A rational choice approach to the rise and decline of ethnoregional political parties

The reemergence of ethnoregionalism in the advanced industrial democracies presented a paradox to scholars. Diffusion theories of national development anticipated that the spread of markets, industrialization, urbanization, and national systems of education, politics, administration, and conscription would diminish regional political, economic, and cultural distinctiveness. This chapter presents the cautious beginning of such a project. The ethnoregional party itself must be able to supply benefits potential members value, or else nonparticipation would be the more rational choice. Although the cultural division of labor (CDL) may account for why people perceive it in their interest to engage in collective action around questions of ethnicity, one of the most important findings of the literature on social movements is that interest is not sufficient to sustain political organization. The existence of a CDL alone should explain most of the variation in the geographical distribution of the ethnoregional political parties.