International Norms in Ethno-Territorial Disputes: Legitimacy and Efficacy in Outsiders’ Views of Independence and Irredentism

Abstract

Ethno-national territorial disputes typically involve conflicting homeland claims between states and minority ethnic groups. Where such minority ethnic groups have cross-border ethnic kin who themselves constitute a dominant or influential ethnic group in a neighbouring state, separatist goals may take the form of either irredentism or independence. We conjecture that external sympathy for irredentism and independence may vary significantly, and that this variation may be an important influence in situations where secessionist groups and ethnic kin states have a choice between the two goals. Using a bargaining framework that controls for variation in relative power, status quo conditions and minority-side leadership preferences, we present experimental evidence indicating that external audiences are likely to support more confrontational policies in pursuit of independence than in pursuit of irredentism. Our evidence also indicates that independence attracts greater support largely because outsiders perceive it as a more legitimate goal; and that practical efficacy is not important in stimulating sympathy for either independence or irredentism. These results also support a broader argument in the literature on international norms – that such norms receive support not only because they may justify pre-existing goals or interests, but also because they are perceived as having greater legitimacy per se.

Notes

1. Game theorists have analysed the precise conditions under which such long-term agreements to uphold norms are likely to be upheld (e.g., Aumann 2005).

2. See the discussion below of the conflicts between Russians and Ukrainians in the Crimea and Donbass regions of Ukraine and between Armenians and Azerbajanis in the Nagorno-Karabakh region of Azerbaijan.

3. This is distinct from the question of whether international law may be more favourable to independence or irredentism. Here the strongest proposition is that, following the break-up of certain pre-Second World War-era empires or multi-ethnic states considered by situational political consensus to be illegitimate, any further change in recognised state borders is only legitimate when agreed upon voluntarily (e.g., Knight 1985). This requirement applies equally to both independence-driven and irredentist-driven territorial change.

4. Available at http://www.mar.umd.edu/mar_data.asp.

5. We count major conflicts using the intensity threshold of Fearon and Laitin (2003, 76). They require at least 1000 combatant and civilian deaths total, with at least 100 killed on each side, and averaging at least 100 killed per year. Of course, different criteria will yield slightly different lists of conflicts.

6. As discussed, proclaimed goals may not be real goals. Proclaimed goals may be changed – often after a first-stage objective has been achieved – and this may be an intentional, longer-term strategy.

7. Another case, Croats in Bosnia-Herzegovina, is not easily classified, since goals were kept ambiguous in the service of Croatia’s simultaneous conflict with Serbs in Croatia – who were supported by Serbia. There are also three cases of secessionists seeking an Islamic Caliphate: Sunni Arabs in Iraq, Pashtuns in Pakistan, and Malays in Thailand. This latter goal is a throwback to the pre-nation-state, imperial states-system.

8. Some local secessionist leaders have explicitly sought unification with Russia, but the dominant formal goal of the new secessionist governments of Donetsk and Luhansk has been independence – at least as a first step (Cavandoli 2016, Robinson 2016).

9. Armenians complained mainly of official neglect and informal discrimination, but the problems were not large in comparative terms. After the dispute began, anti-Armenian riots in some of Azerbaijan’s big cities triggered a two-way expulsion of isolated Armenian and Azerbaijani communities.

10. Arguably, it was particularly important to reach out to the new Russian government, in the hope that Russia might renew its traditional historical role as patron or protector of the Armenians (Croissant 1998, 54n147). But again, the Russian government was almost certainly aware that the underlying goal of irredentism had not changed.

11. For example, participants may assume that ethnic minorities seeking independence are militarily weaker, or that they live under more adverse status quo conditions, as compared to ethnic minorities represented by a kin state seeking irredentist unification. By explicitly varying factors such as relative power and status quo conditions, we can see both whether there is a general tendency for outsiders to be influenced by the choice between independence and irredentism, and whether this tendency is related to other, decision-theoretic variables.

12. Online Appendix I presents a formal version of the one-period model. The model’s logic generalises to multiple-period games, in which players may choose to restart the same bargaining process in each period. Following Rubinstein (1982), the model has been widely applied in international relations and other areas of political science (e.g., Powell 1999).

13. A large literature discusses why players may fail to choose mutually preferred bargains over going to war. This question is beyond the scope of this paper.

14. For details of the experimental scenarios, see Online Appendix II.

15. As mentioned, we do not examine ‘extrinsic’, power-seeking leadership preferences. These are left for future research.

16. We chose not to go above a 50 per cent chance of victory for the side not currently possessing the disputed territory. Such advantages are more rare in the type of scenario we consider, because they more often lead to successful past attempts to seize the disputed territory. We chose not to go below a 20 per cent chance of victory, because that would tend to make use of more intense forms of pressure seem hopeless.

17. In describing status quo conditions, we sought a range that seemed common in practice. Thus, we stopped short of describing the most favourable status quo as one in which the ethnic minority group in the disputed territory enjoys better conditions than the dominant ethnic group. Similarly, in describing the most unfavorable conditions, we tried to stop of conditions that would be viewed as so intolerable that almost any alternative would seem better.

18. Participants were also told that the study was unrelated to course assignments, and that they should not write their names on the instrument. About five per cent of students and auditors chose not to participate.

19. For example, age does not have a statistically significant impact for either conflict type. Thus, holding non-age-related factors equal, the large numbers of middle-aged, part-time students and retired auditors do not offer advice significantly different from that of younger students.

20. A variable of interest is changed by a given amount – here, leadership preferences from moderate to extreme or initial conditions from worst to best – while other variables are left at their actual sample levels.