Relative Deprivation Theory, Nationalism, Ethnicity and Identity Conflicts

Politicisation of identity is the operative and most pertinent term for the paper’s central argument. The gravity of the people’s identity problematic and state’s security concerns correlates closely with the extent to which societal identity is politicised. The more politicised these identities become, the more they display a ferocity which makes them a force to be reckoned with. By applying ‘Relative Deprivation Theory’ embedded alongside an appreciation of societal security, this research offers unique insights into how this process of politicisation takes place. This paper examines how identity, legitimacy and dissent from the existing state order have come to define a new security dynamic that denies agency to a purely Realist understanding of security dilemmas. This study builds upon an array of secondary qualitative sources, both in order to construct the theoretical argument and to back this theory up with historical and social scientific data. By combining the concept of societal security and Relative this research fuses two interrelated theories that allow the paper to make an innovative and original contribution to understanding the complexity of the internal security dilemmas and the process of political identity.