Diffusion and Escalation of Ethnic Conflict

Abstract

In this book we offer an approach to understanding the internationalization of ethnic conflict in different regional contexts that integrates international relations and comparative analysis. We examine four core explanatory frameworks that contribute to the diffusion and the escalation of ethnic conflicts in divided states and societies. These explanations are at the nexus of comparative and international understandings of conflict. Much of the literature on ethnic conflict focuses on the origins of ethnic identity (instrumentalists versus constructivists; Smith 1986, 1993; Kaplan 1993; Connor 1994; Arfi 1998) or on the sources of ethnic conflict (Lake and Rothchild 1998).1 We focus on the link between ethnic and interstate conflict, and specifically, on the internationalization of ethnic conflicts. We recognize the internationalization of ethnic conflict as requiring an under-standing of “intermestic” structures and processes.2