Abstract
AbstractAutonomy arrangements short of secession have been popular among international actors as a solution to deadly self‐determination conflicts. However, the number of peace agreements incorporating autonomy, while clearly eliminating the possibility of secession, is limited in practice. According to the literature, this is because: (1) ethnic rebels are too weak militarily to extract substantial concessions from national governments; and (2) because the governmental offer of autonomy is not credible to rebels. Drawing upon the single case study of Aceh, this research examines how warring parties overcome these two obstacles and successfully settle ethnonational conflicts through autonomy. First, although ethnonational conflicts do not tend to be costly over a single year, they often last for decades, and the accumulation of this cost over years can be substantial. In light of this long‐term cost, national governments have incentives to offer substantial concessions to stop the conflict from persisting indefinitely. Second, rebels could sign the agreement if they perceive that their autonomy is internationally guaranteed in the long term. It is imperative for international policy makers to consider these points when they try to help resolve ethnonational conflicts through autonomy.
Highlights
Autonomy arrangements short of secession have been popular among international actors as a solution to deadly self-determination conflicts
When seeking a way out, how do warring parties overcome these two obstacles and reach an autonomy arrangement? This paper aims at filling this gap in the literature (Caspersen, 2017; da Rocha, 2019; Zartman, 2000)
Ethnonational conflicts are defined as conflicts between ethnic minority rebels and national governments where the former demands some kind of self-determination such as autonomy or independence over what they consider their homeland (Gurr, 1993)
Summary
This paper examines how warring parties in ethnonational conflicts successfully negotiate an autonomy arrangement. Ethnonational conflicts are defined as conflicts between ethnic minority rebels and national governments where the former demands some kind of self-determination such as autonomy or independence over what they consider their homeland (Gurr, 1993). A type of territorial self-governance, refers to a special status for a specific territorially delimited entity with a wider range of powers than other territorial entities in the same country (Wolff, 2013). As such, granting the status of (wider) autonomy to a specific region ‘need not affect the general institutional organisation of a state’ Even though autonomy is granted during the interim period prior to self-determination, this paper focuses on autonomy arrangements that eliminate the possibility of secession, namely autonomy short of independence
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