Partition and conflict transformation in India-Pakistan and Cyprus

Abstract

This article argues that partition – a peacebuilding approach in apost-conflict society – can lead to the transformation of intrastate conflict to interstate conflict, thereby providing a helpful insight for further comparison of partition with multi-ethnic settlements such as federalism/powersharing and reconciliation. While advocates of partition maintain that intrastate conflict caused by a security dilemma between ethnic groups can be settled only by partition, this article argues that partition could cause the transformation of conflict rather than settling it. The cases of India-Pakistan and Cyprus provide the empirical evidence. The partition of India and Pakistan transformed intrastate conflict within India into interstate conflict between India and Pakistan including nuclear competition. The partition of Cyprus contributed to interstate conflict between Greece and Turkey. Therefore, this article concludes that the transformation of conflict reduces the value of partition, and that it is necessary to take this point into consideration when partition is compared with alternatives such as federalism/powersharing andreconciliation.