How elections may lead to political violence
Introduction Elections are supposed to function as a peaceful means for making decisions and settling political differences. However, they do not always function in this way: sometimes, they trigger political violence. Especially ethnically divided societies are often thought to be prone to such dynamics. This paper presents a comparative analysis of the 2007 Kenyan elections and the 2006 and 2011 elections in Zambia. Working with these cases, it asks, first, whether the presence of ethnic diversity must lead to violence around election time. In a second step, the paper gives an analysis of under what conditions ethnic diversity tends to lead ...
