The hunger games: Food prices, ethnic cleavages and nonviolent unrest in Africa
| DOI | 10.1177/0022343319866487 |
| Published date | 01 March 2020 |
| Date | 01 March 2020 |
| Author | Luke Abbs |
| Subject Matter | Research Articles |
The hunger games: Food prices, ethnic
cleavages and nonviolent unrest in Africa
Luke Abbs
ESRC Business and Local Government Data Research Centre, University of Essex
Abstract
Nonviolent movements are more successful when mobilizing large and diverse numbers of participants. However,
while there has been considerable research on the outcomes of nonviolent campaigns, far less is known about the
initial emergence of nonviolent action. A growing literature suggests ethnic divisions may undermine the ability of
activists to engage in mass nonviolent mobilization across diverse social lines. Yet many large and diverse nonviolent
movements have successfully emerged in various ethnically divided societies across the world. I argue that nonviolent
mobilization is made possible in ethnically polarized contexts when broader cross-cutting grievances are present as
they enable local activists to widen their appeal across social lines. I focus on food price spikes as an example of a
cross-cutting issue that is likely to affect consumers from different ethnic groups. The unique and symbolic nature of
food price spikes facilitates nonviolent mobilization across ethnic lines and provides clear short-term incentives for
many people to participate in protests against the government. Using new spatially disaggregated data on government
targeted nonviolent action, I analyse grid-cell years across 41 African countries (1990–2008). I find strong evidence
that food price spikes increase the likelihood of nonviolent action in politically excluded and ethnically diverse
locations.
Keywords
ethnicity, food insecurity, food prices, nonviolent action, spatial analysis
Introduction
In recent years, mass nonviolent resistance has become
an increasingly prevalent form of anti-government dis-
sent. Movements have been remarkably successful in
achieving political change using unconventional nonvio-
lent action (Chenoweth & Stephan, 2011), defined as a
combination of persuasive tactics (i.e. protests and
demonstrations) and non-compliant methods (i.e. strikes
and sit-ins) (Sharp, 2005).
1
The growing civil resistance
literature relates this success to a movement’s ability to
mobilize large and diverse numbers of participants across
social lines, which builds legitimacy and draws support
away from the government (DeNardo, 1985; Schock,
2005; Sharp, 2005; Svensson & Lindgren, 2011; Che-
noweth & Stephan, 2011).
Yet, while there has been considerable research on the
outcomes of nonviolent campaigns, far less is known
about the initial emergence of nonviolent action (Che-
noweth & Ulfelder, 2017), in particular, how move-
ments succeed in mobilizing large numbers of people
across diverse support bases. There are many prominent
examples where activists have engaged in mass nonvio-
lent action after unifying otherwise disparate social
groups, including the ‘Arab Spring’ and movements that
emerged in countries with a history of ethnic conflict
(e.g. Burundi and Bosnia). Yet, a number of recent stud-
ies have shown that ethnic cleavages undermine nonvio-
lent mobilization, by reducing the ability of activists to
Corresponding author:
la17561@essex.ac.uk
1
While a contested concept, this widely used definition of
nonviolent action focuses on mass and unconventional measures of
action, undertaken by individuals and organizations that aim to
overthrow a regime or change government policy (see also Schock,
2005; Chenoweth & Stephan, 2011).
Journal of Peace Research
2020, Vol. 57(2) 281–296
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DOI: 10.1177/0022343319866487
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attract mass numbers of people from different social
groups (Svensson & Lindgren, 2011; Arriola, 2013;
Vidovic & Gleditsch, 2015; Thurber, 2018).
2
How do
nonviolent movements mobilize sufficient numbers in
societies with ethnic divisions?
This article seeks to unravel this question and extend
our understanding of emergence by highlighting a pro-
cess through which nonviolent activists overcome polit-
ical exclusion and local ethnic divisions to engage in mass
and diverse mobilization. I argue that cross-cutting grie-
vances, which transcend divisions within and between
politically relevant ethnic groups, provide opportunities
for activists to appeal to individuals across social bound-
aries, thereby greatly facilitating nonviolent mobilization
in socially divided contexts. I focus on one example of a
cross-cutting issue, spikes in domestic food prices, which
are likely to impact consumers from all social groups,
enabling a movement to mobilize individuals based on
a common economic grievance.
To test these claims, I disaggregate the emergence of
nonviolent action to the subna tional level, using new
geocoded events data. This approach advances existing
quantitative research on emergence using country-level
variables that do not reflect subnational realities (Che-
noweth & Ulfeder, 2017; Butcher & Svensson, 2016).
Ethnic cleavages are a social barrier faced by activists
locally and vary considerably within countries along with
other structural factors that influence the viability of
nonviolent mobilization. I explore the emergence of
nonviolent action across subnational grid-cells of 41
peacetime African countries (1990–2008). The findings
provide strong evidence that the cross-cutting nature of
food price spikes increases the feasibility of nonviolent
mobilization in ethno-politically excluded and diverse
areas that would otherwise be unlikely to observe non-
violent action.
The article begins by exploring existing research and
ways ethnic cleavages may constrain nonviolent action,
before theorizing food prices as a cross-cutting issue that
facilitates mass and diverse mobilization. This is followed
by the empirical analysis and concluding remarks.
Ethnic divisions and nonviolent mobilization
The strategic logic of mass nonviolent action is to gen-
erate enough leverage, through mobilizing greater num-
bers, in order to disrupt the state’s ability to rule or
impose particular policies (DeNardo, 1985; Schock,
2005; Sharp, 2005; Chenoweth & Stephan, 2011;
Svensson & Lindgren, 2011). Few governments con-
fronting nonviolent action from 5% of the population
have avoided political change (Lichbach, 1998).
Studies of civil resistance tend to explain the emer-
gence of mass nonviolent action through forms of polit-
ical agency, such as the skills and leadership of activists
(Sharp, 2005; Schock, 2005). Yet, mass mobilization is
also likely to depend on existing structural contexts that
remain outside the control of political activists (Gold-
stone, 1994; Chenoweth & Ulfelder, 2017; Butcher &
Svensson, 2016). Nepstad (2015), for example, points to
three broad determinants of nonviolent action: widely
held grievances against the government, intergroup coa-
litions, and space to organize. While the latter has syner-
gies to opportunity factors and resources that provide
‘space’ for mobilization, the former largely correspond
to two interconnected forms of mass mobilization
unique to nonviolent action: the vertical mobilization
of large numbers against the regime (i.e. building on
widespread anti-government grievances) and horizontal
mobilization that occurs across diverse social groups
(coalition building).
Nonviolent movements seek to challenge the regime
vertically by mobilizing large numbers of people in order
to achieve political change. Leverage is achieved by draw-
ing on widely held anti-government grievances and by
dislocating the regime from its so-called ‘pillars of sup-
port’ (e.g. police, military, workers, civil servants, busi-
ness, political parties), which if removed, limit the
regime’s ability to rule (Sharp, 2005). Nonviolent acti-
vists target these pillars of government support by
appealing to common ground and by encouraging loy-
alty switches within broad segments of the population,
including pro-regime supporters and security forces that
carry out state repression (Chenoweth & Stephan, 2011;
Nepstad, 2015).
Nonviolent mobilization also occurs horizontally
across social lines, as winning popular support is often
dependent on the movement’s ability to appeal to vari-
ous social groups. Mobilizing individuals from different
social backgrounds, occupations and political ideologies,
which have differing relationships with the state, pro-
vides a movement with greater leverage (Svensson &
Lindgren, 2011; Butcher & Svensson, 2016). Yet, while
nonviolent mobilization has fewer moral and physical
barriers to participation (Chenoweth & Stephan,
2011), mobilizing thousands of people across social lines
is extremely challenging, particularly in polarized societ-
ies with high social distance within and between ethnic
2
I define ethnicity as a socially constructed ascriptive identity, based
on common descent and collective cultural affiliations such as:
language, tribe, race and religion (Horowitz, 1985).
282 journal of PEACE RESEARCH 57(2)
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