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" Legacies of Conflict: Civil War Violence, Group Identities, and Ethnic Polarization "
Price, Chris G.
Wood, Elisabeth J.
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Latin Dissertation
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| Language of Document
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English
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| Record Number
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1053313
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| Doc. No
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TL52430
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| Main Entry
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Price, Chris G.
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| Title & Author
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Legacies of Conflict: Civil War Violence, Group Identities, and Ethnic Polarization\ Price, Chris G.Wood, Elisabeth J.
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| College
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Yale University
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| Date
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2020
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| Degree
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Ph.D.
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| student score
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2020
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| Note
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268 p.
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| Abstract
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Scholars struggle to explain why some conflicts entrench pre-existing social differences, while others do not. My dissertation seeks to answer questions related to this puzzle: Under what conditions does civil war violence alter the importance of an individual's group identities, such as ethnicity or sect? Why does this process occur in some civil wars, but not in others? How are changes in individuals perception of identity aggregated into cleavages, the societal divisions which constitute the primary axes of political competition? How violence is targeted during civil war is essential to explaining the observed variation. Based on theories of group identity, I argue that collective violence, that which is deliberately targeted at pre-existing identities, even if they were previously seen by individuals as unimportant, leads to shifts in the salience and polarization of these identities. However, discriminate violence, that which is targeted based on individual behavior, is unlikely to provoke these responses. Where these changes are widespread, they lead to changes in social cleavages, and these results may persist well past the initial conflict. To test the theory, I compare across multiple sites within two different post-conflict nations, Bosnia and Liberia. Using statistical, archival, and interview evidence, I test my argument against existing theories that seek to explain when and where we should see polarization of group identities. I have conducted interviews at multiple sites within each country, which holds country specific factors constant while allowing for variance in wartime violence, my independent variable. Exploiting the difference in post-war political polarization in Liberia and Bosnia, I also examine how these changes at the micro-level of individuals and communities aggregate to the societal level, again comparing my theory against alternatives.
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| Descriptor
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International relations
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Political science
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| Added Entry
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Wood, Elisabeth J.
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Yale University
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