Does Modernization Breed Ethnic Political Conflict?

Abstract

Until the early 1970s many scholars believed that the process of economic modernization would result in the decline of ethnic political activity throughout the world. This melting pot modernization perspective failed on both theoretical and empirical grounds. After its collapse, scholars promoted a new conflictual modernization approach, which argued that modernization brought previously isolated ethnic groups into conflict. Although this approach accounted for the origins of ethnic conflict, it relied too heavily on elite motivations and could not account for the behavior of ethnic political movements. In the last five years, scholars have tried to develop a psychological approach to ethnic conflict. These scholars see conflict as stemming from stereotyped perceptions of differences among ethnic groups. This approach fails to analyze the tangible group disparities that reinforce these identifications and that may serve as the actual catalysts for ethnic political conflict. The conflictual modernization approach is reinvigorated by applying it to the cases of ethnic conflict in Canada and Belgium. In both of these countries the twin processes of economic modernization and political centralization intensified ethnic conflict while stripping ethnic movements of the romantic cultural ideologies and institutional frameworks that could provide these movements with some long-term stability. Thus, by integrating the modernization approach with a resource mobilization perspective we can develop theories that can account for ethnic conflict throughout the world.

Egalitarian norms, economic development, and ethnic polarization

“…Urbanization, education, and economic growth -the markers of modernity -inevitably generate unequal benefits and opportunities for people, and thus may accelerate and intensify group competition for scarce resources or over the power to control these resources. Based on Marxist and functionalist theories, it was initially expected that, with this emerging competition, ethnic boundaries would fall away and be replaced by class divisions (see e.g., Newman, 1991). When this failed to occur, new theories were advanced that see ethnic conflict as a by-product of modernization itself.…”

The Long-Term Consequences of Managing and Settling Ethnic Conflicts Through Ethnic Federalism: The Case of Ethiopia.

“…In multiethnic and multicultural societies, ethnic conflicts are not only recurrent, but often protracted and highly destructive (Newman, 1991). "Ethnic conflicts are as old as mankind" (Crocker, 1999).…”

‘Ungoverned Space’ and the Oil Find in Turkana, Kenya

“…Perceived inequality led to conflict in Darfur, Sudan and the Niger Delta (Carmody, 2011) and, all the more relevant to this case, conflict may be caused by uneven development that does not deliver the hoped-for benefits to populations (Newman, 1991). Similarly, the 'grievance' theory that conflict is caused by failure of political, economic and social institutions to pay attention to the grievances and perceived needs of large numbers of the population (Azar, 1990) may be supported by observations in several resource-rich areas.…”

“…Even if it is argued that the Turkana benefit from economic growth, modernisation, increased literacy and opportunities for political mobilisation, demands are likely to increase and trigger tension unless perceived benefits are adequate. Huntington (1968) notes that economic growth generates increasing demands for political participation by opening new opportunities for physical, social and economic mobility and Newman (1991) adds that social, economic and political modernisation can account for the rise of ethnic conflict.…”