Expert: Max Kimball Date: 6/25/2008 Subject: Maintaining Peace
Question What are the various methods of maintaining peace and unity in binational, multinational, and multiethnic states? What are the strengths and
weaknesses of each method?
Answer Hi Alison,
I'll be glad to help with your question.
Here are few methods:
1. Trying to impose a common culture, based on language and certain shared traditions.
2. Using law enforcement to prevent conflict. More specifically, using the law to rigidly control behavior, and to have strong penalties for deviating from the law.
3. Using the media and government to create and to maintain the reality of a nation. That is, if there is a national government, and a national media offering nationalistic messages, then there must be a nation, and one can be so conjured.
Of course, multiethnic states have not been successfully, historically. Yugoslavia and the Soviet Union are two notable failures. China is a notable success. Iraq remains a question mark.
