Local ethno-political polarization and election violence in majoritarian vs. proportional systems
| Author | Carl Müller-Crepon |
| Date | 01 March 2022 |
| Published date | 01 March 2022 |
| DOI | 10.1177/0022343320973724 |
| Subject Matter | Regular Articles |
Local ethno-political polarization and election
violence in majoritarian vs. proportional systems
Carl Mu
¨ller-Crepon
Department of Politics and International Relations, University of Oxford & St Hilda’s College
Abstract
How does local ethnic demography affect the conduct of majoritarian elections? Because legislative elections in majoritarian
systems are contested locally, local ethno-political polarization increases the risk of pre-election violence. In districts that are
polarized between politically competing ethnic groups, violence can be targeted with comparative ease at opposing voters,
and can, if perpetrated collectively, mobilize the perpetrators’co-ethnics. I do not expect such dynamics in PR systems where
political competition plays out at higher geographical levels. To test this argument, I combine new data on the ethnic
composition of local populations in 22 African countries with monthly data on riots and survey data on campaign violence.
Ethno-politically polarized districts in majoritarian and mixed electoral systems see substantively larger increases in the
number of riots prior to legislative elections and more fear of pre-election violence among citizens than non-polarized districts
in the same country and at the same time. I do not find these patterns in PR systems. The results enhance our understanding
of how electoral systems interact with local ethnic demography in shaping pre-election violence.
Keywords
electoral violence, ethnic geography, majoritarian election
Introduction
Choices over the design of electoral systems in ethnically
divided societies are most influential in determining the fate
of democracy and peace in a polity. Addressing electoral
violence as a vital threat to democracies around the globe,
this article analyzes the impact of local ethnic demography
on violence preceding legislative elections in Africa. In par-
ticular, I argue that local competition between politically
mobilizedethnicgroupsincreasestheriskofviolencebefore
majoritarian but not proportional legislative elections.
The literature on the vices and virtues of majoritarian
and PR systems in ethnically divided societies is exten-
sive, beginning with the seminal contributions of Hor-
owitz (1990, 1991, 1994), Lijphart (1985), and Lijphart
& Aitkin (1994). It mostly focuses on the effects of
electoral systems on political parties, post-conflict stabi-
lity, and the risk of civil war in general.
1
Studying the
effects of electoral systems on electoral violence, Birch
(2007) and Fjelde & Ho
¨glund (2016) present country-
level evidence that majoritarian elections come with
more misconduct and campaign violence than PR sys-
tems, in particular where ethnic groups are excluded
from political power. However, despite Birch’s (2007)
theoretical insight that election violence in majoritarian
systems is caused by local competition, prevailing
country-level research does not shed empirical light on
why campaigns turn violent in some constituencies but
not in others (Birch, Daxecker & Ho
¨glund, 2020).
Furthermore, not all types of electoral competition may
lead to equal levels of violence. Focusing on competition
along ethnic cleavages, this study addresses these issues
with high-resolution spatio-temporal data that evidence
the violent consequences of local competition between
politically mobilized ethnic groups in majoritarian
elections.
Corresponding author:
carl.muller-crepon@politics.ox.ac.uk.
1
On electoral systemsand voting in ethnically diversepolities, see e.g.
Neto & Cox (1997), Ordeshook & Shvetsova (1994), and Mozaffar,
Scarritt & Galaich (2003); on post-conflict stability Bogaards (2013),
and on civil wars Schneider& Wiesehomeier (2008).
Journal of Peace Research
2022, Vol. 59(2) 242–258
ªThe Author(s) 2021
Article reuse guidelines:
sagepub.com/journals-permissions
DOI: 10.1177/0022343320973724
journals.sagepub.com/home/jpr
Drawing on the incentives set by the structure and
geographic locus of competition in majoritarian legisla-
tive elections, I argue that local political competition
between ethnic groups incentivizes violent campaigning.
In ethno-politically polarized constituencies, violence
can be effectively targeted and, especially when it comes
in the form of a riot, serves the purpose of polarizing the
electorate. In contrast, local ethno-political competition
does not increase the risk of violence before PR elections,
where legislative elections are contested at the regional or
national level. This makes local ethnic polarization
inconsequential for campaign strategies in PR systems.
With this focus on local ethno-political competition,
the argument builds on and extends previous research
that understands pre-election violence as intending to
‘influence the electoral process and in extension its out-
come’ (Ho
¨glund, 2009: 417; Birch, Daxecker &
Ho
¨glund, 2020). Pre-election violence can increase the
odds of victory of its instigator through the polarization
of the electorate (Dercon & Gutie
´rrez-Romero, 2012;
Horowitz, 2001; Wilkinson, 2004) and the demobiliza-
tion of his opponent’s voters by means of intimidation,
displacement, and death (Bratton, 2008; Collier & Vice-
nte, 2014; Klopp, 2001; Steele, 2011).
2
It not only
affects nationwide official elections, but also intraparty
contests (Goldring & Wahman, 2018; Bech Seeberg,
Wahman & Skaaning, 2018; Reeder & Seeberg,
2018). In parallel to incentives to campaign peacefully,
violence likely accompanies contested campaigns
(Hafner-Burton, Hyde & Jablonski, 2013; Salehyan &
Linebarger, 2015; Wilkinson, 2004), in particular those
led by incumbents (Taylor, Pevehouse & Straus, 2017;
Rauschenbach & Paula, 2019).
I test the argument that local ethno-political compe-
tition increases the risk of violence before majoritarian
but not PR elections with new spatial data on the ethnic
composition of local populations in 22 African countries
between 1990 and 2013, mostly countries with uncon-
solidated democratic institutions and recurring electoral
violence (Goldsmith, 2015). The main analysis studies
the effect of local ethno-political competition on pre-
election increases in rioting. Districts that are demogra-
phically polarized between politically mobilized ethnic
groups experience steeper increases in rioting prior to
majoritarian elections than non-polarized districts do.
Consistent with the argument, this effect is absent in
PR systems.
Rigid two-way fixed effects and controls for spatio-
temporal autocorrelation restrict the potential of spur-
ious results. The findings are robust to using different
data on rioting and pre-election violence, and are not due
to reverse causality affecting the timing of elections and
local ethnic demography or endogenous district bound-
aries. In addition, I find that survey respondents’ fear and
experience of pre-election violence increases with the
level of local ethno-political polarization in majoritarian
but not proportional electoral systems.
The consistent empirical evidence supports the theo-
retical argument and contributes to our understanding of
the effects of ethnic geography on the conduct of major-
itarian elections in Africa. It also supplies evidence on the
local drivers of electoral violence to those who try to
prevent it. Further discussed in the conclusion, the
results add to the existing literature on drawbacks of
majoritarian electoral systems in multi-ethnic and
unconsolidated democracies. The findings also highlight
the effect of the spatial design of electoral districts on the
(violent) conduct of elections.
The geography of ethno-political competition
and violence before legislative elections
It is often argued that campaign violence is ‘produced’
(Brass, 2011) by political elites and their henchmen try-
ing to increase their chances at the ballot box (Collier &
Vicente, 2011, 2014; Horowitz, 2001; Wilkinson,
2004). Particularly in ethnically divided constituencies,
candidates might choose to deliberately incite ethno-
nationalist discourses and plan interethnic violence. Such
patterns have affected, for example, elections in India
(Brass, 2011; Wilkinson, 2004) and the 1992 Kenyan
legislative election (Throup & Hornsby, 1998). Here,
incumbent MPs of the Kenya African National Union
(KANU), traditionally associated with the Kalenjin, were
involved in inciting riots against ethnic Kikuyu, Kisii,
Luo, and Luhya, leading to the displacement of 300,000
and the death of 1,500 (Africa Watch, 1993; Klopp,
2001). However, violence did not break out everywhere
in the country. Instead, closely contested precincts with
non-Kalenjin swing-voters saw most rioting, which may
have actually harmed the prospects of KANU candidates
elsewhere (Klopp & Zuern, 2007; Throup & Hornsby,
1998).
In (cynical) parallel to monetary expenditures (Cox &
Munger, 1989; Erikson & Palfrey, 2000; Pattie, John-
ston & Fieldhouse, 1995), the likelihood of instrumental
campaign violence increases with the probability that it
turns an election to the benefit of its instigator. As the
2
Electoral violence leads to mixed effects on turnout (Bekoe &
Burchard, 2017).
Mu
¨ller-Crepon 243
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