Deciphering Disorder in Africa: Is Identity the Key?
By Crawford Young. World Politics, 2002
Noted Africa-watcher Crawford Young reviews five books that examine the role of identity in recent conflicts in Liberia, Rwanda, Algeria, and elsewhere. While competing identities certainly can influence conflict, they are just one factor among many that cause and perpetuate them. [PDF]
Ethnicity, Insurgency and Civil Wars
By James Fearon and David Laitin. APSR, 2003. The authors counter the influential claim that civil wars have proliferated after the end of the Cold War by presenting data suggesting civil wars since the 1990s have their roots in conflicts from the 1950s and 1960s. [PDF]
