Ethnicity without Groups

Commonsense Groupism

• The Concept of Group

  • Basic and indispensable concept in social sciences.

  • Core to sociology, political science, anthropology, demography, and social psychology.

  • Fundamental to studies involving:

  • Political mobilization

  • Cultural identity

  • Economic interests

  • Social class and status groups

  • Collective action, kinship, gender, religion, ethnicity, race, multiculturalism, and minority studies.

  • Despite its importance, the concept of "group" lacks scrutiny in recent literature.

  • The social psychological literature exists but lacks resonance outside its subfield.

  • Sparse recent literature on "group" compared to class, identity, gender, and ethnicity.

• Group as Taken-For-Granted Concept

  • We often assume groups are unproblematic.

  • The analysis of ethnicity, race, and nationalism assumes discrete bounded groups without challenging that view.

Groupism

• Definition of Groupism

  • Tendency to treat ethnic, racial, and national groups as basic units of social life.

  • Reifying groups leads to oversimplified notions of ethnic identities, which are often seen as homogeneous and unitary actors with collective aims.

  • Examples include treating groups like Serbs, Croats, Jews, and Palestinians as internally homogeneous and externally bounded.

• Surprising Strength of Groupism

  • Despite diverse social theories challenging group treatment as real entities, groupism persists and is prevalent in the common discourse about ethnicity and conflict.

  • While constructivist views are growing in academic contexts, lay understandings, media reports, and policies still often reflect groupist perspectives.

Critique of Groupism

• Questioning Ethnic Common Sense

  • Common sense notions partition society into intrinsic categories, which can be essentializing (Hirschfeld 1996).

  • Ethnic common sense is part of what needs explanation, not what should ground our analysis.

• Critique of Ethnopolitical Practice

  • Ethnic conflicts are framed by participants in traditional group-centric ways, which need not be replicated in analytical frameworks.

  • Ethnopolitical entrepreneurs and their rhetoric contribute to the reification of ethnic identities for political gain.

  • Emphasizes need for analysts to resist reinforcing common superficial categories of ethnic group identity.

• Reification as a Social Process

  • By treating ethnic groups as substantial entities, analysts reinforce constructed identities which can lead to a misunderstanding of ethnic conflicts.

Rethinking Ethnicity

• Beyond Groupism

  • Understand ethnicity and conflict without defaulting to group models.

  • Ethnicity, race, and nationalism are more useful when conceptualized as dynamic, relational, and contextually contingent phenomena.

• Conceptualizing Ethnicity

  • Must be seen in terms of practical categories, cognitive schemas, discursive frames, political projects, etc.

  • Emphasizes the processes of ethnicization rather than viewing groups as fixed entities.

• Reconsidering the Reality of Ethnicity

  • Reality and significance of ethnicity can be maintained without positing fixed groups or entities without undermining their social and political impacts.

Groupness as Contextual and Variable

• Shift from Groups to Groupness

  • Groupness = fluctuating social relations rather than a permanent state.

  • This allows acknowledging moments of solidarity without assuming the groups are always present or dominant.

• Distinguishing Groups and Categories

  • A mutual, interacting community is a group; a category is not—it can only become a basis for forming groups.

  • Analyzing categories allows us to unpack the social and political processes through which groupness is created and experienced.

Group-Making as a Project

• Group Dynamics and Ethnic Insurgencies

  • Analyzes how movements can provoke violence to catalyze group identity (e.g., Kosovo Liberation Army's provocations leading to Serb repression).

  • Successful group-making is influenced by both strategic actions and historical legacies of identities.

Organizations vs. Groups in Ethnic Conflict

• Role of Organizations

  • Ethnic conflicts are characterized by organizational dynamics (state structures, political parties, etc.) rather than ethnic groups acting as coherent units.

  • Displays how groups and organizations interact but emphasizes the importance of recognizing organizations' role in ethnic conflict.

Framing and Coding Ethnic Conflict

• Interpretation and Framing

  • Ethnic conflict becomes defined through the narratives ascribed to actions by various participants.

  • The act of framing shapes how conflicts are perceived and categorized as ethnic or otherwise.

Cognitive Dimensions of Ethnicity

• Perceiving Ethnicity

  • Ethnicity, race, and nationalism are ways of interpreting the world, offering frames and schemas that influence social interactions and perceptions.

  • The cognitive aspects affect how identities are constructed and mobilized in various contexts.

Practical Implications

• Impacts on Analysis and Policy

  • Awareness of framing dynamics and the centrality of organizations can lead to more precise interpretations of ethnic conflicts, recognizing underlying interests beyond mere ethnic categorization.

  • The implications stress the importance of understanding the contingency of groupness

Case Study: Ethnicity in Cluj, Romania

• Setting Overview

  • Examination of an East Central European town (Cluj), highlighting how ethnicity operates through political discourse rather than as a conflict between groups.

  • Noted a significant Romanian and Hungarian population, with historic tension post-communism.

• Organizational Dynamics vs. Group Solidarity

  • The ethnic conflict framed by political organizations reflects not solidified group identities but competing organizational interests (e.g., DAHR vs. Romanian nationalists).

  • Analysis avoids conflating ethnic categories with group dynamics found in other regions.

• Cognitive Category Impact

  • Local residents’ ethnic identities are often influenced by political narratives but do not equate to substantial solidarity or organic identity.

• Conclusion of Case Study

  • Groupness did not solidify even amidst political rhetoric; events demonstrated the gap between organized action and meaningful group identities.

Conclusion

• Redefining Ethnicity Study

  • Push for a framework that moves beyond static ethnic group paradigms toward a focus on dynamic relations and cognitive processes of ethnicity, race, and nationality.

  • Raises questions about the validity of studying something defined as "ethnicity" at all in light of increasingly complex socio-political landscapes.

Brubaker’s critique of ethnicity is primarily based on the phenomenon of Groupism. This critique challenges the common-sense notion that society is intrinsically partitioned into discrete, bounded, and essentializing ethnic categories.

Key aspects of this critique include:

1. Questioning Ethnic Common Sense: Brubaker argues that common-sense understandings of ethnicity, which often treat groups as unproblematic and naturally existing entities, should be explained rather than serving as the foundation for analysis (Hirschfeld 1996).

2. Critique of Ethnopolitical Practice: He suggests that analysts should resist reifying the superficial ethnic categories often used by ethnopolitical entrepreneurs for political gain, even if participants frame conflicts in traditional group-centric ways.

3. Reification as a Social Process: By treating ethnic groups as substantial, internally homogeneous, and externally bounded entities, analysts inadvertently reinforce constructed identities, leading to potential misunderstandings of ethnic conflicts.

The note treats national identity as a form of group identity. It discusses how "ethnic, racial, and national groups" are often perceived as the basic units of social life, a phenomenon referred to as "groupism." The critique of groupism applies equally to national identity as it does to ethnic or racial identities: it warns against viewing them as fixed, homogeneous, and unitary actors with collective aims. Instead, the note advocates for understanding "ethnicity, race, and nationalism" as dynamic, relational, and contextually contingent phenomena, emphasizing "groupness" as fluctuating social relations rather than a permanent state. The fundamental distinction is drawn between a "group" (a mutual