We are pleased to recommend a new paper on political parties, power-sharing, and post-conflict societies. The manuscript (“Political parties matter: a research agenda on interactions among elites in post-conflict democracies“) has been published (gated, here) by Giampiero Cama and (our) Fabrizio Coticchia on Contemporary Politics.
Here below you’ll find the abstract:
The literature has devoted considerable attention to the understanding of state institutions and rule of law in the processes of democratization. However, despite the crucial relevance of dynamic and repeated interactions between actors and institutions in non-homogenous post-conflict societies, most research lacks systematic analyses on the role of parliaments, parties and party systems after civil wars. While several studies have examined the effects of electoral systems or veto rights after power-sharing agreements, as well as the transformation of rebel groups into political parties in post-conflict societies, the development of parties within parliaments has been largely ignored. Therefore, by combining conflict studies, institutional design perspectives and peacebuilding approaches, this paper presents a research agenda on the overlooked role played by parliament as a crucial arena for a better analysis, in the long term, of power-sharing mechanisms and state-building, post-war political framing and narratives, ethnic outbidding and party modernization strategies.
The paper is one of the results of the workshops “Conflicts and Institutions” that have been organized in recent years by the Observatory on Conflicts at the University of Genova.