Religion as a marker for ethnic groups in conflict and of political national conflicts

Abstract

The links between religion and ethnic and/or political dividing lines has manifested itself in many different ways in contemporary conflicts. In this paper I present briefly the following two forms: religion as a cleavage line of groups in ethno-religious confrontations: struggles between Catholics, Orthodox and Muslims in the Balkans; of Catholics and Protestants in Northern Ireland; of Sunni and Shia and Iraq; of Buddhists and Hindus in Sri Lanka; of Muslims and Catholics in Indonesia; and religion as a mechanism for legitimizing power in the form of State Religions: National-Catholicism in Francoism, which is likely to generate the formation of the internal religious enemy.