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Securitised Ethnic Identities And Communal Conflicts, Tarja Väyrynen

Peace and Conflict Studies

Excerpt

The paper is inspired by Ernesto Laclau's (1996, p. 46) observation of the terrain into which history has thrown us. The terrain is characterised by: [...] the multiplication of new--and not so new--identities as a result of the collapse of the places from which the universal subject spoke--explosion of ethnic and national identities in Eastern Europe and in the territories of the former USSR, struggles of immigrant groups in Western Europe, new forms of multicultural protest and self-assertion in the U.S., to which we have to add the gamut of forms of contestation associated with the new social movements.