Many scholars have detected a decrease in political violence in recent decades, but the causes of this decline remain unclear. As a contribution to this debate, this chapter revisits the controversy over trends in conflict after the end of the Cold War. While several scholars made ominous predictions of surging ethnic warfare, Ted Robert Gurr presented evidence of a pacifying trend since the mid?1990s and predicted a further decline in ethnic conflict in an article on"ethnic warfare on the wane." Leveraging more recent data on ethnic groups and their participation in ethnic civil wars, this chapter evaluates if Gurr was right about the decline of ethnic conflict, and if he was right for the right reasons. We assess whether an increase in governments' accommodative policies toward ethnic groups can plausibly account for a decline in ethnic civil war. Our findings are largely compatible with Gurr's observations and stand in stark contrast to various pessimistic projections that were made in the early post-Cold War period. Among a number of empirical dimensions, we have found that this relatively optimistic perspective holds up well despite a surge in civil conflict in recent years. Ethnic, as opposed to non-ethnic, civil wars appear to have subsided after the mid-1990s, and this decline is at least partially attributable to an increase in governments' accommodative policies toward ethnic groups, such as the granting of group rights, regional autonomy, and inclusion through governmental power sharing, as well as democratization and peacekeeping.

Focusing on regional autonomy arrangements, this chapter investigates, to what extent, and in what form, territorial power sharing mitigates civil conflict (see Master Hypothesis 1b). Our point of departure is again our past research indicating that exclusion of ethnic groups increases the risk of internal conflict. As argued in Chapter 3, however, such results do not automatically imply that regional inclusiveness will guarantee peace, especially if the relationship between an excluded group and the incumbent government has already seen violence. Based on a global sample of ethnic groups as provided by the Ethnic Power Relations dataset, here we show that, in such situations and on its own, regional autonomy is likely to be"too little, too late." It is too little because only full inclusion through governmental power sharing reduces conflict propensity significantly (see Master Hypothesis 5); and it is too late since regional autonomy could be effective, but only if offered in a timely, preventive fashion before group-government relations turn violent (see Master Hypothesis 3). Accounting for endogeneity, we also instrument for autonomy in postcolonial states by exploiting that French, as opposed to British, colonial rule rarely relied on decentralized governance. This identification strategy suggests that naïve analysis tends to underestimate the pacifying influence of decentralization.

Focusing on regional autonomy arrangements, this chapter investigates, to what extent, and in what form, territorial power sharing mitigates civil conflict (see Master Hypothesis 1b). Our point of departure is again our past research indicating that exclusion of ethnic groups increases the risk of internal conflict. As argued in Chapter 3, however, such results do not automatically imply that regional inclusiveness will guarantee peace, especially if the relationship between an excluded group and the incumbent government has already seen violence. Based on a global sample of ethnic groups as provided by the Ethnic Power Relations dataset, here we show that, in such situations and on its own, regional autonomy is likely to be ``too little, too late.'' It is too little because only full inclusion through governmental power sharing reduces conflict propensity significantly (see Master Hypothesis 5); and it is too late since regional autonomy could be effective, but only if offered in a timely, preventive fashion before group-government relations turn violent (see Master Hypothesis 3). Accounting for endogeneity, we also instrument for autonomy in postcolonial states by exploiting that French, as opposed to British, colonial rule rarely relied on decentralized governance. This identification strategy suggests that naïve analysis tends to underestimate the pacifying influence of decentralization.