Dynamics of Dissent

Who Are the People? Why Ethnic Politics Matters Tristan James Mabry In the first decade of the twenty-first century, the idea of mass mobilization in order to redirect government is axiomatic. If Tristan James Mabry is a visiting assistant pro- the environment is degraded, then the solution is to educate fessor in the Department and organize concerned citizens. The same can be said of gen- of Government at George- der inequality, racial prejudice, or, in the form of labor move- town University and is writing a book on the ments, class disparity. Yet of all the challenges a society may intersection of ethnicity launch at its state, the most serious are not those that challenge and Islam in regional con- flicts based on field a particular policy or seek redress of a single social issue, but research in Iraq, China, those that challenge the legitimacy of the state itself. This begs Pakistan, India, Indonesia, the question: what makes a state legitimate or illegitimate? The and the Philippines. Mabry has previously produced short answer is whether or not the state represents the will of for CNN and reported for the people. But the long answer demands an answer to anoth- the Wall Street Journal. er question: who are the people? In the global arena, it is implicit that different peoples are different nations, and that different nations have different states. If there is disagreement over the composition of a particular nation, there is by exten- sion disagreement over the composition of the state. If the rai- son d’etre of the state itself is contentious, this can upset the stability of said state, and, by extension, may threaten the equi- librium of international relations. Ethnic politics matter because ethnicity is what makes a nation, and a nation is what makes a state. In the three sections that follow, this essay outlines the underlying principles of the nation-state, identifies the shortcomings of contemporary

Summer/Fall 2008 [13] WHO ARE THE PEOPLE? political science in addressing the ques- and most minorities are uninterested, tion of ethnic politics, and considers unwilling, or unable to challenge the contemporary cases of ethnic mobiliza- legitimacy of their country. Their state tion in Europe, Africa, Asia, and Latin may be benign and liberal—welcoming America. In regard to what academics integration and political representation— and policymakers concerned with inter- or malign but formidable—controlling national order can do, the essay con- dissent and suppressing alternate identi- cludes that U.S. citizens need to spend ties. In either case, ethnic heterogeneity more time overseas to understand the is in no way a sufficient condition for subjective perspectives of the politically communal conflict. dispossessed or to at least listen carefully Crises emerge when a subordinate when area experts and diplomats report group has the motive, means, and the problems of a particular people. opportunity to strike against the domi- However, even the best advice is worthless nant nationality and their institutions, if ignored, as when a foreign policy is viz. the government of their nation-state. predetermined by domestic politics. A group may claim its own right to self- determination by repairing the state’s First Define the People, Then institutions, often by ratifying a rewritten Define the State. While settler constitution, or by redefining the state states such as Canada, Australia, and the itself to represent a different nation, as in make a best effort to define the case of Blacks in South Africa. If nei- citizenship according to patriotism and ther remedy is possible than the group allegiance to a civic ideal—and thus an may simply remove itself from the state by explicitly non-ethnic identity—most of redrawing its borders. Yet to explain, the world remains comprised of self- anticipate, or manage any one of these described nation-states like Italy or crises, it is essential to understand who is Vietnam. Each justifies its existence who: who is dominant or subordinate? according to the doctrine of national Who lives where, speaks what, worships self-determination: a state for every whom? What, for any aggrieved or agitat- nation and a nation for every state. Of ed group, defines membership or exclu- course, national homogeneity is make- sion? The immediate and obvious answer believe. Few countries may even pretend is ethnicity: Kurds challenge Turks, to claim that every citizen is the same as Basques challenge Castilian Spaniards, everyone else. Aside from voluntary Tibetans challenge Han Chinese, and so immigrant communities, such as Turks on. in Germany, there are also groups who What is alarming, however, is how find themselves in a situation crafted by often the ethnic component of politics is the caprice of history, including indige- ignored or eclipsed, even among inter- nous peoples like the Sami in Norway national affairs experts. It is often and Sweden or the Ainu in Japan; ignored because the people and places in nations divided such as the Hungarians question are unfamiliar or unknown: in Romania or Malay in the deep south of how many academics or analysts really Thailand; and nations trapped, such as had any idea what was happening to the Uighurs in China or Chechens in Albanians in Macedonia before the col- Russia. Yet most nation-states are stable lapse of Yugoslavia, or know now what

[14] Georgetown Journal of International Affairs MABRY Dynamics of Dissent the problem is between Madurese and Central Asian “Stans.”4 This was a posi- Dayaks in Borneo?1 Yet even when antag- tive development and applied to research onists are not unfamiliar to informed on many regions. The bi-polar politics observers, the importance of ethnic of the Cold War was apparently replaced identity is often eclipsed by a big, bad by a collision of cultures or “civiliza- idea. tions,” and so new questions were asked— and answered—about the sources of, and Academic Indifference about solutions to, deep social divides. The dis- Ethnicity. In contemporary American integration of Yugoslavia and the geno- political science, it is fashionable to sug- cide in Rwanda, for example, demon- gest that “ethnic conflict” is a layman’s strated it was a good idea to know who term, applied only by amateurs who fail lived where within different countries— to appreciate the real importance of eco- whether Slovenian, Serbian, Croatian, nomic and political institutions.2 Bosnian or Albanian in the former, or Academics and analysts who sideline eth- Hutu or Tutsi in the latter. nic politics do so to no good end. Even as Nonetheless, ethnic politics as a sub- ethnic violence slashes across Kenya, ject lost favor at the start of this century. indigenous mobilizations destabilize In 2000, Ted Gurr argued that ethnic Bolivia, multi-national tensions strain conflict was waning because more groups Malaysia, and bi-national politics threat- were willing to try negotiation instead of en the very existence of Belgium, players bloodshed.5 But a more serious downsiz- in the arena of international affairs ing followed research suggesting that remain too often unprepared, or trou- “ethnic conflict” was a kind of bogeyman, blingly ill-advised, to respond intelli- a term used by journalists to scare readers gently. and by academics or policy experts who Like a meteor smashing into the just did not know any better. Earth, the sudden and surprising col- Consider an Op-Ed in the lapse of the USSR was a mass extinction Washington Post by a pair of political sci- event for a certain species of academic entists: Steven Fish and Matthew What makes a state legitimate or illegitimate? The short answer is whether or not the state represents the will of the people. But the long answer demands an answer to another question: Who are the people? called “Sovietologist.”3 Just as mammals Kroenig. Their explanation of group supplanted reptiles, this afforded a violence in Kenya, which erupted follow- growth opportunity for a range of new ing a contested December 2007 presi- species—area specialists trained in the dential election between candidates from languages and political scenarios of different ethnic groups, begins with the diverse peoples in the Baltics, the proviso that the cause of Kenya’s crisis is Balkans, the Caucasus, or the five “not ethnic.” While they allow that the

Summer/Fall 2008 [15] WHO ARE THE PEOPLE? conflict “does indeed run along ethnic nic groups are not all that important. In lines, ethnic diversity is not to blame for this now prominent view, Kenya’s diver- the disaster,” and that the “key culprit” is sity is no more or less important than the a weak system of governance.6 In other diversity of many other heterogeneous words, it is not a question of clashing states because “political scientists have ethnic identities, but a question of faulty found that there is no statistical correla- institutions. Thus, the best plan to repair tion between ethnic diversity and civil the politics of Kenya is to rebuild and war.”10 This claim is valid, and Stanford reinforce the legislature. University’s James Fearon and David In the long term, this is fair enough; Laitin are the political scientists most the institutions are weak. Yet it is safe to often credited with demonstrating this suggest that this is of little comfort to point. They are the co-authors of members of the various communities— “Ethnicity, Insurgency, and Civil War,” a Kikuyus, Kalenjin, Luos, Kisii, and oth- statistical analysis of 127 conflicts between ers—who flee for their lives.7 According 1945 and 1999, that challenges the con- to Jendayi Frazer, the U.S. Assistant ventional wisdom of “journalists, policy- Secretary of State for African Affairs, makers, and academics, which holds Kenya is wracked by nothing less than ‘plural’ societies to be especially conflict- ethnic cleansing.8 Kenyan writer and prone due to ethnic or religious tensions filmmaker Simiyu Barasa laments that and antagonisms.”11 Instead, civil vio- Nairobi has been “Balkanized, with lence is statistically linked to conditions whole neighborhoods turned into exclu- that favor insurgency, a military mobi- sive reserves of certain tribes.” Because lization that enables small numbers of membership in a particular tribe can fighters to challenge the inevitably larger mean “the difference between not being forces of an entire state. In other words, dead or being seriously dead,” there is no civil violence erupts where conditions are point in waiting for stronger institutions. favorable for guerrilla warfare, such as a One short-term solution, writes Barasa, weak state, a large population, and is to strengthen your tribal bona fides notably “rough terrain.”12 Laitin distilled with “crash courses” in the tongue of the these points in a later work by ascribing tribe that is stamped on your ID card— predictive power to “country-level factors even if it is a dialect that you may not that have little to do with ethnicity or know well, especially if you moved away nationalism.”13 from home to study or work in a polyglot When considering civil war, their city such as Nairobi or Mombassa where analysis makes a lot of sense, especially in Kikuyu (the mother tongue of the dom- regard to topography. It is far easier to inant minority) or either of the official sustain a revolt when you can safely languages (English and Swahili) are the retreat into dense jungles or forbidding norm.9 mountains. But it is the iconoclastic Fish and Kroenig accept that the effect claim that ethno-national politics are of institutional weakness in Kenya is, in relatively unimportant that seized the fact, the exacerbation of ethnic divisions, attention of the discipline. The influence yet insist such divisions are not to blame. of the Fearon and Laitin findings cannot The clear implication is that the charac- be emphasized enough. Their co- teristics and perceptions of distinct eth- authored work is the single most down-

[16] Georgetown Journal of International Affairs MABRY Dynamics of Dissent loaded article from the website of the dis- band of rogue Walloons, but in what cipline’s highest-ranked journal, the political universe could this topic be con- American Political Science Review.14 sidered unimportant, uninteresting, or The troubling legacy of “Ethnicity, unworthy of our professional attention? Insurgency, and Civil War,” however, is What is important, interesting, and a its tendency to support straw man argu- worthy avenue of research is how and why ments that sweep ethnicity in general to antagonists in Belgium may come to the sidelines. It is sensible that insurgen- believe that their government is no cies do not erupt in small, flat countries longer legitimate, that the state no longer with strong governments, but this is an represents the will of “the people”. Even observation that applies to questions if shots are not fired, “legitimacy cannot about civil wars. Does this also mean that be inferred from a peaceful situation,” a small, flat country with a strong govern- and legitimacy depends on how people ment is immune to ethno-national crises define themselves.17 of legitimacy? This process is now evident and accel- erating in Bolivia. In 2006, that country The Abundance of Ethnic elected its first indigenous president. Evo Politics. Recent events in Belgium, of Morales, an ethnic Aymara Indian, cam- all places, do not bear this out. Home to paigned on a promise—since delivered— NATO and the EU, Belgium, if nothing to rewrite the constitution and explicitly else, is a small, flat, country with a strong include the majority Indians (los indios). government. It is also bi-national: the The Minister of Education and Culture, French-speaking Walloons and the Felix Patzi, directed all government Dutch-speaking Flemish united as employees to learn Aymara or another of Catholics to secede from the Protestant the major indigenous languages, Netherlands in 1830 and have shared Quechua or Guaraní. All of this deeply power in one form or another ever since. troubled the formerly dominant minor- Yet the country is beset with chronic ity comprised of the whites (las blancas, communal tension, a “bad marriage writ descended from Europeans) and the large” between a pair of ethnolinguistic mestizos. The four regions where they are communities “that cannot stand each clearly the majority have unilaterally other.”15 According to Filip Dewinter, declared autonomy. It is the opinion of the leader of the separatist party Vlaams Bolivian Vice President Álvaro García Belang (Flemish Bloc), Belgium is a con- Linera that there are now “two different” tainer for “different nations, an artificial Bolivias and that the country is “really state created as a buffer between big pow- split.”18 ers, and we have nothing in common Even in multi-national states with except a king, chocolate and beer… it’s carefully crafted institutions, socioeco- ‘bye-bye, Belgium’ time.”16 nomic inequalities can destabilize the Nobody is suggesting fighting is about country if inequality overlaps a specific to erupt in Antwerp or Bruges, but any ethnicity. In Malaysia, for example, eth- analysis of Belgian politics that addresses nic Malay, Chinese, and Indians official- institutional schematics at the expense of ly share government power, but that has ethnic patterns is a waste of time. There not engendered relative economic power may never be a Flemish firefight with a or social status. Malaysia’s Indian popu-

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lation accounts for just ten percent of the such minorities may find it difficult to country; it is now quite clear this group accept the legitimacy of some other has “lost out in the long battle of all three nation’s state. ethnic groups over power, privilege, and Violence is more likely, however, if a religion.”19 In November 2007, more dominant minority loses control of a than twenty thousand Indians staged an subordinate majority, just as the Sunni anti-government protest that was dis- Arab minority in Iraq has lost control of persed with water cannons and teargas. the majority Shia.20 A most horrific case Ethnic Chinese account for about one of this dynamic was the slaughter of a quarter of the population and are eco- once-dominant Tutsi minority by the nomically more secure, but chafe at affir- Hutu majority in Rwanda. But if any mative action programs that admit more lessons were learned following that Malays to university and grant more gov- tragedy, they are already forgotten in ernment contracts to Malay-owned com- Kenya. The Kikuyu are the largest ethnic panies at the expense of Chinese appli- group in the country, but account only cants. for 22 percent of Kenya’s 37 million Belgium, Bolivia, and Malaysia appear people. Yet they are the long-time eco- to have little in common, but they all can nomic and social elite, and are often be categorized as democracies, and it is resented by the majority who see the easy to claim that a democratic govern- Kikuyu “disproportionately represented ment is legitimate. But a necessary con- in the civil service, the professional class- dition for a democracy is a demos: there es, and the business community.”21 After is little point holding elections if there is refusing to relinquish control of the gov- disagreement over who gets to vote. ernment, the Kikuyu are challenged en Nationalism may not be liberal—it is hard masse by groups that are comparatively to protect everybody’s liberty when the disadvantaged, both socio-economically whole state hinges on a claim to represent and politically. a nation—but it is politically expedient: This pattern is not unknown to polit-

If we accept the principle of popular sovereignty as a necessary condition for legitimate government, then the sole source of political legitimacy is “the people.”

the electorate is the nation. Does this ical science. In 2003, Barbara Huff necessarily mean that minorities—and demonstrated statistically that states with there are always minorities—who are a dominant minority, even when con- either unwilling or unwelcome to assim- trolling for other variables, were 2.6 ilate or integrate into the official nation times more likely to experience genocidal will necessarily take arms and launch an violence or politically-motivated mass insurgency? No, it does not. This is a murder.22 Why this finding was eclipsed separate question. But it does mean that by Fearon and Laitin’s claim that ethnic

[18] Georgetown Journal of International Affairs MABRY Dynamics of Dissent diversity does not correlate with civil war, real danger. But if we are increasingly however, is odd. The lead essay in a deaf to ethnic voices inside states we are recent issue of Foreign Affairs by histori- limited to essentially ex post facto inter- an Jerry Muller offers one explanation, pretations of why this group challenged namely parochialism: “Projecting their that state. What is to be done? own experience onto the rest of the It would not be a bad idea to consider world, Americans generally belittle the the opinion of Robert Bates on this role of ethnic nationalism in politics.”23 question. A chaired professor in the To this I would add that such a confirma- Department of Government at Harvard, tion of the American Weltanschauung Bates is widely recognized as one of the makes it easier to ignore the inconve- most influential political scientists of his nient facts of intractable ethnic inequal- generation. After four decades of schol- ities in the United States. Muller’s arship, he is particularly critical of unflinching assessment also helps explain research crafted in the comfortable why so few American authors participate enclosures of academe. It is easy and in scholarship on nationalism. therefore common to opine at length Again, this is not to say that ethnic about people and places of interest with- mobilization is necessarily bloody. It is out ever having met those people or seen not. Czechoslovakia, for example, split those places. Hence, those opinions are along ethnolinguistic lines into the often far removed—figuratively and liter- Czech and Slovak republics, but this eth- ally—from the people and places in ques- nic diversity was not a sufficient condi- tion. Moreover, the academic or policy- tion for group violence. It was, however, maker may never know whether their a sufficient condition for destabilizing conclusions are accurate or imaginary. ethnonational politics: one state died, How can this be amended? For acade- but two were born, and ethnic national- mics, the polite but oblique answer is to ism bore witness to both. research other countries by actually visit- ing them, or to at least take seriously the What is to be Done? Despite rising the findings of researchers, from whatev- economic globalization and regional er discipline, who collect primary sources integration, membership in intergov- abroad, including quantitative survey ernmental organizations such as the UN, data or qualitative interviews with politi- the EU, ASEAN, the WTO, or even the cal actors. In either case, the relevance of Organization of the Islamic Conference, overseas research is made plain by Bates: is allocated to states alone. If we accept “the cure for bullshit is fieldwork.”24 the principle of popular sovereignty as a For policymakers, the best first step is necessary condition for legitimate gov- to weigh far more heavily the opinions of ernment, then the sole source of political diplomats and intelligence agents work- legitimacy is “the people.” By extension, ing abroad, rather than to blithely accept in the international arena, “the people” the advice of domestic agencies or nomi- are consolidated as separate nations, and nal experts who may treat countries like it is the right to national self-determina- so many pieces on a board game. The tion that justifies the existence of a state, obvious sources for this kind of informa- i.e. a nation-state. Hence, dissenting tion are the Department of State and the definitions of “the people” present a very CIA, though this raises the thorny ques-

Summer/Fall 2008 [19] WHO ARE THE PEOPLE? tion of political selectivity: it is easier to experience, language skills, and area accept opinions that support an existing expertise. I would expect that these can- policy than it is to accept inconvenient didates could recognize conditions where facts. This was the lesson illustrated by institutional characteristics alone cannot the so-called Downing Street Memo of explain why things are falling apart. This 2002; following a visit to Washington, is especially critical in countries like Iraq Sir , then head of or Serbia that suddenly find that some of Britain’s Secret Intelligence Service, their citizens, such as Kurds or reported that the decision to invade Iraq Albanians, no longer identify with their was made a priori since “the intelligence state, but rather with their own people. and facts were being fixed around the Determining how a people defines policy.”25 In short, and for good or for itself—in other words, figuring out who is ill, it is easy for a domestic agenda to pre- who—is a difficult and uneven exercise, determine foreign policy. but it is essential to understanding the Nonetheless, it is fortunate that the most destabilizing form of dissent: eth- State Department is working to enhance nic nationalism. the U.S. government’s understanding of regional conditions—and the highly sub- jective perspectives of distinct groups—by The author would like to thank Brendan O’Leary, hiring more than a thousand new diplo- Jerry Muller, Gregory Stanton, and an anonymous mats.26 At the very top of their recruit- reviewer for their very helpful comments and criticisms ment lists are candidates with overseas on earlier drafts of this essay.

NOTES 1 In Indonesia, hundreds have died and thousands Real Problem (It’s Not Ethnic)” , 9 have been displaced since the 1990s by communal vio- January 2008, A(15). lence in the West Kalimantan region of Borneo; the 7 Jeffrey Gettleman “Kenya Kikuyus, Long feud is between the indigenous Dayaks and the immi- Dominant, Are Routed From Rivals’ Land,” the New grant Madurese who relocated as part of Suharto’s York Times, 7 January 2008, p. 1. development-through-resettlement policy called 8 “U.S. Envoy Sees ‘Ethnic Cleansing’ in Kenya, transmigrasi (transmigration). the International Herald Tribune, 31 January, p. 8. Gurr. 2 The qualifier “American” is necessary because 9 Simiyu Barasa, “Kenya’s War of Words,” the New ethno-nationalism is considered critical elsewhere. York Times, 12 February 2008, p. 21. The most influential general theories of nationalism 10 Fish and Kroenig. were developed at the London School of Economics 11 James D. Fearon and David D. Laitin, by Ernest Gellner, Elie Kedourie, and Anthony “Ethnicity, Insurgency, and Civil War” American Political Smith. Superior work exploring normative concerns Science Review 97, no. 1 (2003): 75-90, 75. is often Canadian (e.g. Charles Taylor, Will Kymlicka, 12 Fearon and Laitin. and Margaret Moore). In the United States, Benedict 13 David D. Laitin, Nations, States, and Violence Anderson is a central figure, but he was raised overseas (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2007), 14. and his work is often considered social anthropology 14 According to the American Political Science rather than political science. Association, the American Political Science Review’s publish- 3 The ranks of former Sovietologists include the er, Cambridge University Press, reports that current Secretary of State. See, for example, “Ethnicity, Insurgency, and Civil War” has been , “The Party, the Military, and downloaded 6,990 times since its publication in Decision Authority in the Soviet Union,” World Politics 2003—more than any other article published in the 40, no. 1 (1987): 55-81. one-hundred year history of the journal. “Top 50 4 The five countries are: Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Articles from the American Political Science Review,” Tajikistan, Turkmenistan, and Uzbekistan. Internet, www.apsanet.org/content_30489.cfm. 5 Ted Robert Gurr, “Ethnic Warfare on the 15 Elaine Sciolino, “Calls for a Split Grow Louder Wane,” Foreign Affairs 79, no. 3 (2000): 52-64. in Belgium,” the International Herald Tribune, 21 6 M. Steven Fish and Matthew Kroenig, “Kenya’s September 2007, p. 1.

[20] Georgetown Journal of International Affairs MABRY Dynamics of Dissent

16 Sciolino, “Calls.” eignaffairs.org/20080109faupdate87176/joel-d- 17 Walker Connor, “Nationalism and Political barkan/kenya-s-great-rift.html. Illegitimacy,” in Ethnonationalism in the Contemporary World: 22 Barbara Harff, “No Lessons Learned from the Walker Connor and the Study of Nationalism, ed. D. Conversi Holocaust? Assessing Risks of Genocide and Political (New York: Routledge, 2002), 38. Mass Murder Since 1955,” American Political Science Review 18 Julie McCarthy, “Bolivian Leader’s Successes 97, no. 1 (2003): 57-73, 66. Weirdly, Harff’s argument Expose Divisions” National Public Radio: Morning Edition, 5 appeared in the same issue of the American Political Science February 2008. Review as the Fearon and Laitin article that dismissed a 19 Thomas Fuller, “Indian Discontent Fuels link between a state’s ethnic composition and civil war. Malaysia’s Rising Tensions,” , 10 23 Jerry Z. Muller, “Us and Them: The Enduring February 2008. Power of Ethnic Nationalism,” Foreign Affairs 87, no. 2 20 In the twentieth century, this scenario also (2008): 18-35. unraveled in Sri Lanka (then Ceylon). Following 24 Gerardo L. Munck and Richard Snyder, Passion, independence from British rule in 1948, the previ- craft, and method in comparative politics (Baltimore: Johns ously dominant Tamil minority was democratically Hopkins University Press, 2007), 511. ousted in the 1950s by a newly independent Sinhalese 25 Don Van Natta Jr., “Bush Was Set on Path to majority. Civil war followed in the 1970s and contin- War, British Memo Says,” the New York Times, 27 March ues to this day. 2006. 21 Joel D. Barkan, “Kenya’s Great Rift,” Foreign 26 , “U.S. Hopes to Add More Than Affairs 87, no. 1 (2008), Internet, http://www.for- 1,000 Diplomats,” 4 February 2008.

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