Ethnic Conflicts and Solutions for Them - Essay Example

The given analysis represents two views from Security Studies journal that discuss ethnic wars and try to find the best solutions for them. On the one hand, Alexander Downes (2004) in his article “The Problem with Negotiated Settlements to Ethnic Civil Wars” provides a detailed investigation of different negotiating outcomes from ethnic conflicts. In his vision, radical victory of one side in the conflict is much better than any negotiation. Among the main goals of his article, he assumes that “ending such wars with partition or military victory may be more stable than agreements to share or diffuse power within the confines of a single state” (Downes, 2004, p. 252). On another hand, James Fearon (2004) wrote his “Separatist Wars, Partition, and World Order” article in order to clarify the opposite view on partition. In this work, he states that partition ad hoc is the worst solution contemporary international system based on states can allow happening. In his own words, “ad hoc partition applied to one trouble spot may help more violent separatist nationalist movements elsewhere, in addition to making existing nationalist wars more difficult to resolve” (Fearon, 2004, p. 397). In short, it is evident that two articles provide completely different solutions for the ethnic war to be the best one. Notwithstanding this, they have not only opposite traits; if fact, by seeking for the way to turn ethnic conflicts into dormant ones, they simply deal with different aspects of the analyzed problem and augment each other’s statements. On the one hand, articles share the same methodological goal of the analysis. In this context, both authors pay specific attention to cases of Bosnia and Kosovo as illustrative examples of how ethnic war destroyed not only the houses and lives but also further destinies of the survived people. As the core purpose of Downes’ (2004) analysis, the record of these and other resolved ethnic conflicts that had turned violent is the reason of current academic concernment. In particular, he highlights the problem of uncertainty in the negotiations between rebel groups and state representatives. In his own words, “both the government and the rebellious group(s) are uncertain as to how political institutions will work, and distrust that their recent adversary will sincerely abide by the rules of the game” (Downes, 2004, p. 233). In other words, he investigates hot and bloody level of ethnic conflicts through the lens of mutual suspicion between them. Like Downes, Fearon (2004) is also concerned about the increased level of violence and hatred in the current civil wars. From his point of view, violence in the ethnic conflicts is a common practice since 1945, and the number of them is getting even greater with time (Fearon, 1945, p. 408). Thus, both authors work on the management of ethnic wars in a long-term perspective. In the given circumstances, the conflict between democracy and ethnicity appears in both articles. Concerning the nature of negotiations, Downes (2004) states that “the non-trivial risk of betrayal, combined with the enormous costs of being cheated, inhibits groups from gambling on a settlement” (p. 236). In this context, he weighs in on the debate with Arend Lijphart, who believes that shared government between major ethic groups can reduce the violence and tension in societies. In short, the key idea of cooperation failure is the fact that balance of powers between the state and separatist group(s) is certainly unequal, especially after the ethnic war (Downes, 2004, p. 243). Because of this, it is impossible to create an effective solution in the negotiation process. Therefore, the necessity of radical clear victory inevitably occurs. Correspondingly, Fearon (2004) does not rely on the potential of communication between these two forces and refers to the effective work of third parties in his analysis. By looking at the title, it is evident that he investigates ethnic wars from the standpoint of world order. Hence, the more separatist movements empower and spread over the world, “the more states have incentives to protect themselves de facto be arming, acquiring nuclear weapons, forming alliances, and so on” (Fearon, 2004, p. 412). In other words, he stresses on the above-mentioned by Downes (2004) mutual suspect that leaks into international relations. Thus, both authors realize that the best solution of ethnic war does not correspond with democratic reliance on internal negotiations and liberal rights to self-determination. On another hand, the researchers deal with different notions of nationalism. For Downes (2004) it is an obvious fact that “most ethic groups are deeply attached to territory, viewing it as integral to their identity and security” (p. 234). Thus, he is a representative of primordialist framework that relies on the fact that “the cause of separatist nationalism is simply the violation of the principle of self-determination for some proper nation” (Fearon, 2004, p. 399). In contrast, Fearon (2004) does not limit himself to this perspective and widely incorporates in his theory constructivist visionary works of Gellner and Anderson. For him, state borders and territories are not that stable as they are for Downes. Actually, separatist groups operate not as homogeneous centralized organization; unlike this model, “nationalist insurgencies are frequently initiated by small minorities within an ethnic group” (Fearon, 2004, p. 407). In other words, while Downes stresses on the geographical characteristics of territory’s size and borders and occurring cases in the reality, Fearon attract readers’ attention to the cultural and economic aspects of separatist problem and potential threats of them. Hence, the authors significantly differ in the way they enforce their arguments. In fact, Downes (2004) concentrates more on the local and regional dimensions of ethnic conflicts. For him, the main task is not to allow ethnic conflict to appear again in the same or neighbor states and create regions of economic and political instability (Downes, 2004, p. 278). In fact, in the analyzed cases of Bosnia and Kosovo he does not concentrate as much on the international reaction as on the internal separation of armies and political parties (Downes, 2004). On the contrary, Fearon (2004) discusses acknowledgment of the new states after ethnic wars in the global perspective. In his own words, “no advocate of partition could deny that setting the implicit threshold this low would be an absolute disaster for international peace, order, and justice” (Fearon, 2004, p. 406). In this situation, the problem lies not in the very nature of contemporary states’ system. In fact, the importance of previously established cultural diversities as the “raw material” that is in “a tremendous amount” all over the world emerges (Fearon, 2004, p. 408). In this situation, this author does not concentrate on their activity, because their appearance is a dependent variable for him in comparison to state behavior. Hence, the authors concentrate on different levels of the problem. In order to sum up, it is evident that sparkling differences between the two presented articles are not as sharp as they seem to be. In fact, both Downes and Fearon dedicate their works to finding the best solution for transforming violent ethnic wars into the dormant diversities. Moreover, both authors realize that this task disaccords with the democratic belief in group rights and negotiation potential. However, the authors took different approaches to solve this problem. As for Downes, he concentrated on fixing the outcomes of already passed ethnic conflicts from primordialist view. In his turn, Fearon widely uses constructivist approaches to the potential threats of separatism and investigates common global reaction on these attempts. Thus, the articles are not in conflict but significantly supplement each other. References: Downes, A. (2004). The problem with negotiated settlements to ethnic civil wars. Security Studies, 3(4), 230-279. Fearon, J. (2004). Separatist wars, partition, and world order. Security Studies, 3(4), 394-415. Read More