Abstract
Ethnic violence after political transition has characterized the Balkans, Indonesia, post-Saddam Iraq, Russia, and a multitude of other countries. Yet not all multiethnic liberalizing states have experienced ethnic conflict. Some, like Kenya, experienced a relatively peaceful transition from one ruler to another, and developed ethnic violence only after the country was well past the “transitional” phase. Other multiethnic countries such as post-1999 Nigeria and South Africa seem to have avoided all indications of politicized ethnicity and the attendant conflict well into the consolidation phase. These instances of ethnic peace during democratization stand against the emerging conventional wisdom that periods of political opening create seemingly irresistible opportunities to mobilize ethnic constituencies into political blocks, which then escalate into violence.
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Notes
See Jessica Piombo,“Political Parties, Social Demographics and the Decline of Ethnic Mobilization in South Africa, 1994–1999,” Party Politics 11, no. 4 (July 2005): 447–470.
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© 2009 Jessica Piombo
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Piombo, J. (2009). Introduction: Ethnic Mobilization during Democratization. In: Institutions, Ethnicity, and Political Mobilization in South Africa. Palgrave Macmillan, New York. https://doi.org/10.1057/9780230623828_1
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