Abstract (may include machine translation)
The comparative study of civil war has recently gone through a structural turn, towards large-n quantitative studies that explain the variation in the incidence of civil wars in terms of structural factors. The alternatives have been a return to case studies and a constructivist critique that emphasizes the role of ideas in conflict. While there is no a priori reason to reconcile these approaches, it remains a practical task for those who want to understand how a given social situation escalates into civil war. After reviewing the two poles in the debate, we mine the literature on nationalism for insights into this issue.
| Original language | English |
|---|---|
| Pages (from-to) | 38-57 |
| Number of pages | 20 |
| Journal | Nationalism and Ethnic Politics |
| Volume | 19 |
| Issue number | 1 |
| DOIs | |
| State | Published - Jan 2013 |
