Ethnic diversity and democracy serves best via a “State Nation” - Prof. Ashutosh Varshney

How can ethnic diversity and democracy be combined? What helps increase or decrease the chances of democracy and social peace in polities with a multi-ethnic dimension? These were the questions addressed in a presentation made by Prof.

Ashutosh Varshney at a video-conference seminar organised by the Pathfinder Foundation, at the American Centre in Colombo. This was the sixth of the Pathfinder/Harvard University seminar series and was titled “Ethnic Diversity and the Structure of Government.”

Prof. Varshney is currently Professor of Political Science at Brown University and has previously taught at Harvard and the University of Michigan. He drew on international experiences, particularly France, India and USA to address the questions posed above.

Prof. Varshney argued that ethnic diversity and democracy were best combined through the concept of a “State Nation” rather than a “Nation State”. He contended that in a “Nation State” there was a very strong overlap between its territorial and cultural boundaries. France was cited as a good example of this. Prior to the Revolution (1789), France was characterised by diverse ethnic identities. However, during the period between the French Revolution and World War I (1789 – 1915), there was a concerted move to create an undifferentiated citizenry. Conscription from all the different ethnic identities into a “national army” and the education system were the primary means used to forge a single cultural identity that became the French “Nation State”. Prof. Varshney argued that while this was possible during the 19th Century it was not a viable option in the much more rights-oriented early 21st century. He cited Japan and Scandinavia as other countries that approximated nation states comprising single cultural identities within their borders.

He contrasted the “melting pot” approach of creating a single cultural identity in a “Nation State” (e.g. France) with “salad bowl” societies which had multiple cultural identities within a single boundary.  In his view, much of the world fell into this latter category.

Prof. Varshney went on to define a “State Nation” as one that was multi-ethnic with concentrations of ethnicities within its boundaries (e.g. Belgium, Canada, India and Spain). He pointed out that individuals could have multiple identities within a “State Nation.” He cited India as a country where many individuals had three identities based on state (language), religion and caste. Prof. Varshney categorised the Indian constitutional dispensation as “linguistic federalism based on language and tribe”.

Prof. Varshney considered India to be relatively successful. In support of this, he cites the fact that 75% of its people consider their national (Indian) identity as being more important than their regional one. In addition, he points out that India has been able to move from 14 states at independence to 28 states at present, without the Centre being threatened. (Prof. Varshney was of the view that there could be five or six additional states by the end of this decade.) He also commented favourably on the end of the language issue after the 1960s with the effective implementation of the three language policy (regional language, Hindi and English). Prof. Varshney also recognised there had been failures and cited five separatist insurgencies in the post-Independence period, with the worst moment being in 1990 when there were separatist movements in both Punjab and Kashmir simultaneously.

The speaker identified two explanatory factors for India’s “relative success”. The first related to the political engineering made possible by the Freedom Movement and the Congress party’s leadership role within it. It was argued that the Freedom Movement transformed India from a “civilisational” to a “national” entity. The Congress Party became the vehicle for nation-building. Prof. Varshney raised the possibility that without the Freedom Movement India could now be 28 nations with a common civilisational identity, as found in Europe.

Prof. Varshney contended that there was also a key structural advantage that supported Indian nation-building. He pointed out that the cleavages in Indian society have “cross-cutting” dimensions across the different regions. For instance, religion (Hinduism) cuts across language based divisions; or the religiously distinct Muslims speak the language of their respective regions. Furthermore, caste also cuts across various regions. He contrasted this with countries which have “cumulative” cleavages where there was a lack of “cross-cutting” links. He argued that when cleavages in a society were essentially cumulative, the likelihood of such divisions becoming a threat to the state were greater as a result of divisive politics.

Prof. Varshney argued that the concept of the “State Nation” should nurture two things simultaneously:

1. commitment to a larger identity through nation – wide institutions, such as the civil service, armed forces, sports teams and education systems; and

2. institutions that support diversity.

A distinction was also made between “coming together” (USA) and “holding together” (India) federations. Prof. Varshney pointed out that the former was more difficult to achieve as it usually entailed a more challenging bargaining process which resulted in stronger sub-national units and a relatively weak Centre. The latter usually resulted in a stronger Centre.

A lively debate followed which focused on how universally these concepts and analysis could be applied, with particular reference to the Sri Lankan context.

The Pathfinder Foundation is exploring the possibility of continuing this seminar series with Harvard University.

Ashutosh Varshney is Professor of Political Science at the University of Michigan, Ann Arbor. Previously, he taught, among other places, at Harvard University as an assistant and associate professor of government.

His most recent work Ethnic Conflict and Civic Life: Hindus and Muslims in India (Yale University Press, 2002 and 2003) won the Gregory Luebbert Prize of the American Political Science Association for the best book in comparative politics in 2002, was Choice magazine’s “outstanding academic title”, and a Kiriyama Prize “Notable”. His other books are: Democracy, Development and the Countryside: Urban-Rural Struggles in India (Cambridge University Press, New York, 1995 and 1998), which in its PhD dissertation form won the Daniel Lerner Prize; India and the Politics of Developing Countries: Essays in Memory of Myron Weiner (Sage 2004; India in the Era of Economic Reforms (Oxford University Press, 1999 and 2000), co-edited with Jeffrey Sachs; Beyond Urban Bias (Frank Cass, London, 1993).

His research and teaching cover three areas: Ethnicity and Nationalism; Political Economy of Development; and South Asian Politics and Political Economy. His academic papers have appeared, among other journals, in World Politics, Perspectives on Politics, Comparative Politics, Daedalus, Journal of Development Studies, Journal of Asian Studies, Journal of Democracy, Journal of Commonwealth and Comparative Politics, Foreign Affairs, Policy Sciences, and Asian Survey.

He is currently working on a multi-country project on cities and ethnic conflict, and on the politics of economic reforms in India. For research, he has received fellowships from the Social Science Research Council, the Ford Foundation, the McArthur Foundation, the Open Society Institute, the U.S. Institute of Peace, and the Woodrow Wilson International Centre for Scholars.