Ethnicity, Religion, Conflict and Violence in Postcolonial South and Southeast Asia: A Comparative, Interdisciplinary Study

The independent nation-states that emerged in South and Southeast Asia during post-war decolonisation faced the difficult task of creating, out of all their diversity, a national people. Since the end of the colonial era nation-building projects have clashed violently with the identity politics of heterogeneous ethnic and religious communities, for these regions are home to some of the longest-standing ethnic and religious conflicts in the world. Given the ubiquity and longevity of such ethnic and religious conflict, it is clear that the particularity of each national case notwithstanding, there are more general factors at work, which would be revealed by a comparative study.
This project establishes a network of 20 South and Southeast Asia specialists from Japan and the UK to: investigate the causes and dynamics of ethnic and religious conflict in South and Southeast Asia; identify commonalities across these national and regional differences; arrive at provisional conclusions on the salience and relative importance of these commonalities; and thus also identify those issues that warrant further and research-intensive enquiry in subsequent collaborations. Its aim is to bring into conversation and collaboration, through a series of workshops, the research that has already been done, but usually with reference to a specific country or region, rather than comparatively and across disciplines; and in the absence of collaboration between British and Japanese scholars.
Led by professors Seth and Nakamizo, who have previously collaborated, this project gathers a unique network of 20 experts on ethnic and religious conflict (including scholars of India, Pakistan, Sri Lanka, Nepal, Myanmar, Indonesia, Vietnam, Thailand and the Philippines) to investigate these more general factors and causes, and identify those factors and issues that warrant further and intensive research in subsequent collaborations, with a view to identifying measures that mitigate against violence and promote justice and peace. The 10 scholars from each country have been chosen for their expertise, but also with an eye to mixing senior scholars with early career researchers, and to achieving a rough balance of both genders. Its aims are:
1 - Networking and Knowledge Creation: To connect a network of UK based and Japan based scholars through 4 workshops where information and research is shared in a directed manner and with a shared goal, that of investigating the causes and dynamics of ethnic and religious conflict in South Asia and Southeast Asia.
2 - Outputs and Impact: To produce a special journal issue on this theme, with contributions by a number of the participants. In addition, participants will be encouraged to produce collaborative articles on the basis of joint interests discovered in the course of the workshops. Non-academic stakeholders from government and civil society will be invited to send representatives to all workshops. A website will make summaries of the papers delivered, as well as of each workshop's proceedings, available in Japanese and English to non-academic and academic audiences. An interactive blog will be set up by participants to share their research with a wide audience in an accessible manner.
3 - Laying the Basis for Subsequent Collaboration: We bring existing specialist expertise within a comparative frame, and into a collaborative conversation, in order to identify those areas and issues that require sustained and ongoing collaborative enquiry (including new and intensive research of a type not funded by this call), to be funded by potential future bilateral UK-Japan SSH research calls. Bringing scholars working on shared regions and themes is thus intended not only to produce a network for, and produce knowledge specific to this project, but also to lay the foundations for subsequent projects that arise out of this collaboration.

By gathering a wide network of Asia expertise and laying the foundations for subsequent collaborative research proposals, this network aims to build up impact beyond the actual funding period. At the same time, this project will maximise impact during the period of funding, by engaging with non-academic actors and producing knowledge that has significant implications for policy and for civil society.
Who will benefit: Ethnic conflict and violence affects the lives of many people across South and Southeast Asia. This project and its subsequent collaborations aim to benefit stakeholders working to address this pressing problem such as governments, non-governmental organisations (NGOs) of various description, and civil society actors. The production of knowledge about ethnic and religious conflict and violence that clarifies the issues at stake, identifies common factors and causes across the various national and other differences, and that arrives at some conclusions regarding measures and policies that may ameliorate and even resolve such conflicts, is of interest and benefit to all these groups/actors.
How will they benefit: Enhanced knowledge of the character and causes of ethnic and religious conflict is potentially of great benefit to those governments, including the UK and Japanese governments, that give aid or other forms of assistance to affected regions, in helping determine what forms of assistance are likely to mitigate conflict and violence, and what forms may contribute to it. NGOs active in the region will similarly benefit, for the outcomes of this research will be of assistance in determining where and how their efforts should be directed. Civil society organisation such as associations of minority communities and faiths and diasporic communities, will benefit in ways that are less direct but by no means unimportant, through the production of knowledge that speaks to their concerns, and that they can draw upon and engage with.
What will be done to ensure they can benefit from this activity?
1. The academic participants in this project have agreed to make themselves available for questions and discussion with non-academic representatives for the last half day of each workshop, which is specifically set aside for this purpose. We will be inviting relevant branches of government (Department for International Development, and the Foreign and Commonwealth Office in the UK; Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Ministry of International Trade and Industry, and the Japan International Cooperation Agency in Japan), civil society organisations (including aid NGOs, and relevant religious associations- e.g., the Islamic Cultural Centre in Kyoto), and associations of migrant/ethnic groups in Japan and the UK, to send representatives to attend the workshops, and to utilise the half-day set aside for discussions with non-academic stakeholders. A programme of each workshop will be sent to these organisations in advance, along with a letter of invitation.
2. A website established for this project will make summaries of the papers delivered, and a short summary of the proceedings of each workshop after it has finished, available to any interested parties, academic and non-academic. These will be in English and also in Japanese. In addition, participants will be encouraged to write regular blogs on their research inasmuch as it is connected to this theme, and through these means we hope that those who are not participants will become engaged with the research as it proceeds, and that this interaction will keep the research public-facing and wide ranging in its impact.
3. The workshops will bring together an unusual number of Asia specialists from the two countries, and their expertise will be made available to the media for interviews. The Press Office of Kyoto University and of Goldsmiths will be sending a press release to all major media outlets inviting them to make us of this expertise through interviews, and opinion pieces.