Ethnic Conflict in the Western World

While there are convincing reasons why ethnic conflicts have accompanied the processes of decolonization and state-building, there are only limited perspectives on why the politics of ethnicity have become so central to a number of industrial societies. Twelve case studies and three theoretical essays cover the most significant examples of the politics of ethnicity in Western Europe, Canada, and Yugoslavia. The diagnosis is more complete on the descriptive than on the explanatory level.