Ethnic democracy

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The term ethnic democracy, as used by some political scientists, purports to describe a governance system that combines a structured ethnic dominance with democratic, political and civil rights for all. Both the dominant ethnic group—typically an ethnic majority—and the minority ethnic groups have citizenship and are able to fully participate in the political process. However, critics of the "ethnic democracy" model argue it is a contradiction in terms, and thus conceptually inadequate or confusing; these critics allege that purported ethnic democracies, most notably Israel, are not democratic at all, or are at best a sort of semi-democracy.^[1]

Beyond the conceptual coherency of the term, scholars also disagree, in normative terms, on whether any purported ethnic democracies are a legitimate mode of governance. Proponents of their moral legitimacy may variously emphasize either their ethnic or democratic character in attempting to derive a base of legitimacy: arguments of the former type tend to argue that the preservation of the ethnic character of such states is paramount, and defend it even when it infringes upon democratic ideals; conversely, arguments of the second type emphasize the right of self-determination as a moral imperative. Other arguments include construing an ethnic democracy as a sort of "lesser evil", or as a just compromise between competing abstract principles. On the other hand, critics of the moral legitimacy of such states argue that there is a fundamental incompatibility between such values, contending that ethnic democracies are especially objectionable because they are in fact intrinsically undemocratic but present themselves as having a democratic façade, thereby "legitimating the illegitimate".^[1] Critics have also argued that, because of the competing and contradictory democratic and ethnocratic impulses of purported ethnic democracies, they are inherently unstable, prone to transforming either into an outright ethnocracy or abandoning their ethnic character; they also argue that such states are ineffective at managing inter-ethnic conflict, "freezing" or prolonging such conflicts.^[1]

The term "ethnic democracy" was first introduced by Professor Juan José Linz of Yale University in 1975, who used the term as functionally synonymous with Herrenvolk democracy: "a political system that is democratic for the dominant group but excludes, on the basis of ethnicity, other groups from the democratic process".^[2] It was subsequently and independently used by University of Haifa sociologist Professor Sammy Smooha in a book published in 1989,^[3] as a universalised model of the nature of the Israeli state.^[4][2] However, unlike Linz, Smooha and a number of other scholars have used the term to refer to a type of state that differs from Herrenvolk democracy (or ethnocracy) in having more purely democratic elements: they argue that Israel and other purported ethnic democracies provide the non-core groups with more political participation, influence and improvement of status than is typical under a Herrenvolk state.^[1] However, critical scholars have argued that the so-called "ethnic democracies" are not fundamentally different from Herrenvolk democracies or ethnocracies, or that the differences are of degree rather than kind. According to these critics, Herrenvolk democracy and ethnic democracy both share numerous key features, in particular hegemonic control and tyranny of the majority, but differ in tactics: when the minority is unmanageable or outright ceases to be a numerical minority, the dominant ethnic group resorts to the more repressive tactics of Herrenvolk democracy, but when the non-dominant ethnicities are smaller or weaker, the dominant group maintains a façade of democracy.^[1]

Besides Israel, the model has since been used by political scientists to describe a number of other governments, including those of Northern Ireland, Estonia, Latvia, and Slovakia.^[2]