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For the best paper presented at the 2005 annual meeting. Supported by Pi Sigma Alpha.

Award Committee: Sunita Parikh, Washington University in St. Louis, Chair; Byron E. Shafer, University of Wisconsin; and Jytte Klausen, Brandeis University

Recipient: Dawn M. Brancati, Harvard University

Paper: "The Impact of Political Decentralization on Ethnic Conflict and Secessionism"

Citation: In "The Impact of Political Decentralization on Ethnic Conflict and Secessionism" Dawn Brancati utilizes an impressive combination of theoretical, empirical, and statistical approaches to analyze an important question in political science. Brancati examines the relationship between ethnic conflict and political decentralization. Scholars of federalism have argued that decentralization reduces ethnic conflict, pointing to cases such as Belgium, Spain, and India. But others have countered with examples in which decentralization has not been accompanied by a reduction in ethnic strife. Brancati explains this variation by examining the role of political parties. She argues that regional parties frequently increase ethnic conflict and secessionist tendencies by reinforcing regionally-based ethnic identities and favoring certain ethnic groups over others.

To test this hypothesis Brancati has created an impressive dataset, which collects constituency-level election results from fifty countries between 1945 and 2000. She combines this with data from the Minorities at Risk dataset to analyze the effects of decentralization and regional parties on ethnic conflict in thirty countries between 1985 and 2000, using an ordered logit regression model. Brancati finds that decentralization is an effective tool in reducing ethnic conflict and secessionism. However, because decentralization also increases the probability that regional parties will become strong, it is linked through the party system to increased ethnic strife. By demonstrating the precise nature of this linkage, Brancati has increased our understanding of the relationship between decentralization and ethnic conflict and has suggested both theoretical and policy avenues for further research. The paper and its conclusions are of importance to political scientists and policymakers, and it can be expected to stimulate other work in the field.