Ethnonationalism and State Building

Since the end of the Cold War, ethnic and religious conflicts have increased significantly. The international community was largely helpless in the face of genocide in Rwanda and the Balkan wars. Since then, interest in conflict management methods has grown considerably. Nation building and state building in fragile states has thus become an instrument of international policy. The issues related to the structuring of government bodies, constitutions, or institutional frameworks for political pluralism are regularly confronted with forms of ethnic and religious conflicts. Managing these conflicts involves finding equilibrium between the territorial integrity of a state and its inherent promise of stability and the principle of a peoples’ right to self-determination. Comparisons can be helpful in evaluating the successes and failures of various ethnic integration strategies. The international political weight of the topic was underscored by the events related to the war in Georgia in the summer of 2008.

With contributions by Joscha Schmierer, Ulrich Schneckener, Milan Horacek, Walter Kaufmann, Benoit Lechat, Genevieve Warland, Bodo Weber, and Ralf Fücks.



Preface

Since the end of the Cold War, ethnic and religious conflicts have increased significantly and claimed countless victims – especially among civilian populations. The international community was largely helpless in the face of genocide in Rwanda and the Balkan wars of the mid-1990s. Since then, interest in conflict management methods has grown considerably. Nation building and state building in fragile states has become an instrument of international policy.

The term “state building” is generally preferred in political and scientific discourse, as nation building involves extremely long-term processes that offer little scope for outside intervention. This observation does not take into account the fact that wherever the international community is actively involved in state building in post-conflict societies, it is increasingly confronted with ethnonational issues. In situations dominated by ethnic or religious conflicts, the international community has little choice but to address ethnonationalism in its state building activities. In turn the resulting positions – for example on issues related to the structuring of government bodies, constitutions, or institutional frameworks for political pluralism – affect the forms of ethnic and religious conflicts. They influence their significance within society. Striking a careful balance between the conflicting interests of states’ territorial integrity and their peoples’ right to self-determination is therefore essential.

This publication contains contributions to an international conference held by the Heinrich Böll Foundation in April 2008. In it, policymakers, academics, political educators, and consultants examined how the international community has dealt with the phenomena of ethnonationalism and religious fragmentation in the past fifteen years and the lessons for the future that can be gained from these experiences. In addition to the question of instruments of international policy, the conference focused on identifying practical principles that can also be applied to methods of crisis prevention and crisis resolution. These issues are directly relevant to the Heinrich Böll Foundation, as we are regularly confronted with ethnic and religious conflicts in our international work in southern Europe, South Caucasus, the Middle East, and elsewhere. The international political weight of the topic was also underscored by the events related to the war in Georgia in the summer of 2008.

Berlin, autumn 2008
Azra Dzajic-Weber, Head of Department Southeast Europe/Eastern Europe/Caucasus
Bastian Hermisson, Head of Department EU/North America

 

Ethnonationalism and State Building
Editor	Heinrich Böll Stiftung
Place of publication	Berlin
Date of publication	December 2008
Pages	68
ISBN	978-3-927760-96-7
Service charge	Free of charge

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