Simon Hug1 2
Université de Genève
CefES, Università degli
Studi di Milano-Bicocca
 , Sandra Penic3
Université de Genève

First version: August 2015, this version: Oct 13, 2021
The Political Economy of Democracy and Dictatorship conference (Münster, February 24-26th, 2022)

The consequences of one-sided violence on inter-ethnic relations

The consequences of one-sided violence on inter-ethnic relations4

Abstract

Recent research emphasizes that individuals in war-torn societies are affected differently by several forms of violence. Especially, the distinction among acts of one-sided violence between targeted and non-targeted ones has been theorized to affect individuals differently. While one-sided violence is expected to reduce interpersonal trust and trust in governmental institution more generally, targeted one-sided violence should be even more detrimental, especially if carried out by government actors. Drawing on a large set of surveys and information on perpetrators and targets of one-sided violence we assess these expected effects empirically, drawing on variation both across time and space. Our results are in line with the hitherto largely anecdotal findings that targeted one-sided violence has nefarious consequences, well beyond those of violence more generally.

1  Introduction

1  Département de science politique et relations internationales, Université de Genève, 40 Bd du Pont d'Arve, 1211 Genève 4; Switzerland, phone +41 22 379 83 78, email: simon.hug@unige.ch.
2 CefES research fellow, Università degli Studi di Milano-Bicocca
3  Département de science politique et relations internationales, Université de Genève, 40 Bd du Pont d'Arve, 1211 Genève 4; Switzerland, email: Sandra.PenicJunge@unige.ch
4We greatly appreciated Andreas Wimmer for making his data data available, as well as Nils-Christian Bormann for giving us access to a file linking EPR-groups to groups in various surveys. Some similar research tasks were accomplished by Elise Clerc, which we also gratefully acknowledge.

File translated from TEX by TTH, version 4.12.