Comparative Politics

B12 - Contested Autonomy: State Power, Ethnic Identity, and Political Regimes

Date: Jun 4 | Time: 12:00pm to 01:30pm | Location:

Discussant/Commentateur/Commentatrice : Muhammad Sajid (Punjab University)

Influence of Divergent Political Regimes on Ethnic Autonomy: The Cases of China and Nepal: Hari Jnawali (Queen's University)
Abstract: Political regimes leave a significant influence on ethnic politics. Such regimes influence the political actors to choose specific policies that help them neutralize and even eliminate ethnic minorities’ demand for autonomy and self-determination in their ancestral territories. The policies and practices of China and Nepal provide a glaring illustration of this fact. China practices a centralized political system, and its autonomous structures and subordinate units are subordinate to the center. In contrast, Nepal has established a democratic political regime that regards a multiparty system, adult franchise, human rights, fundamental freedoms, separation of powers, an independent judiciary, and several other democratic institutions. Despite these differences in regime types and political ideologies, both countries are unwilling to provide ethnic minorities with autonomy and self-determination that enable them to pursue growth and development on their own. Against this background, this paper investigates the following question: How do the divergent political regimes work against ethnic autonomy in China and Nepal? Both countries envision threats to their political systems from autonomy and self-determination. In China’s mind, autonomy promotes separateness and distinct status, hurting its mission to construct a homogenous proletarian culture and consolidate its centralized socialist system. Likewise, Nepal considers that autonomy provides additional rights and privileges to ethnic minorities, not available to other communities in the state, which hurts people’s equal access to rights, resources, and democratic values. With these perceptions, both countries adopt measures and strategies that reject autonomy and defend their political systems.

Reassessing Ethnic Power Relations: Issues and Innovations for Understanding Ethnic Dynamics: Owen Wong (Queen's University), John McGarry (Queen's University)
Abstract: The Ethnic Power Relations (EPR) dataset has become a foundational resource for analyzing ethnic dynamics in political science, providing data on the status, power access, and influence of various ethnic groups within states. However, while the EPR dataset has facilitated groundbreaking research, it also presents significant limitations that constrain the accuracy and scope of ethnic conflict studies. This article critically examines three key issues with the EPR dataset: its often static categorization of ethnic groups, the dataset’s reliance on state-centric definitions of power and influence, and challenges with cross-temporal consistency and bias in coding. The reliance on static categorizations may overlook fluid ethnic identities and power-sharing arrangements, especially in hybrid or fragile states. Similarly, the focus on formal power may obscure informal yet influential networks of authority within ethnic communities. Finally, cross-temporal inconsistencies in the dataset complicate longitudinal studies of ethnic power dynamics, impacting replicability and reliability in comparative research. Addressing these limitations is essential for advancing research on ethnic power structures, conflict, and integration, and this article proposes pathways to improve data collection and analysis methodologies in future iterations.

What Black Am I? A Study of the Scattered Population of Black North American’s post-Slave Trade Genocide: Paige Mignotte (Wilfrid Laurier University), Andrew Basso (Wilfrid Laurier University)
Abstract: Why does the genocide of enslaved Africans during the Trans-Atlantic slave trade continue to distort the identities of the modern-day African American? The trade of enslaved peoples in North America was not only a colonial tool of forced labour, but a campaign of cultural and physical genocide against Black Africans. The remnants of this genocide continue to shape Black North Americans' lives, causing identity disorientation, systemic challenges, and cultural hurdles. Scholarship conceptualizing the Trans-Atlantic trade in enslaved peoples as genocide are limited in genocide studies, human rights, and transitional justice literatures. Thus, this paper first reconceptualizes the enslavement period (1526-1865) as a process of genocide and traces the trade's impact on identity construction among the Black African diaspora in the United States. Applying academic and legal understandings of genocide as a concept and crime to the enslavement period assists in highlighting severe intergenerational traumas and identity losses suffered by millions. The forced removal and systematic destruction of Black cultural heritage left descendants of enslaved peoples with fragmented identities and limited concepts of pre-enslavement culture, which continue to disorient, divide, and ontologically destroy modern Black populations. This paper develops a novel understanding of Black identities as post-genocidal constructions in North America while critically engaging with Black diaspora literatures, as well as those that examine identity construction processes, more broadly. Ultimately, it contributes a new perspective designed to stimulate healing and learning in North America and other colonized regions about the long shadows of past and ongoing violence.