Introduction

This chapter attempts to compare territorial and non-territorial approaches to autonomy and the way they relate to one another. It also deals with the reasons for the different institutional and policy choices, including criteria of entitlement, and their consequences both for the ethnic minority and the dominant majority, both with respect to system stability and democratic and other values. The chapter examines 35 cases of civil war, for the most part in ethnically divided societies, and, being concerned with internal stability rather than nation-building or state maintenance for its own sake, they tend to be fairly positively inclined towards autonomy arrangements. Territorial autonomy is rejected also because it would lead to secession and the creation of hundreds of small, economically unviable mini-states. Finally, it discusses the relationship between autonomy and interstate relations.