A Qualitative-Comparative Analysis of Violent Political Conflict at Macro Level

By accepting this basic fact that human needs are diverse and our resources to satisfy them are limited, we can acknowledge that all communities are prone to conflict and it is, according to Simmel, an integral part of social life. Conflict, together with reconciliation, constitute forms of human community. The question is why in some countries conflict is, regulated, managed and even play an effective role in integration and social order, while in other countries it exists in a variety of mild to severe forms and is experienced through violent measures. Why do violent conflicts arise in some given communities? What are the important accessories of social cooperation, social harmony and conflict management? In the classical and contemporary theories of Marx to Dahrendorf, Collins and Turner, the most important variable in the conflict literature is inequality (Blue and Blue, 1982). According to Bangura, inequality among different social groups is a stronger source of violent conflicts in comparison to inequality between individuals. When inequality in income, wealth and access to services or political power is based on group differences, then mobilization of individuals to perform collective action considered an important issue (Bangura, 2006). As well, Mueller suggests that income inequality lead to political violence. The dissatisfaction of income distribution is a necessary precondition of collective action (Hartman & Way, 1988). Quality of democracy and quality of governance are another effective factor on conflict. As for democracy, all of its indicators have reverse and significant relationships with indicators of conflict. In other words, the more democracy is institutionalized and political rights and civil liberties improve, more reduction comes in the degree of conflict. While there is a direct relationship between inequality and social conflict, the political-economic development is also inversely related to the conflict index (Shekarchy, 1389: 176). In addition, the quality of governance has an influence on conflicts. Accountability, rule of law, control of corruption, government effectiveness, political stability, quality and regulation of affairs are the main dimensions of governance (Ibid, 135). As for the relationship between economic development and political conflict, while previous theories have emphasized that economic development, as measured by an increase in average incomes, reduces political violence, Muller challenged this notion and maintained that economic development leads to political violence (Weede, 1986). This study is based on case-oriented comparative approach. Macro variables and macro units are considered. The main purpose is to understand what variable in combination with what variables and in what circumstances lead to political violent conflict. On the other hand, causal relationships are established upon set relationships, not covariation between variables. Using a fuzzy approach, attaining necessary and sufficient conditions for occurrence of the result, and the recognition of structure of causal mechanisms through causal combinations of pathways are other features of this research. In the present study, degree of membership in the set of result (violent political conflict) and set of causal conditions were determined with reference to technical resources, the international indexes and world ranking. Violent political conflict as result and wealth inequality, nominal inequality, quality of governance, democracy and economy based on energy exports and economic development were defined as sets of causal conditions. After determining the threshold of full membership, cut-point and not full membership for causal conditions and result, membership functions, the calibration terms for result variable, causal conditions and finally fuzzy scores were generated by the Fuzzy Software.Countries selected as cases share some similarities and differences. With the exception of some countries such as South Korea, most of the countries have social and cultural diversity, and this provides their similarities. On the other hand, the geographical location (Middle East, Europe, North America, Latin America and Africa), political system (democratic government, semi-democratic and authoritarian) and economic policies indicate their differences. It should be noted that Turkey and Egypt were selected as positive cases because they met the highest level of political violence as it is included in the set result. The US, Canada, Sweden and Denmark were selected as negative cases because these countries do not share the same amount of political conflict as is the case in the positive countries above. However, there is the possibility of occurrence of result among them. Also, for diversification of cases and dispersion of the fuzzy scores a diverse range of countries such as South Korea, Malaysia, South Africa, Brazil and India were included in the study. The index of violent political conflict is defined by estimating the degree of political violence among countries which their score ranged between -2.5 and +2.5. Wealth inequality is measured by Gina coefficient index and nominal inequality is defined by the degree of political and economic discrimination among different ethnic, religious and race groups that inhabit in the each country. Political rights and civil liberties were used for measuring democracy and evaluation of the economic situation was based on the energy export as it is calculated by share of fuel resources export from total exports. GDP per capita was used to calculate the economic development. Composite index of government quality was defined based on criteria such as control of corruption, government efficiency, accountability, rule of law and the quality of settings, all of which ranged between -2.5 and +2.5. This study includes the period of 2009, with except of wealth inequality that is based on Muller's theory (who says the effect of inequality on violent conflict reveals itself in 5 years). Data for democracy was obtained from Polity institute, Index of quality of governance and violent political conflicts were obtained from WGI data set and nominal inequality index was obtained from Marupdate data set. Also index of wealth inequality and economic development were obtained from World Bank data sets.Discussion of Results and To sum up, the results of this paper indicate that wealth inequality is neither a necessary nor a sufficient condition for violent political conflict at the macro level. In other words, the presence of this variable does not influence the occurrence of violent political conflict. Also, in examination of multiple conjectural causation, this variable is not an influence on occurrence of violent political conflict and even its absence in combination with other variables, lead to occurrence of violent political conflict. Nominal inequality itself is neither a necessary nor a sufficient condition for occurrence of violent political conflict, but in two casual combinations, it leads to violent political conflict. Absence of democracy, economic underdevelopment and government quality individually are a necessary and a sufficient condition for incidence of violent political conflict, namely, the presence of each of these variables can lead to violent political conflict. The combination of the two conditions, economic underdevelopment and absence of democracy, in one the hand and inequality in wealth and absence of democracy on the other hand, are sufficient for the occurrence of violent political conflict. Finally, an economy based on energy exports is neither necessary nor sufficient for violent political conflict. Among the various multiple causal pathways, 4 causation-conjectural paths with regards to combination of theories were selected to improve the coverage ratio. Among above causal pathways, the third and the fourth pathways have relatively more coverage and the total coverage of the two pathways (0.736) is a higher coefficient. Also, the consistency coefficient of fourth path is less than the other paths. Nevertheless, all paths have a theoretical importance. Overall, in the countries studied it was observed that even the absence of wealth inequality, existence of undemocratic regimes and absence of economic development can lead to violent political conflict. Our Forth casual path shows that in countries where economy is not based on energy exports, violent political conflict is a result of existence of democracy and absence of economic development and presence and absence of democracy in various combinations can lead to violent political conflict.