People hate. They resent the authority of ethnically different others. They can find themselves in situations in which they fear for their lives and the lives of their families. No one denies that these emotions exist, but few have tried to systematically link them to ethnic conflict. This work has treated these emotions as central to four narratives of social processes leading to ethnic violence and discrimination. Because individual intentions and motivations are difficult to discern and sometimes contradictory, leading scholars of revolution and political violence have chosen not to pursue them as a central object of study. While it may be difficult to study these elements of ethnic conflict, motivation poses a major puzzle for many of the violent outbursts and ethnic cleansings of Eastern Europe. In these events, significant numbers of individuals participated or tacitly supported brutal actions against a relatively defenseless people. Despite the difficulties and ambiguities in the study of emotion and motivation, this phenomenon demands an answer. The present work contributes to the literature on ethnic conflict by identifying four emotion-based paths to ethnic conflict and systematically comparing their abilities to explain variation within limited puzzles and across broad historical sweeps. What have we learned through this exercise?

Summary of Findings

First, one of the most widely accepted theories of political science, Fear, is not very helpful in explaining ethnic violence in the majority of cases found in Eastern Europe.