the politics of culture in ethnically divided societies
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Book reviewed: Cultural Contestation in Ethnic Conflict Marc Howard Ross (Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 2007), 360pp., ISBN: 0 52 169032 3 (paperback); ISBN: 0 52 187013 5 (hardback).
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arc Howard Ross’s useful book uses a wide range of interesting case studies to develop the argument that the role of cultural factors tends to be neglected in the analysis of long-term ethnic conflicts. ‘In general’, he argues, ‘political scientists approaching ethnic conflict have focused on the interests motivating contending groups and the strategies by which these interests are pursued’(p. 1). This line of argument provides a serviceable peg on which to justify his series of case studies, but it does overstate the extent to which scholars in the field present ethnic conflict as a clash of interests, with ethnic entrepreneurs manipulating inter-communal antagonisms to further their own political ambitions. Such instrumental accounts of ethnic conflicts certainly exist, but the construction of identities through cultural mechanisms that Ross describes in his book is far from representing a novel approach to the study of ethnic conflict. Indeed, Ross’s book runs with, rather
than against, the grain of contemporary accounts of the ethnic conflict and a number of the general propositions that Ross advances will seem unexceptional to many in the field. What is more impressive is the rich detail that Ross provides on the individual case studies. His first major case study examines the ongoing disputes that have taken place in Northern Ireland over the routing of parades of the Protestant Orange Order. Ross describes well both the passions that the issue continues to arouse in Northern Ireland and partially successful efforts to defuse the issue during the peace process. He shows how disputes over the routing of parades have arisen out of the historical role that parades of the Orange Order have played in the assertion of Protestant dominance, which explains why marching through the neighbourhoods of the Catholic community have been so central to the tradition of parading. In this context, he sets out the relationship between key events in european political science: 6 2007
(453 – 456) & 2007 European Consortium for Political Research. 1680-4333/07 $30 www.palgrave-journals.com/eps
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the politics of the north of Ireland before and after partition and the evolution of parading. His account draws on generally appropriate and reliable secondary sources, though there are some significant gaps in the literature he refers to. In particular, missing is Frank Wright’s powerful analysis of the issue. Wright analysed parading as part of a system of communal deterrence through which Ulster’s Protestants sought to subordinate Catholics in the nineteenth century and which caused conflict even then with governments in London. It may be that this line of argument linking parading to the maintenance of order and to Protestant supremacy went too far beyond the realm of cultural contestation for Ross’s purposes. The chapter on Northern Ir
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