POLI 212 Chapter Notes - Chapter 3: Security Dilemma, Ethnic Conflict

• School: McGill University
• Department: Political Science
• Course: POLI 212
• Professor: Vincent Post

Document Summary

Containing fear (lake and rothchild) reading notes. Main objective: understand ethnic conflict and collective (national) identities how. Lake and rothchild see ethnic conflict and how this view is different from the understanding of ethnic conflict as a product of age-old historical hatreds. Focus on first part of article (up to p. 56: lake a(cid:374)d oth(cid:272)hild do(cid:374)(cid:859)t (cid:373)i(cid:374)(cid:272)e (cid:449)ords: (cid:858)the (cid:373)ost (cid:449)idel(cid:455) dis(cid:272)ussed explanations of ethnic conflict are, at best, incomplete and, at worst, simply (cid:449)ro(cid:374)g. (cid:859) (cid:894)p. (cid:1008)1(cid:895). The (cid:373)ost i(cid:373)porta(cid:374)t thi(cid:374)g for this readi(cid:374)g is to figure out a(cid:895) (cid:449)hat that e(cid:454)pla(cid:374)atio(cid:374) is, (cid:271)(cid:895) (cid:449)hat is so (cid:449)ro(cid:374)g (cid:449)ith it. (cid:894)has to do (cid:449)ith (cid:858)age-old hatreds(cid:859) (cid:858)seethi(cid:374)g (cid:271)elo(cid:449) the surfa(cid:272)e(cid:859): Ethnic conflict is not caused directly by inter-group differen(cid:272)es, (cid:862)an(cid:272)ient hatreds(cid:863) and (cid:272)enturies-old feuds, or the stresses of modern life within a global economy. Nor were ethnic passions, long bottled up by repressive communist regimes, simply uncorked by the end of the cold war.