Doctoral Dissertation Research: The Localized Geographies of Kenyan Election Violence

发展中世界许多地区的政治暴力阻碍了个人和群体权利的制度化。从广义上理解，这些权利不仅包括安全，而且还包括在改善社会经济地位方面不受人为障碍的自由。社区间的信任被视为维持群体间和平关系的关键，而机构间的信任被认为有助于促进民间社会和正式政治领域的参与。本项目以肯尼亚为个案研究，调查1）政治暴力的空间维度和2）冲突后对机构和社区间信任的影响。冲突研究领域最近的一个转向强调在更广泛的暴力事件中发生的群体冲突的地方一级动态，从彻底的内战到争夺政治代表权或自然资源的群体之间的持续小规模冲突。考虑到这种范式的转变，精细分辨率分析，本研究采用了混合方法分解的方法来了解冲突及其对肯尼亚的社会结构的影响。首先，空间统计方法被用来确定肯尼亚境内围绕该国最近的选举暴力冲突的模式。除了对某些地区暴力发生率高的传闻外，这些分析的目的是查明任何意外的趋势。此外，该项目还将评估哪些党派互动和派别活动可能促成了该国境内的这些不平衡格局。为了说明暴力冲突对肯尼亚社会结构的影响，这项研究包括调查研究，旨在引起受访者对机构和群体间信任的看法。对国家和地方机构的信任是成功治理的关键。然而，由于担任领导职务的个人给予某些人口优惠待遇，公共产品，包括安全的提供不均衡，这种形式的信任可能受到限制。在许多研究人员强调强大的排他性社会关系的背景下，本项目旨在研究种族社区相互信任的程度。预计这些关系会受到社区冲突的影响，但更重要的是，行为科学的研究表明，人口之间的社会距离会增加社会内部未来冲突的风险。此前的研究表明，非洲国家的选举经常受到政治暴力的破坏。冲突可能以选举前恐吓运动的形式发生，以扼杀选民投票率，也可能是选举后一个因被控操纵选票而感到受害的团体进行的报复。这项研究有助于奖学金的普遍存在的社会问题，适用于一套新的和多样化的空间方法，肯尼亚的政治景观。该项目的结果将使人们深入了解肯尼亚地方一级的暴力动态，并将能够随着2012年选举的临近而描述肯尼亚的社会结构。

Political violence in many areas of the developing world represents a barrier against institutionalizing individual and group rights. Understood broadly, such rights include not only safety, but also freedom from encountering artificial obstructions to improving socio-economic status. Intercommunity trust is viewed as crucial for maintaining peaceful relationships between groups, and institutional trust is believed to foster engagement in civil society and the formal political sphere. Using Kenya as a case study, this project investigates 1) the spatial dimensions of political violence and 2) the aftermath of conflict on institutional and intercommunity trust. A recent turn in the field of conflict studies emphasizes local-level dynamics of group clashes that occur within broader episodes of violence, ranging from outright civil war to persistent skirmishes between groups contending for political representation or natural resources. Considering this paradigm shift toward fine resolution analysis, this research employs a mixed-methods disaggregated approach to understanding conflict and its impacts on Kenya's social fabric. First, spatial-statistical methods are used to identify patterns of conflict within Kenya surrounding the country's most recent election violence. Beyond anecdotal accounts of certain areas experiencing high rates of violence, the goal of these analyses is to identify any unexpected trends. Furthermore, the project will assess what party interactions and faction activities may have contributed to these uneven patterns within the country. To illustrate the impacts of violent conflict on Kenya's social fabric, this study includes survey research that is designed to elicit respondents perceptions of institutional and inter-group trust. Faith in national and local institutions is crucial for successful governance. Yet, this form of trust can be limited by the uneven provision of public goods, including security, as a result of preferential treatment granted to certain population by individuals in leadership roles. In a context where many researchers emphasize powerful exclusive social ties, this project is designed to examine the degree to which ethnic communities trust one another. It is expected that these relationships have been influenced by communal conflict, but, more importantly, research in the behavioral sciences has shown that social distance between populations can elevate the risk of future conflict within a society. Previous research has shown that all too often elections in African states are marred by political violence. Conflict can occur in the form of pre-election intimidation campaigns to stifle voter turnout, or as post-election retribution carried out by a group who feel victimized by accusations of ballot manipulation. This research contributes to scholarship on a pervasive social concern by applying a new and diverse suite of spatial methods to the Kenyan political landscape. Results of the project will provide insight into the dynamics of violence in Kenya at local scales and will also be able to characterize Kenya's social fabric as the 2012 election approaches.