The late Tatu Vanhanen wrote in 2012:
The history of genocides implies that all nations have been more or less equally capable of carrying out genocides and ethnic cleansings in appropriate circumstances. Kiernan notes that the phenomenon transcends political labels: “Genocide has been associated with expanding colonialism, shrinking empires, religious communalism, atheist dictatorships, unfettered capitalism, National Socialism, Communist revolution, post- Communist nationalism, National Security militarism, and Islamist terror” (p. 37). It is remarkable that nearly all genocides have been directed against other racial or other ethnic groups.
This fact and the universality of ethnic violence throughout the
known human history implies that the roots of this behavior pattern may be in our common human nature. Kiernan does not refer to human nature. He tries to explain the ideological preoccupations of the perpetrators of genocide, extermination and genocidal massacres by racism, expansionism, agrarianism and antiquity (pp. 38, 605), but it seems to me that a more ultimate explanation can be traced to the continual struggle for existence and to our evolved disposition to ethnic nepotism. The struggle for the control of land and territory follows from the inevitable struggle for existence and scarce resources, and ethnic nepotism explains why the contenders are so often different ethnic groups.
Steven Pinker (2011) points out in his extensive historical analysis that brutal violence calculated by the number of killings per 100,000 people per year has declined dramatically as a consequence of the civilizing process. The twentieth century was not the bloodiest in history. He does not refer to ethnic violence, but it is quite probable that the relative extent of ethnic violence has also declined dramatically, although we do not have any exact statistical evidence on the extent of ethnic violence in the past centuries. It is probable that the civilizing process has reduced ethnic violence and replaced violent conflicts by more or less peaceful ethnic interest conflicts. Edward O. Wilson (2012) notes that war and genocide have been universal and eternal, but since “the end of the second World War, violent conflict between states has declined drastically… But civil wars, insurgencies, and state- sponsored terrorism continue unabated” (pp, 65-66).
So my theoretical explanation for the significance of ethnicity and ethnic groups is based on an evolutionary argumentation. Because we are bound to a ceaseless competition and struggle for scarce resources in politics and in many other forums of life and because we have an evolved tendency to nepotism and ethnic nepotism, many interest conflicts become canalized along ethnic lines in ethnically divided societies. It is natural for the members of an ethnic group to support each other in political interest conflicts. Thus ethnic nepotism provides the ultimate theoretical explanation for the significance of ethnicity and ethnic conflict. Because of its evolutionary roots, our behavioral predisposition to ethnic nepotism is shared by all human populations, although it can play a significant role only in ethnically divided societies and in relations between ethnically different nations. Thus my basic hypothesis is that the more deeply a population is ethnically divided, the more interest conflicts become canalized along ethnic lines.
The argument that our evolved behavioral predisposition to ethnic nepotism is shared by all human populations led me to hypothesize that we can expect ethnic interest conflicts in all ethnically divided societies, although the nature and intensity of such conflicts may vary greatly. The conflicts may vary from peaceful competition by legal means to utmost violence. The variation depends not only on the significance of an interest conflict but also on the available means to solve conflicts. There are intervening factors, which may increase or decrease the intensity of conflicts. Intervening factors include various cultural and situational factors, including political institutions and political leadership. The role of political institutions is
especially interesting for the reason that, in principle, it is easier to change political institutions than many other intervening factors. Depending on their nature, political institutions can help to accommodate ethnic interest conflicts or to deepen them. Here we come to the role of democracy in ethnic interest conflicts and to the impact of other environmental factors
