ABSTRACT
The internal colonial characterization of the state is one variant of the more general argument that it is economic disparities which are the root cause of political tensions.1 The central proposition is that when the state promotes the economic development of a core region at the expense of the development of its periphery, then the peripheral regional community will develop a reactive ethno-regional consciousness which may be articulated in the form of an ethno-regional autonomy movement, directed against the state.
