the second the Rokkan spatial approach while the third develops a revised view of the center-periphery cleavage in relation to space at the national (minority ethnic groups vs. state), regional (EU vs. Eastern European member states), and global (USSR vs. satellite countries during the bipolar system) levels.     

Generalized Social Trust and International Dispute Settlement

What determines the success of a peaceful settlement attempt of a border dispute? In order to fully understand why decision makers choose to put an end to an ongoing conflict, it is necessary to consider the social trust levels of the general populations in both states. International conflict settlement requires public support at the domestic level. If a state’s general population perceives the potential dangers of a settlement as too severe, the conclusion of a peace agreement will be difficult. We argue that high levels of social trust allow citizens (1) to favor more conciliatory foreign policies and (2) to be more optimistic about the future behavior of other states. In democratic settings, these public attitudes serve as powerful constraints for decision makers. As a result, high aggregate levels of social trust should be directly related to concession-granting behavior by democracies as well as effective dispute settlement among jointly democratic dyads. We test these expectations with a new aggregate-level measure of social trust and find mixed support for our hypotheses: While trust does not influence the behavior of challenger states, it does have strong effects on democratic target states and jointly democratic dyads.     

Identity and democracy in the Baltics

The purpose of this essay is to consider the probable impact of issues related to ethnic and cultural identity on democratization in Estonia, Latvia, and Lithuania. Particular attention will be given to the demographic make‐up of the Baltic states, which are home to a high percentage of Slavs (mostly Russians but also Belarusians, Poles, and Ukrainians), and to those factors which affect how these Slavs and the majority Baits: (1) identify themselves; and (2) identify with the new states in which they find themselves. The key question is the degree to which civic democracy can prosper in a newly emerging multi‐ethnic state. The answer is important not only for the Baltic states but also for the other new multinational states that have emerged from the former Soviet Union and Central and Eastern Europe in the past few years.