print

Conceptualising a Methodology for a Comparative Analysis of the Success of Secessions

Torosyan T.S.,

Yerevan Bryusov State University of Languages and Social Sciences. Yerevan, Armenia; Center for Perspective Research and Initiatives. Yerevan, Armenia, t.tigran@yahoo.com

Vardanyan A.V.,

Center for Perspective Research and Initiatives. Yerevan, Armenia, a.vardanyan@gmail.com

DOI: 10.17976/jpps/2021.01.04

Rubric: Theme of the Issue: Contemporary Conflicts and Their Conceptualization

For citation:

Torosyan T.S., Vardanyan A.V. Conceptualising a Methodology for a Comparative Analysis of the Success of Secessions. – Polis. Political Studies. 2021. No. 1. P. 41-57. (In Russ.). https://doi.org/10.17976/jpps/2021.01.04

Abstract

The collapse of two unions – the Soviet Union and Yugoslavia – has not only led to the need for a new world order to be formed and to the creation of more than two dozen UN member states, but also to the increase in the number of ethno-political conflicts by more than a dozen. Some of those that made attempts at secession have been joined to the metropolis through various tools, while the others maintained the status of a de facto state and are seeking to join the UN thereby becoming the states recognized by the international community and endowed with powers stemming from it. This process has been going on for nearly three decades, but for many this goal will not be achieved in the near future. Moreover, since the early 2000s, the intensified competition in forming a new world order has hardened the conflict resolution processes, since powerful countries try to use the conflict factor to influence the development of this competition. This not only impedes conflict resolution, but also complicates their study. Within studies of ethno-political conflicts and their resolution, it is especially important to assess the success of secessions, since this is directly linked to the purpose of that process. The assessment is often carried out through the method of comparative analysis. The article deals with both quantitative and qualitative models of such analysis. It demonstrates that although the problem is interdisciplinary, the legal component is sidelined in the analysis. To increase the effectiveness of such assessments, it is recommended to use a complex and interdisciplinary approach, conceptualizing the problem and its analysis, and taking into account all three components: legal, geopolitical, and ethno-cultural. In this case, the analysis will be carried out in two stages: a selection of comparable cases of secession, and an analysis of the necessary and sufficient variables. 

Keywords

ethnoplitical conflict, secessions, comparative analysis, legal component, (geo)political component, variables, self-determination of peoples, concept of secession analysis.

 Full Text

Apter D.E. 1996. Comparative Politics, Old and New. – A New Handbook of Political Science. Ed. by R.E. Goodin, H.-D. Klingemann. Oxford: Oxford University Press. P. 372-397. https://doi.org/10.1093/0198294719.003.0015

Bakke K.M., Linke A.M., O’Loughlin J., Toal G. 2018. Dynamics of State-Building After War: External-Internal Relations in Eurasian de Facto States. – Political Geography. No. 63. P. 159-173. http://doi.org/10.1016/j.polgeo.2017.06.011

Blakkisrud H., Kolsto P. 2011. From Secessionist Conflict Towards Functioning State: Processes of State- and Nation-Building in Transnistria. – Post-Soviet Affairs. Vol. 27. No. 2. P. 178-210. http://doi.org/10.2747/1060-586X.27.2.178

Blakkisrud H., Kolsto P. 2012. Dynamics of de facto Statehood: The South Caucasian de Facto States between Secession and Sovereignty. – Southeast European and Black Sea Studies. Vol. 12. No. 2. P. 281-298. http://doi.org/10.1080/14683857.2012.686013

Burg S. L. 2005. Intractability and Third-Party Mediation in the Balkans. – Grasping the Nettle: Analyzing Cases of Intractable Conflict. Ed. by Ch.A. Crocker, F.O. Hampson, P. Aall. Washington, DC: United States Institute of Peace. P. 183-207.

Caspersen N. 2008a. Separatism and Democracy in the Caucasus. – Survival. Vol. 50. No. 4. P. 113-136. https://doi.org/10.1080/00396330802329014

Caspersen N. 2008b. Between Puppets and Independent Actors: Kin-state Involvement in the Conflicts in Bosnia, Croatia and Nagorno Karabakh. – Ethnopolitics. Vol. 7. No. 4. P. 357-372. https://doi.org/10.1080/17449050701618546

Caspersen N. 2012. Unrecognized States: The Struggle for Sovereignty in the Modern International System. Cambridge: Polity Press. 210 p.

Кing C. 2001. The Benefits of Ethnic War: Understanding Eurasia’s Unrecognized States. – World Politics. Vol. 53. No. 3. P. 524-552. https://doi.org/10.1353/wp.2001.0017

Kolsto P. 2006. The Sustainability and Future of Unrecognized Quasi-States. – Journal of Peace Research. Vol. 43. No. 6. P. 723-740. https://doi.org/10.1177/0022343306068102

Kolsto P., Blakkisrud H. 2008. Living with Non-Recognition: State- and Nation-Building in the South Caucasian Quasi states. – Europe–Asia Studies. Vol. 60. No. 3. P. 483-509. https://doi.org/10.1080/09668130801948158

Kolsto P., Malgin A. 1998. The Transnistrian Republic: A Case of Politicized Regionalism. – Nationalities Papers. Vol. 26. No. 1. P. 103-127. https://doi.org/10.1080/00905999808408553

Kolossov V., O’Loughlin J. 1998. Pseudo-States as Harbingers of a New Geopolitics: The Example of the Trans-Dniester Moldovan Republic (TMR). – Geopolitics. Vol 3. No. 1. P. 151-176. https://doi.org/10.1080/14650049808407612

Kriesberg L. 2005. Nature, Dynamics, and Phases of Intractability. – Kriesberg L. Pioneer in Peace and Constructive Conflict Resolution Studies. Cham: Springer. P. 63-89. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-40751-7_4

Lijphart A. 1971. Comparative Politics and Comparative Method. – The American Political Science Review. Vol. 65. No. 3. P. 682-693. https://doi.org/10.2307/1955513

Lynch D. 2004. Engaging Eurasia’s Separatist States: Unresolved Conflicts and De Facto States. Washington, DC: United States Institute of Peace Press. 168 p.

O’Loughlin J., Kolossov V., Toal G. 2014. Inside the Post-Soviet de Facto States: a Comparison of Attitudes in Abkhazia, Nagorny Karabakh, South Ossetia, and Transnistria. – Eurasian Geography and Economics. Vol. 55. No. 5. P. 423-456. http://doi.org/10.1080/15387216.2015.1012644

Pegg S. 1998. International Society and the De Facto State. Aldershot; Brookfield, USA: Ashgate. 308 p.

Popescu N. 2006. Democracy in Secessionism: Transnistria and Abkhazia’s domestic politics. – International Policy Fellowship. Final research paper. Budapest: Central European University. 27 p. URL: http://www.policy.hu/npopescu/ipf%20info/IPF%204%20democracy%20in%20secessionism.pdf (accessed: 29.11.2020)

Putnam L.L., Wondolleck J.M. 2003. Intractability: Definitions, Dimensions, and Distinctions. – Making Sense of Intractable Environmental Conflicts: Concepts and Cases. Ed. by R.J. Lewicki, B.L. Gray, M. Eliott. Washington: Island Press. P. 35-59.

Ryngaert C., Sobrie S. 2011. Recognition of States: International Law or Realpolitik? The Practice of Recognition in the Wake of Kosovo, South Ossetia, and Abkhazia. – Leiden Journal of International Law. Vol. 24. No. 2. P. 467-490. https://doi.org/10.1017/S0922156511000100

Smelser N.J. 2003. On Comparative Analysis, Interdiscisciplinary and Internationalization in Sociology. – International Sociology. Vol. 18. No. 4. P. 643-657. http://doi.org/10.1177/0268580903184001

Soder K. 2008. Appendix 3A. Multilateral Peace Operations in 2007. – SIPRI Yearbook 2008. Armaments, Disarmament and International Security. Stockholm. P. 113-148. URL: https://www.sipri.org/sites/default/files/YB08%20113%2003A.pdf (accessed: 29.11.2020)

Torosyan T. 2010. Conflict Resolution in the Framework of the International Law. Case of Nagorno-Karabakh. Yerevan: Tigran Mets. 336 p.

Torosyan T. 2013. Resolution of Intractable Conflicts: Nagorno-Karabakh and Kosovo. – Iran and the Caucasus. Vol. 17. No. 4. P. 427-441. http://doi.org/10.1163/1573384X-20130407

Torosyan T. 2015. Perspectives of Rights and Challenges of Political Interests in Conflict Resolution: The Cases of Kosovo and Nagorno-Karabakh. – Essex Human Right Review. Vol. 10. No. 1. URL: http://projects.essex.ac.uk/ehrr/v10n1/torosyan-perspectives-of-rights-and-challenges-of-political-interests-inconflict-resolution.pdf (accessed: 29.11.2020)

Torosyan T. Petrosyan M. 2015. Comparative Analysis of Conflicts: Modeling Problems. – Armenian Journal of Political Science. Vol. 3. No. 2. P. 121-138. https://doi.org/10.19266/1829-4286-2015-02-121-138

Torosyan T., Vardanyan A. 2015. The South Caucasus Conflicts in the Context of Struggle for the Eurasian Heartland. – Geopolitics. 2015. Vol. 20. No. 3. P. 559-582. https://doi.org/10.1080/14650045.2015.1050717

Walker E. 1998. No Peace, No War in the Caucasus: Secessionist Conflicts in Chechnya, Abkhazia and Nagorno-Karabakh. Paper, Strengthening Democratic Institutions Project, Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs. URL: http://belfercenter.ksg.harvard.edu/publication/3042/no_peace_no_war_in_the_caucasus.html (accessed: 29.11.2020).

Zartman I.W. 2005. Analyzing Intractability. – Grasping the Nettle: Analyzing Cases of Intractable Conflict. Ed. by Ch.A. Crocker, F.O. Hampson, P. Aall. Washington, DC: United States Institute of Peace. P. 47-64.

Zartman I.W., Touval S. 1996. International Mediation in the Post-Cold War Era. – Managing Global Chaos Ed. by Ch.A. Crocker, F.O. Hampson, P. Aall. Washington Washington: United States Institute of Peace Press. P. 445-461.

Meleshkina E.Yu., Kudryashova I.V. 2015. Secession Processes in the Post-Imperial Space: Kosovo, Abkhazia, South Ossetia. – Urgent Problems of Europe. No. 1. P. 56-80. (In Russ.) URL: http://legacy.inion.ru/index.php?page_id=352&id=1445 (accessed: 20.11.2020).

Political Change in a Global World: Theoretical and Methodological Problems of Analysis and Forecasting. 2014. Editorial Board: I.S. Semenenko (editor-in-chief), V.V. Lapkin, V.I. Pantin. Moscow: IMEMO RAN. 218 р. (In Russ.)

Semenenko I.S., Lapkin V.V., Pantin V.I. 2016. Classifying Ethnic Conflicts: Challenges for Political Theory and Methodology. – Polis. Political Studies. No. 6. P. 69-94. (In Russ.) https://doi.org/10.17976/jpps/2016.06.06

Tokarev A.A. 2017. Comparative Analysis of the Post-Communist Secessions: The Prognostic Attempt of Quantification of the Factors` Impact on Secession. – Polis. Political Studies. No. 4. P. 106-117. (In Russ.) https://doi.org/10.17976/jpps/2017.04.08

Torosyan T. 2007. An Imaginary Contradiction. – Russia in Global Affairs. Vol. 5. No. 4. P. 203-214. (In Russ.) URL: https://globalaffairs.ru/number/n_9224 (accessed: 20.11.2020).

Troitskaya O.V. 2015. Right of Nations to Self-Determination: Evolution of Concept and Practices. – Polis. Political Studies. No. 6. P. 116-130. (In Russ.) https://doi.org/10.17976/jpps/2015.06.12

Fomin I.V. 2016. Performatives of the Secession of Contested States: South Ossetia, Abkhazia, Kosovo. – Political Science (RU). No. 4. P. 271-284. (In Russ.) URL: http://inion.ru/site/assets/files/3454/4.pdf(accessed: 20.11.2020).

Fomin I.V., Ilyin M.V. 2016. What Can Semiotics Contribute to Political Science? – Political Science (RU). No. 3. P. 12-29. (In Russ.) URL: http://inion.ru/site/assets/files/3517/nauka_016_3.pdf (accessed: 20.11.2020).

See also: