Economic Governance, Political Freedoms and the Conditions of Societal Violence

Liberty and Peace
1. Auflage 2025
ISBN: 978-1-032-86885-1
Verlag: Routledge

Buch, Englisch, 256 Seiten, Format (B × H): 161 mm x 240 mm, Gewicht: 552 g

Reihe: Routledge Advances in International Relations and Global Politics

This book shows how the underlying causes of civil war and political violence are based in concrete conditions relating to economic governance. The author argues that what matters for cauterizing the potentiality of "sustainable" violence is economic governance, specifically growth-promoting governance that maximizes returns to investment due to competitive free-market processes upheld by the rule of law and the protection of private property rights. The arguments are assessed against three major forms of societal violence—civil wars, one-sided violence by states against ordinary citizens, and interpersonal violence that results in mortality.

Political and economic rights and freedoms are clearly intertwined, but there may be advantages to prefacing one over another. This study shows why and how economic governance matters for generating civil peace, perhaps more so than rival perspectives based on the understanding that violence is motivated by political concerns and grievances that motivate people to rebel broadly. The book demonstrates that the organization of violence that is sustained over long periods of time is far more narrowly focused than the loud discourses generated by violence itself predict. Even if people have legitimate reasons for contesting a government’s policies, such concerns become side-tracked, even abandoned, for reasons that may trump the necessity of compromise; namely, because more narrowly organized groups may have advantages for organizing violence and surviving sanction. The mechanism through which this may occur is the primary focus of this book. The author examines quantitative data but uses empirical detail from Sri Lanka as a case study. Relying on a variety of historical sources on the Sri Lankan conflict to guide the discussion, the author uses data collected by a host of individuals and agencies in the statistical analyses that follow.

The work demonstrates that economic governance matters more than the political mechanisms most often argued in the literature. It will be of interest to those studying South Asian Politics, economic development, sociology, history, law, international relations, cultural studies, and peace, security, and conflict studies.

Zielgruppe

Postgraduate

Autoren/Hrsg.

de Soysa, Indra

Fachgebiete

• Sozialwissenschaften Politikwissenschaft Politikwissenschaft Allgemein Politische Studien zu einzelnen Ländern und Gebieten
• Sozialwissenschaften Politikwissenschaft Politische Kultur Staatsbürgerkunde, Staatsbürgerschaft, Zivilgesellschaft
• Sozialwissenschaften Ethnologie | Volkskunde Volkskunde Historische & Regionale Volkskunde

Inhaltsverzeichnis

Chapter 1: A Capitalist Civil Peace? Identifying the Mechanism

Chapter 2. The Shape of Armed Violence: Does Politics Trump Economics?

Chapter 3. Critically Assessing Rival Theory: Push Back on Grievance

Chapter 4. Explaining the Capitalist Civil Peace: The Organizational Logic

Chapter 5. Empirics of the Onset of Civil War: Data, Methods, and Replications

Chapter 6. Peace is Not Peace! Economic Governance, Grievance, and Gratification

Chapter 7. Interpersonal Violence: Economic Freedom, Shadow Markets, and Criminogenity

Chapter 8. The Governance Imperative: Some Conclusions, Recommendations for Policy, and Future Research

Über Autor(innen)

Indra de Soysa is Professor of Political Science at the Norwegian University of Science and Technology in Trondheim, Norway. His research primarily focuses on the political, economic and social outcomes of economic liberalization, the effects of institutions, and the causes of peace and prosperity. He has published widely on Foreign Direct Investment, the causes of civil and political violence, consequences of inequality, the natural resource curse, globalization, and environmental politics. His publications include the monograph Foreign Direct Investment, Democracy, and Development: The Correlates and Concomitants of Globalization (Routledge, 2003).