Political Behavior of Ethnic Leaders

Abstract

In determining those forces which shape the course of interethnic relations in developing societies, one of the most important elements is ethnic' leadership. In recent decades, self-conscious ethnic groups have rarely acted spontaneously. Instead, alternative courses of action have been followed as a result of the conscious or unconscious choices of ethnic community leaders. Perhaps to stress the significance of the leadership variable for the outcomes of ethnic politics is to state the obvious. Yet what is surprising is the relative paucity of studies on Third World ethnic and racial elites by political scientists. This is curious in view of the consistent interest of political scientists in studies generally, despite the imprecision of the elite concept. In fact, anthropologists have written the most incisive analyses of ethnic leadership to date. One example is Frederick Barth's work on the Swat Pathans which was influential in showing that relationships of dominance were dyadic ones of a contractual or voluntary nature.2 Another example is G. William Skinner's seminal study on Chinese minority leadership which marks a threshold for studies of ethnic elites in developing nations.3 Skinner echoed themes of the community power studies (of the 1950s) by considering the questions: How is a subnational defined? Who composes it? What values motivate its actions? Second, Skinner analyzed the processes of interelite relationships, illustrating ethnic decision making, Chinese dyadic ties to Thai officials, and the relationship between level of assimilation and both political and economic power in the community. Although the premises of Skinner's study were comparative, they have not been applied to other ethnic minorities. Country studies on the overseas Chinese customarily include sections on leadership. 4 Yet, for our purposes, these share two deficiencies: they are primarily concerned with Chinese community life and general interethnic relations, and they regard leadership in the modern community as a dependent variable. Thus, we learn about actions of community leaders only insofar as they respond to challenges of the environment (e.g., nationalization pressures) or occasionally from demands of nonelite community members. Leaders are not treated as an independent stratum within the community which can design policies autonomously. Such a conception