ABSTRACT

This book analyses cases of incomplete secession after separatist wars and what this means for relations between central governments and de facto states.

The work explores the interplay between violence and power by examining the micro-dynamics inherent in the process of escalation between separatists and central governments. These dynamics affect not only the security interactions between these entities, but also the character of political and governance relations that are built in the aftermath of secessionist war. The book provides comprehensive analyses of the evolution of post-conflict relations between the Republic of Moldova and Transnistria and between Georgia and South Ossetia and Abkhazia. Beyond these empirical and conceptual examples, the book contributes to a key debate in International Relations that addresses the relationship between democratisation, nationalism and violence, and its applicability to the study of escalation in the post-Soviet space.

This book will be of much interest to students of secession, statehood, conflict studies, democratisation, post-Soviet politics and International Relations in general.

Chapter 2 of this book is freely available as a downloadable Open Access PDF at https://www.taylorfrancis.com under a Creative Commons Attribution-Non Commercial-No Derivatives (CC-BY-NC-ND) 4.0 license. 

chapter |16 pages

Introduction

part I|50 pages

Contested concepts

chapter 2|24 pages

Post-conflict political order

Conceptualising the exercise of authority under conditions of incomplete secession

part II|120 pages

Political order and escalation in the post-Soviet space

chapter 3|40 pages

Political order and escalation in the Republic of Moldova

Between accommodation of secessionist demands and stalemate with Transnistria

chapter 4|38 pages

Political order and escalation in Georgia

The failure to accommodate Abkhazia's secessionist demands

chapter 5|40 pages

Political order and escalation in Georgia

From stalemate to confrontation with South Ossetia

part III|53 pages

Understanding the dynamics of post-conflict political order

chapter 6|27 pages

Democratisation, elections and the politics of secession and counter-secession

Understanding escalation in political order

chapter 7|15 pages

External actors and the principles of the liberal international order

Addressing the crisis of the nation state

chapter |9 pages

Conclusion