Do Religious Factors Impact Armed Conflict? Empirical Evidence From Sub-Saharan Africa

Theoretically, the “mobilization hypothesis” establishes a link between religion and conflict by arguing that particular religious structures are prone to mobilization; once politicized, escalation to violent conflict becomes more likely. Yet, despite the religious diversity in sub-Saharan Africa and the religious overtones in a number of African conflicts, this assumption has not yet been backed by systematic empirical research on the religion–conflict nexus in the region. The following questions thus remain: Do religious factors significantly impact the onset of (religious) armed conflict? If so, do they follow the logic of the mobilization hypothesis and, if so, in which way? To answer these questions, this article draws on a unique data inventory of all sub-Saharan countries for the period 1990–2008, particularly including data on mobilization-prone religious structures (e.g., demographic changes, parallel ethno-religious identities) as well as religious factors indicating actual politicization of religion (e.g., inter-religious tensions, religious discrimination, incitement by religious leaders). Logit regressions suggest that religion indeed plays a significant role in African armed conflicts. These findings are compatible with the mobilization hypothesis, and stress the impact of conflict-prone religious structures, and particularly, the fact that overlaps of religious and ethnic identities are conflict-prone. Future research should investigate the religion-ethnicity-nexus in more detail.     

The motivation of European Union mediation in civil conflicts

ABSTRACT

Since the EU has expanded its common security focus in the 1990s, this important regional organisation has become the most frequent mediator in low-level civil conflicts worldwide. Under what conditions is the European Union (EU) likely to become involved in mediation in civil conflicts? Is the participation in mediation only explained by the EU's bias toward its near abroad, or is the EU more strategic? Some scholars have suggested that the EU's regional bias for its near abroad is the key explanation for the onset of EU mediation, but we propose that the reality of EU mediation presents a more nuanced story. We posit three explanations based on mediator bias: regional bias, economic bias, and normative bias. Overall, we argue that the EU will mediate in civil conflicts that are in its near abroad, but also where the EU has economic bias and where the EU can exercise its normative power in highly intractable conflicts. We test our hypotheses using statistical analysis of the UCDP low-level civil conflicts data from 1993 to 2004 and Civil War Mediation data from 1974 to 2005. We find strong support for our hypotheses, determining key factors that reveal the EU's strategic onset of mediation.     

次区域合作背景下国际河流通航利用的冲突模式——澜沧江—湄公河与图们江的实践比较

探索国际河流合作通航中的经验及模式,对于化解矛盾和早日实现图们江合作通航有着重要意义。以次区域合作为背景,运用地缘政治与地缘经济理论与方法,对澜沧江—湄公河与图们江通航实践进行比较分析,基于正反经验提出了合作通航的冲突模式。研究表明,在国际河流的合作通航中,地缘政治向地缘经济的转移是前提条件,次区域合作是主要推动力,多维利益的平衡是核心问题,签署和规范国际河流法是根本保障。针对图们江合作通航中的矛盾冲突,指出了化解途径。     

Conversations in Istanbul: An interview with Bulent Ecevit

Turkey, a strategically located but often unappreciated ally of the West, receives inadequate attention in Western media. It has served as a crucial element of Western defense during the cold war and is a bridge between Europe and the Middle East. The following interview with former Prime Minister Bulent Ecevit examines the Turkish perspective on important Turkish foreign and domestic issues, specifically focusing on: Arab‐Israeli conflict, Turkish‐Greek dispute over Cyprus, Turkish relations with the Arabs, Turkish relations with the United States and West European countries, Arab relations with the West, and internal Turkish political affairs.     

Relative Political and Value Proximity in Mediated Public Diplomacy: The Effect of State-Level Homophily on International Frame Building

This article applies the homophily thesis to public diplomacy and offers an empirical examination of a country's success in its mediated public diplomacy efforts. It analyzes international frame building, the process of creating or changing media frames in the international communications arena, by applying it to the case of Israeli mediated public diplomacy efforts during the war in Gaza in the winter of 2008–2009. The article claims that one way to use the homophily thesis in empirical analyses of international frame-building campaigns in conflicts is to measure the political and value proximity of a country promoting frames to other countries. Yet, proximity should be measured relatively rather than in absolute terms. Therefore, one should look not only at the dyadic proximity between two actors (i.e., Country A that attempts to promote its frames to Country C), but at the relative proximity between Countries A and C considering the proximity between the rival Country B and the target Country C. The study proposes a model and a method to facilitate empirical analysis of this claim. Using sophisticated computerized content analysis, our analyses demonstrate that relative proximity is related to successful international frame building in the hypothesized direction: The closer the relative proximity between Israel and a foreign country, the greater the acceptance of Israel's views.     

The religious experience as affecting ambivalence: the case of democratic performance evaluation in Israel

Religiosity increases both criticism and instability in democratic performance evaluations, and accordingly decreases reliance on these assessments in the construction of political self-efficacy, trust in institutions, and patriotism. This is due to the conflicting experiences that religious citizens of democracies live through; while their personal religious environment often adheres to many undemocratic characteristics, their experience as citizens contains assorted democratic attributes. These results, from heteroskedastic maximum likelihood models using data from a 2006 representative survey among Israeli Jews, augment the exclusive focus of the literature of democratic attitudes on the strength of attitudes, and shift attention from policy attitudes to other evaluative judgements.     

Illiberal democracy and violent conflict in contemporary Indonesia

When Indonesia's President Suharto was forced to resign in 1998, the accompanying uncertainty triggered serious communal violence in five regions. As the nation's politics and economy stabilized from 2002, so did those provinces. Identity-based conflict is now the rare exception rather than the rule in democratic Indonesia. Yet puzzlingly, despite the consolidation of democracy, ethnic clashes and mob violence against religious minorities continue to occur. While such events are now far smaller than those in the first years of democratization and occur only occasionally, their persistence requires analysis given the potential for escalation and what it tells us about Indonesia's reform process. In this article I compare recent incidents with that of the initial post-authoritarian era, and find that identity-based collective violence persists because many important causes of conflict have not been removed by democratic consolidation. As found by numerous scholars, many illiberal characteristics of the authoritarian state have segued neatly into democratic Indonesia. I assert that this has left several main causes of group violence firmly in place. I further contend that the failure to remove these phenomena partly has its origins in the order of democratic reforms chosen in the years after Suharto's resignation.     

Considerations on inequality and politics in Thailand

In Thailand, economic inequality has long been a fact of life. It is a “general inequality of condition” that can be seen to influence all aspects of social, economic, and political life. Yet inequality has not always been associated with political activism. Following the 2006 military coup, however, there has been a deliberate and politicized linking of inequality and politics. The article explores a complex of political events – elections, coup, constitution, and the political ascent of Thaksin Shinawatra – that has given rise to a relatively recent politicization of economic and political inequalities, now invoked in street politics – a rhetoric developed amongst pro-Thaksin red shirts that challenged the status quo and generates conflict over the nature of electoral democracy.     

Persuasion and Power in Cameroon

In 2001, the government of Burkinabè launched a major urban renewal project, known as ZACA (Zone d'aménagement commerciale et administrative), in the capital city of Ouagadougou. This decision, which would entail the destruction of several populated neighbourhoods in the downtown core, was vigorously opposed by residents, the vast majority of whom were Musulmans, who were organized into a residents association led by the district imams. Although this religious-oriented protest movement proved to be short-lived and did not lead to a redefinition of the relations between the Islamic community and the state, the events surrounding Project ZACA reveal important changes within the Musulman community, relating to intergenerational tension and the erosion of a certain form of religious authority.     

Only If We Agree? How Value Conflicts Moderate the Relationship Between Transformational Leadership and Public Service Motivation

Existing studies find positive associations between transformational leadership and public service motivation (PSM), but value conflict may moderate the relationship. This is investigated for Danish University Colleges using a mixed-methods design. These colleges educate future teachers, pedagogues, nurses, and social workers, and their strong public service-oriented missions and potentially conflicting public values make this sector a well-suited case to test whether consensus on public values is a precondition for a positive association between transformational leadership and employee PSM. Based on a survey of 968 employees combined with qualitative interviews concerning specific public values, we find that the less value conflict, the stronger the positive relationship between the direct managers’ level of transformational leadership and the employees’ PSM. This is also the case for the top management. This implies that transformational leadership might be a way for managers to enhance employee PSM, but only if there is no severe value conflict.