Two Dilemmas in the Politics of Ethnic Federalism: Experimental Evidence From Ethiopia
Braeden Davis et al.
Abstract
Ethnic federalism, a system that devolves power to subnational states drawn along ethnic lines, is a widely debated approach to managing ethnic conflict. While scholars have studied its macro-level consequences, little is known about micro-level preferences within these countries. We examine two key dilemmas of ethnic federalism: (1) the “minorities within minorities dilemma”, where many ethnic group members live outside their designated state, and (2) the “devolution dilemma,” which concerns which powers should be held by the central versus state governments. Using survey experiments among Ethiopian university students, we find no average effect of changing power distributions on support for ethnic federalism, but substantial heterogeneity: politically and ethnically intolerant respondents respond strongly to devolving state power. We further find security policy is the primary concern in debates over devolution, followed by cultural policies. Our findings highlight the importance of micro-level perspectives in understanding the stability of ethnofederal systems and the political consequences of their reform.
Evidence weight
Balanced mode · F 0.40 / M 0.15 / V 0.05 / R 0.40
| F · citation impact | 0.50 × 0.4 = 0.20 |
| M · momentum | 0.50 × 0.15 = 0.07 |
| V · venue signal | 0.50 × 0.05 = 0.03 |
| R · text relevance † | 0.50 × 0.4 = 0.20 |
† Text relevance is estimated at 0.50 on the detail page — for your query’s actual relevance score, open this paper from a search result.