CEU Electronic Theses and Dissertations, 2018
| Author | Dinu, Elisabeta Cristina |
|---|---|
| Title | Consociationalism in Lebanon after the Independence Intifada External Threats and Political Stability: A Reversed Relationship? |
| Summary | Although consociationalism literature argues the existence of foreign threats to the political system should increase elite cooperation and political stability, after 2005 Lebanon did not follow this pattern. By implying ‘foreign threats’ are objective and shared among political elites, consociationalism literature entails a traditional approach to security. Since in Lebanon the principal focus of insecurity is society, political parties are securitizing actors and disagree fundamentally on how to build security for Lebanon. The study explains why political instability increased in Lebanon after the pull-out of Syrian troops, by exploring the relation between elite perceptions of security threats and political stability. Based on the critical realist paradigm, the study locates the external threat at the empirical level, political stability at the actual level and the relation between the two at the causal level. The study combines analysis of primary and secondary sources with elite and expert interviews, complemented by political elites’ public statements and interviews. The study shows that political stability in Lebanon remains largely dependent on elite perceptions of regional and international threats. As external threats increase political instability, security is not only a conducive factor of consociationalism, but its very subject. |
| Supervisor | Sitter, Nikolai |
| Department | School of Public Policy MA |
| Full text | https://www.etd.ceu.edu/2018/dinu_elisabeta.pdf |
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