Ethno-national Conflict Research Articles

Modelling Game as Socio-Psychological Paradigm for Resolving Ethno-National Conflicts

The aim of this study was: (a) to evaluate the effectiveness of training to improve the intercultural behaviour of students; (b) to study and enrich their personal experience of resolving interethnic and international conflicts; and (c) to identify factors that contribute to the effective development of relevant skills that ensure social self-efficacy, reduce social avoidance, increase empathy and intercultural tolerance. The study used general scientific theoretical, empirical, experimental and statistical methods. To diagnose the dynamics of the studied variables – social self-efficacy, social avoidance, empathy, intercultural tolerance – “Scale of social self-efficacy of Fan and Mak”, “Situational scale of social avoidance”; checklists “Interpersonal skills”; “Basic scale for the diagnosis of empathy in adults”; diagnosis of the level of formation of intercultural tolerance were used. At the experimental stage of the study, a series of training based on modelling games (simulations) to resolve ethno-national conflicts was conducted. At the end of the training, a repeated diagnostic section of the dynamics of the above-mentioned variables and a semi-structured interview was conducted, which included 5 open-ended questions. The multivariate analysis of variance (MANOVA) of these variables in comparison with EG and CG groups revealed significant dynamics in the variables “social self-efficacy”, “empathy”, “intercultural tolerance” and minor changes in the variable “social avoidance”. The dynamics of the EG index was more significant. Respondents also praised the types of work such as working in groups, the model of providing feedback during game situations and presentations of student projects. The results of this study confirmed that the model based on simulation games (simulations) for resolving ethno-national conflicts was effective in improving social self-efficacy, empathy and intercultural tolerance and in lowering psychological barriers (social avoidance) of EG participants compared to CG individuals. Participants reported that this type of training allowed them to develop skills for future professional activities in a multicultural (poly-ethnic or poly-national) community.

Ethno-National Colonialism in South Africa

The purpose of this dissertation is to answer the question: why do ostensibly similar ethno-national conflicts within a system of settler-colonial domination see such wide variation in their outcomes? How they emerge from conflict through power sharing and social integration versus the endurance of separation and systems of domination and control? The study identifies causal paths that resulted in the decline of domination systems of this type. Ethno-national conflicts that feature certain similarities develop in different trajectories due to certain conditions that culminate in transforming the structures of these conflicts towards integration (the establishment of a single political entity) or separation (independence in separate entities). The goal of the dissertation is to examine the Palestinian-Israeli conflict through a comparative lens in order to specify the conditions that led to the persistence of the two-state solution and to examine the prevalence or lack of necessary and sufficient conditions for the emergence of a one civic-democratic state. Building on the comparative approach I argue that ethno-national territorial underpinnings of the conflict and the “regimes of territorial legitimation” of the dominant group are the most crucial explanatory factor in determining the trajectory and outcome of the conflict. “Regimes of territorial legitimation” are the practices, procedures, systems of meaning, and institutional designs that found the relationship between a nation, people or ethno-national group and geography/territory. The dissertation features a qualitative structured and focused comparison of the conflicts in South Africa, and Palestine. Method of difference is applied for a case-oriented interpretive inquiry that focuses on the complexity of each of the two cases and aims at capturing the historical diversity of these similar cases.

Assessment of the Activities of Russian State and Public Institutions in the Ethno-Conflict Sphere

The results of scientific research indicate that the activity of Russian state and public institutions in the ethno-conflict sphere is an important component of the national system of countering extremism. The article examines the problems of assessing the effectiveness of the activities of Russian institutions in the field of prevention and localization of ethno-national conflicts. A survey conducted by the author of the article (using the methods of questionnaires and in-depth interviews) of twenty experts who are highly qualified specialists in the field of countering ethno-extremism, the results of mass sociological studies, as well as an analysis of scientific works and media publications on the research topic allowed to determine the degree of influence of the main state and public institutions on ethno-conflict sphere. The actions of the institution of the presidency, the main religious organizations (the Orthodox Church, traditional Muslim clergy, Jewish organizations, Buddhist organizations) and the FSB were recognized as most positive (score “2”). The experts recognized the actions of the police, the prosecutor’s office, the National Guard and educational institutions as quite positive (score “1”). State legislative bodies of power do not have a tangible impact on the ethno-conflict sphere (score “0”); state executive authorities (ministries, municipal bodies) that are not related to power structures; state judicial authorities; Public Chamber of the Russian Federation; civil society organizations (human rights organizations, communities, parties, etc.). The negative influence on the ethno-conflict sphere in the Russian Federation is often exerted by the media: press, television, radio (expert assessment “-1”). The most negative impact on the ethnoconflict sphere of social media using the Internet, and politicized non-governmental organizations associated with foreign states (score “-2”). The problems of the activities of Russian institutions for the prevention, suppression and localization of ethnic conflicts have a significant impact on ensuring the national security of Russia. Therefore, they deserve the attention of the scientific community and need further sociological, political science and legal research.

CURRENT TRENDS IN THE STUDY, DEVELOPMENT AND MANAGEMENT OF ETHNIC CONFLICTS

The purpose of this article is to try to identify and analyze problematic issues of the methodology and methodology for studying ethno-national conflict, to characterize political and legal novelties in the field of regulation of ethno-national conflict in Russia and to outline the boundaries and formulate the characteristic features and signs of a “new normality” in the course of the ongoing development of the coronavirus pandemic, will in the long term be a determining factor for the further evolution of ethno-national conflicts, their study and management. For this, a special methodology was formulated, which includes the principles of systemic, theoretical-cognitive, institutional, instrumental and interdisciplinary approaches, mediated by the accepted in social science ideas about the relationship and interaction of subjective and objective factors in social processes with the relative independence of the subject. She allowed to achieve the following results: With regard to the methodological problems of theoretical and applied study of the ethno-national, a complex paradigm for the study of ethno-national conflicts was formed and it was established that in the modern English-language discourse there is a transition from the study of conflicts as phenomena in the system of ethno-national relations to their qualification as inter-religious; political novelties in the system of national relations of the modern Russian state are analyzed and characteristics of the current law enforcement in the system of ethno-national relations in Russia are given; the characteristic of the “new normalcy”, which is forming today in the course of the development of the COVID-19 pandemic, is given, conclusions are drawn regarding the crisis and post-crisis transformation of ethno-national conflicts and approaches to their resolution in the post-pandemic era. The conclusions of the work are as follows: ethno-national conflicts are an objectively cognizable phenomenon; their scientific understanding and analysis require the formation of an integrated (polyparadigmatic) approach. Political novelties in the system of interethnic relations in modern Russia (National Security Strategy) indicate that the country's leadership pays great attention to these issues. At the same time, the law enforcement practice, being, on the one hand, established in the criminal and administrative spheres in the civil law sphere, shows us the ill-considered actions of some subjects. With regard to ethno-national conflicts in the course of a pandemic and post-pandemic new normalcy, it should be stated that they will not disappear anywhere and, on the contrary, may acquire new forms, which will have to be promptly and adequately responded to.

Jacques Derrida’s philosophy of forgiveness

This paper presents social and political dimensions of forgiveness within Jacques Derrida’s philosophy. Derrida’s philosophy of forgiveness is an example of how philosophy can help us understand and resolve contemporary social and political issues. Derrida believes that traditional concept of forgiveness should be broadened beyond the bounds of the rational and the imaginable. According to Derrida, traditional concept of forgiveness needs rethinking because of the phenomenon of proliferation of scenes of forgiveness after the Second World War that produced globalization of forgiveness and trivialized and decharacterized this term. According to Derrida, the act of forgiveness can only be thought beyond the limits of common sense and in the space of the impossible, and that is the forgiveness of something that common sense cannot forgive. Derrida’s philosophy of forgiveness has wide social and political implications as it transcends binary oppositions: present/past, self/other, friend/enemy and so forth. All concepts within Derrida’s philosophy of politics (friendship, enemy, hospitality, forgiveness, justice, and so on) are significant for societies eroded with traumas of wars and ethno-national divisions and conflicts. Keywords: Derrida, philosophy, forgiveness, enemy, migration, asylum, hospitality.

Women and peace-building in Northern Ireland’s print news media

This research sits at the nexus of women, peace-building and the news media in order to decipher how the representations of women and peace-building in post-conflict Northern Ireland affect women’s social situation in divided societies recovering from violent ethnonational conflict. Women are habitually associated with non-political community-level reconciliation through an assumed innate and feminine propensity to peace. This is amplified through gendered news media portrayals which serve to reinforce patriarchal social knowledge, and in turn, this disenfranchises women by foregrounding their femaleness rather than political expertise; and damages peace by marginalizing a significant demographic of the population and intensifying social inequality, which is the foundation for conflict.

Settling with Autonomy after Civil Wars: Lessons from Aceh, Indonesia

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.

Transnational coalition building: The case of volunteers in the conflict in Abkhazia

ABSTRACT The 1992–93 war in Abkhazia was one of several ethno-nationalist conflicts which blighted the Caucasus, following the demise of the Soviet Union. The conflict involved the large-scale mobilization of volunteers, from southern Russia and from further afield, who allied with Abkhaz secessionists in the build-up to, and during, the war. This paper examines the coalition-building process between Abkhaz secessionists and other ethno-nationalist movements throughout the conflict. This article’s central questions examine how the coalitions between Abkhaz and non-indigenous movements formed and how the process of coalition-building impacted on the longevity of such alliances. Drawing on the concept of transnational activism, it analyses the role of ethnic relatedness, political opportunity and common threat as contributing factors which influenced mobilization and the alliance-building process. The paper assesses the durability of the transnational coalitions in three different phases of the Georgian-Abkhaz conflict. The study illustrates that the most durable alliances formed with Abkhaz’s closest ethnic relatives Abkhaz-Abaza movements, Ossetian nationalists and the broader “Russian world.” It demonstrates that the Abkhaz connection with Chechen and Circassian movements was event-based and temporary.

Social Services in Ethnically Mixed Cities: Street-Level Bureaucracy at the Crossroads of Ethno-National Conflict

There is a paucity of research examining street-level bureaucracy in cities affected by ongoing ethnopolitical conflict. This study addresses this limitation by exploring the work of social workers in the public services of mixed cities in Israel. It shows the interconnection between ambiguous institutional policies, varying workers’ views of the role of social services, and changing discretion patterns. Findings also suggest that episodes of conflict escalation intensify staff ethnic sectarianism, as well as increase workers’ own ethnic biases, which affect the ways in which they act as a liaison between the welfare system and citizens through their use of discretion.

Political Modernization in the States of South Asia: Historical Trends and Current Models

The article focuses on the analysis of the realities of political and modernization processes that determine the historical and political development of modern countries of the South Asian subregion. The political process in the states of South Asia is considered in the context of the main milestones of state and nation-building. In this regard, the article touches upon the following significant subjects: the shift in the emphasis of nation-building in modern India as the largest non-Western democracy, the departure from the policy of isolationism in Nepal, the influence of the military-bureaucratic apparatus on instability in Pakistan and Bangladesh, the influence of the ethno-national conflict (Sinhalo-Tamil armed conflict) in Sri Lanka on the political process, “training democracy” in the Kingdom of Bhutan, attempts at democratic reforms in the Republic of Maldives. It is noted that despite the ethnic, confessional and political-cultural diversity, the Southern countries have points of contact in the common past: firstly, for a long time (until the late Middle Ages) they existed within the framework of a single socio-cultural community of Indian civilization; secondly, most of them share a common colonial past, which made a kind of “inoculation” of Western political institutions. The main trends of the modern historical and political development of South Asian countries are revealed: the potential instability of political systems, the asynchrony of the temporal experience of political modernization processes, the pendulum-like legitimization of power (from strengthening national identity to returning to democratic transformations, and vice versa), the deideologization of mass political consciousness. The political modernization processes of South Asian countries are also considered in the context of strengthening religious identity and the success of religious nationalisms in the political life of states. It is concluded that the lack of demand for moderate reformism in modern South Asian countries over the past decades can be explained in several socio-philosophical perspectives: firstly, as a result of a natural rollback of forced institutional modernization, followed by a new round of modernization according to the type of the most effective Western model of socio-political development, which is universal; secondly, as one of the variants of the plurality of modernity, when religious revival is perceived as one of the possible interpretations of modernization, taking into account the socio-cultural context, in which there is no place for secular cosmopolitanism.

The Relative Success of Consociational Institutions in Deeply Divided Societies

Lebanon and Northern Ireland conjure opposite images on consociationalism in the minds of many political scientists. While in Lebanon, the consociational system widely proved inefficient in preventing the outbreak of ethno-national conflicts, the Northern Ireland’s experience of consociationalism remains vastly positive. Following a “Most Similar Systems Design” defined by Adam Przeworski and Henry Teune (2000), this research note tests the hypothesis that the positive nature of exogenous influences participates to a higher political stability in Northern Ireland relative to Lebanon, where external influences of negative nature had the reverse effect. For the sake of this study, the developments taking place after the signature of the agreements shaping both consociational systems – the Ta’if Agreement of 1989 in Lebanon and the Good Friday Agreement of 1998 in Northern Ireland – are analysed through a particular focus on elites’ external relations with patron states and their interactions with their regional or global environments.

Women MPs from Northern Ireland: Challenges and Contributions, 1953–2020

This article investigates women’s representation as Northern Ireland (NI) MPs in the House of Commons since 1953. The central argument of the study is that the political and cultural positions dominant at the formation of NI in the early 20th century reverberate through the generations and continue to inform women’s political under-representation today. The article provides an historical context for women’s political and public participation from the 1950s, highlighting the gendered political culture in which this engagement took place. It examines the additional freezing effect of the ethno-national conflict on women’s civic and political involvement from the 1970s–1990s. In terms of women’s Westminster contributions, the article focuses on the period following the 1998 Good Friday/Belfast agreement and details the extent of women’s candidacies in general elections. It highlights their participation in parliamentary voting, and some of the issues to which they have contributed. The study shows the influence of a conservative, gendered political culture on the issues that have engaged women MPs from Northern Ireland. The article concludes that Northern Ireland’s privileging of male power continues to frame the political agendas and work of women MPs.

SOME CHARACTERISTICS OF CONTEMPORARY POLITICAL AND LEGAL DISCOURSE OF ETHNIC AND NATIONAL CONFLICTS IN RUSSIA

The issue of ethnic relations and the conflicts generated by them is acutely relevant. Many branches and directions of modern science study it. Political science and jurisprudence are in the foreground of the modern study of ethno-national conflictology. Over a long period of research, they have developed several influential approaches that have become widespread. The growing complexity of the surrounding political and legal reality, the escalation of conflict in society, including ethno-national, require the search and application of new research paradigms. One of these is the analysis of political and legal discourse, which consists in studying the ways of how legal meanings, ideas, opinions and preferences, which are carried by legislators, are technically and meaningfully embodied in the texts of normative acts, subsequently forming a specific political and legal reality. Analyzing the domestic ethno-conflictological political and legal discourse, the author concludes that in the era of the Russian Empire, the legalization of ethno-national relations had little attention from legislators, the documents adopted in the 19th century carried widespread ideas of the legislative theory and existed unchanged until 1917. The basic paradigm of the Soviet political and legal regulation of ethno-national relations was the ideological dogmas of the theorists of Marxism-Leninism, within which, in Soviet society, such a phenomenon as an ethno-national conflict was denied, but, in fact, existed. At the present stage, after the acute events of the second half of the 1980s - 1990s, a serious system of political and legal regulation of ethno-national relations was developed. It bore fruit. Today, the domestic political and legal regulation of ethno-national relations has the character of a developing system designed to adequately respond to changes. The article can be used to improve the state social and legal policy of the Russian Federation. Also, the materials presented can provide the interest of students, graduate students, teachers, researchers and other people who are interested in the current social, political and legal development of Russia.

Representation and the misidentification of economic and ethnoreligious conflict in Republican Xinjiang

ABSTRACT The era spanning the late Qing and early Republic of China (1877–1933) is regarded as a period of extensive change in East Turkestan (Xinjiang), Chinese Central Asia, particularly with regard to the emergence of modern Uyghur national identity, and therefore of ethnonational conflict. However, the tendency to focus on ethnic identity obscures other dimensions of conflict, among them the tensions that emerge during periods of rapid economic change. This article shows how violence in the oasis of Kucha in 1918 stemmed from conflict between two competing groups of landowners. However, systems of information-gathering within the provincial government and the representation of the events to the outside world promoted the idea that this violence stemmed instead from ethnic or religious difference and international conspiracy. Those power-holders advanced representations of the society they governed that were useful to their politics and, in turn, to modern Chinese politics as well.

Lay theories of peace and their influence on policy preference during violent conflict

We often talk about peace as if the concept is self-explanatory. Yet people can have various theories about what peace "is." In this study, we examine the lay theories of peace of citizens embroiled in a prolonged ethnonational conflict. We show that lay theories of peace 1) depend on whether one belongs to the high-power or low-power party and 2) explain citizens' fundamental approaches to conflict resolution. Specifically, we explore the link between power asymmetry, lay theories of peace, and preference for conflict resolution strategies within large-scale samples of Palestinian residents of the West Bank and the Gaza Strip and Jewish residents of Israel. Results reveal that members of the high-power group (in this case Jewish-Israelis) are more likely to associate peace with harmonious relationships (termed "positive peace") than with the attainment of justice (termed "structural peace"), while members of the low-power group (in this case Palestinians) exhibit an opposite pattern. Yet both groups firmly and equally interpret peace as the termination of war and bloodshed (termed "negative peace"). Importantly, across societies, associating peace with negative peace more than with positive or structural peace predicts citizens' desire for a solution that entails the partition of land (the Two-State Solution) whereas associating peace with structural or positive peace more than with negative peace predicts citizens' desire to solve the conflict by sharing the land (the One-State Solution). This study demonstrates the theoretical and policy-relevant utility of studying how those most affected by war understand the concept of peace.

Identifying The Key Contributory Factors Behind Ethno-national Conflict

Humans have, since time immemorial, contested over territory and, given its connection to resource access, attached great importance thus. Contestation over territory, especially when it is of significant scale, typically occurs via group-level articulation rather than individual. Such claims are all too often rooted in, legitimised by, and resisted on the grounds of, the ethnicity of the group(s) in question—hence ethno-national conflict. Indeed, conflict between ethnic groups, be it violent or non-violent, while not a constant, has been a frequent feature of our modern age. This article aims to identify the key contributory factors that sit behind ethno-national conflict. Particular attention will be paid to factors spanning across categories that hold a considerable amount of explanatory sway, namely, structural, political, and economic. However, light attention will also be given to ‘other factors’ such as those that fall within environmental and cultural categories. For all the contributory factors identified, supportive empirical evidence will be used to demonstrate their relative value.

Ethno-National Conflict Resolution and EU Integration: A Justice-Based Approach

This paper looks at how differing conceptions of justice (Eriksen 2016) are reflected in, and impact upon, the EU’s efforts in the thematic area of ethno-national conflict resolution. As seen in the case studies of Serbia - Kosovo (Tomic 2020) and Cyprus (Diez 2019), the EU’s conflict resolution policy has been characterised by inconsistency. In each case, the EU showed potential for different approaches to justice to be utilised however the focus predominantly remained within a state-centred, approach. As ethno-national conflicts are based on a variety of factors, including territorial disputes, identity, culture and historical injustice, the limitations of justice within such a framework become evident, highlighting the potential of alternative justice models. Simultaneously the EU has aligned its conflict resolution strategy to its ongoing integration and enlargement policies. With enlargement directly linked to the EU’s efforts in conflict resolution, the two case studies show that the EU’s lack of coherence, vis-a-vis its enlargement strategy, prevents it from effectively contributing to ethno-national conflict resolution within its integration policy. In those cases where the EU membership is not the primary aim, the EU’s vision portrays a tentative balance between different approaches to global justice with consequences for policy coherence and effectiveness (Tomic and Tonra 2018). The conclusion provides a summary of considerations to be made for the EU’s role in global justice and ethno-national conflict resolution to be better aligned.

Catholic Mediation in the Basque Peace Process: Questioning the Transnational Dimension

The Basque conflict was one of the last ethnonationalist violent struggles in Western Europe, until the self-dissolution in 2018 of ETA (Euskadi ta Askatasuna, Basque Country and Freedom). The role played by some sectors of the Roman Catholic Church in the mediation efforts leading to this positive outcome has long been underestimated, as has the internal pluralism of the Church in this regard. This article specifically examines the transnational dimension of this mediation, including its symbolic aspect. The call to involve the Catholic institution transnationally was not limited to the tangible outcomes of mediation. The mere fact of involving transnational religious and non-religious actors represented a symbolic gain for the parties in the conflict struggling to impose their definitions of peace. Transnational mediation conveyed in itself explicit or implicit comparisons with other ethnonationalist conflicts, a comparison that constituted political resources for or, conversely, unacceptable constraints upon the actors involved.

The Making of ‘Hesitant Peace’ in Northern Ireland

This article examines the early stage of the Northern Ireland conflict from the beginning of the ethno-nationalist conflict called the Troubles of 1969 to the beginning of the ‘peace process’ through the Downing Street Declaration of 1993 by focusing on a process of political, non-violent resolution efforts of political agents, which affected the route of the conflict. It utilises conflict resolution approaches to determine the variables with regards to the perceptions, positions, and decisions of conflicting parties, which provide an understanding of their role in peacemaking during the highintensity conflict. Particularly, it offers three major aspects for analysis: inter-party collaboration, popular support, and interchangeability between armed and political struggle. It uses rich data from archival documents to analyse the influence of early peace efforts to de-escalate the conflict and establish foundations for peace prior to official negotiations. It argues that peace efforts do not consist of official negotiations in the 1990s. The article finds that they had been initiated long before multilateral negotiations through political conferences, direct and indirect dialogues between major political parties in Northern Ireland, and the British and Irish governments. However, the reluctance of political agents towards peace prevented making progress towards peace. 

Between Border Dispute and Ethnic Conflict: The EU as a Just Mediator in the Serbia-Kosovo Stalemate

This paper analyses the contribution of the European Union (EU) to global justice and ethno-national conflict resolution between Kosovo and Serbia through its rule of law mission in Kosovo (EULEX), the Stabilisation and Association Process (SAP), and the EU-facilitated dialogue between Pristina and Belgrade. The paper argues that an observed inability of the EU to resolve the conflict between Serbia and Kosovo stems from inconsistent and often contradictory normative drivers in the EU’s policy towards Serbia and Kosovo. The normative drivers are part of the EU’s commitment to achieving global justice through its foreign policy. To better understand and disaggregate these justice concerns, the paper utilises the GLOBUS global justice framework, which distinguishes between three conceptions of global justice: justice as non-domination, justice as impartiality and justice as mutual recognition. The paper identifies the ideal-situation policy choices in conflict management, which are in line with the respective conceptions of global justice. The paper then assesses the EU’s actions in Serbia and Kosovo and their effects on the ground against these ideal-type scenarios. The analysis reveals the key policy dilemmas the EU faces on the ground and argues that these dilemmas hinder their efforts in resolving the resolution of the frozen conflict between Serbia and Kosovo. The paper relies on both documentary data and interviews with stakeholders in Kosovo and Serbia that are affected by the EU’s actions, including civil society, businesses and governmental agencies.