Politics in Deeply Divided Societies

The establishment of durable, democratic institutions constitutes one of the major challenges of our age. As countless contemporary examples have shown, it requires far more than simply the holding of free elections. The consolidation of a legitimate constitutional order is difficult to achieve in any society, but it is especially problematic in societies with deep social cleavages. This book provides an authoritative and systematic analysis of the politics of so- called ‘deeply divided societies' in the post Cold War era. From Bosnia to South Africa, Northern Ireland to Iraq, it explains why such places are so prone to political violence, and demonstrates why – even in t…