Mary Beth Altier
130 Corwin Hall
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E-mail: mehrhard@princeton.edu
Specialization: Comparative politics; international relations; nationalism and ethnic conflict; political violence; electoral behavior; European politics; institutional design.
M.A., Politics, Princeton University; B.A. (hon.), Drew University
Thesis Title: Voting for Violence: Citizen Security, the State, and Popular Support for Paramilitary Parties
Committee: Nancy Bermeo, Chris Achen, Mark Beissinger
Abstract: This dissertation investigates why citizens vote for paramilitary political parties in countries confronting internal or international ethno-nationalist conflict. More specifically, I ask why some ethno-nationalist voters support parties that express a clear commitment to the democratic process, while others choose parties that employ a strategy of violence or possess ties to a paramilitary organization.
Drawing upon spatial, temporal, and cross-party variation in Nationalist and Unionist support for paramilitary parties in Northern Ireland, it shows that a voter's decision to support a paramilitary party is driven more by what the state, political parties, and paramilitary groups have done in the past than by what these political actors promise about their future behavior. Popular support for paramilitary parties is best explained by the presence or deepening of a security crisis as a result of the localized experience of state, sectarian, or interstate violence against ordinary civilians with which a voter ethnically identifies. The findings challenge theories that maintain that support for, or participation in, political violence stems from economic grievances, the intensity of inter-communal competition, or religiosity.
The analysis relies upon extensive fieldwork in Northern Ireland, including interviews and archival research, as well as an original dataset that aggregates and combines census and conflict-related violence data at the ward level with electoral data at the district electoral area level. To show that my argument holds elsewhere, I examine temporal and spatial variation in support for paramilitary parties for democratic elections held in Lebanon, Spain, and the Palestinian territories.
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Link to: Curriculum Vitae