Mix or match to check ethnic violence: US study

Washington, Sep 14 - Based on a study of ethnic violence in India and former Yugoslavia, American scientists suggest that such conflict may be prevented by either integration or separation of communities.

Like molecules in a chemist's test tube, different ethnic or cultural groups interact differently depending on the degree to which they are mixed together, say May Lim and colleagues at the New England Complex Systems Institute (NECSI) and Brandeis University in Massachusetts.

Drawing from the concept of phase separation in chemistry, they show that whether groups engage in violence or coexist peacefully can be explained by how well-defined the boundaries between the groups are.

The authors devised a mathematical model based on the assumption that violence does not arise in highly mixed regions, since groups of the same type do not consider the space to be their own, according to the novel study published in Science magazine.

'Our research shows that violence takes place when an ethnic group is large enough to impose cultural norms on public spaces, but not large enough to prevent those norms from being broken,' said Lim. 'Usually this occurs in places where boundaries between groups are unclear.'

Reflecting an emerging direction in science applied to social policy, the study applies the scientific principles of pattern formation - which are used to describe, for example, how chemicals separate by type or phase - to the huge social problem of ethnic conflict.

The researchers discovered that ethnic violence occurs in certain predictable patterns, just like other collective behaviours in physical, biological and social complex systems.

'The concept of pattern formation, while it may have been originally developed to understand chemical systems, is really a scientific model of collective behaviours, in which you look at those aspects that control overall behaviour,' said co-author and NECSI president Yaneer Bar-Yam.

'This study provides an indication of where regions may run into trouble, and how to avoid conflict, said Bar-Yam, adding, 'this research reflects a tremendous opportunity for us to address a wide range of social concerns with new scientific tools.'

For their study of conflict in India, the scientists drew up a map based on the 2001 Census showing the relative densities of ethno-cultural groups like Hindus, Muslims, Christians, Sikhs, Buddhists, and others (primarily Jains).

Their predictions corresponded very well to the primary locations of 'extremist' violence of government reports and confirmed by independent sources, particularly in Kashmir, Punjab, and the states of Northeast India, the authors reported.

Some additional areas of lesser violence were also predicted, particularly Jharkhand. Consistent with predicted results, the violence in this region is not as prevalent as in other violence-prone areas of India, they said.

(c) Indo-Asian News Service

More US (World) News click here