highly specialized and thus more vulnerable to fluctuations in world markets
than the economy of the core community. This core–periphery distinction is a
function of capitalism which entails territorial as well as class inequalities and
conflicts through a process of uneven development (Orridge, 1981, pp. 6–7).
A cultural division of labour is created in the course of such development
(Hechter, 1975, p. 30). The survival of nationalism depends on this cultural
division of labour, a stratification system which links a person’s life chances
to cultural distinctions, thereby giving culture a political salience. People see
a shared material interest in cultural terms. This is a necessary but not suffi-
cient condition of group solidarity and collective action. Other conditions are
necessary to encourage solidarity with a nationalist organization, namely a
high level of dependence on a nationalist movement as a source of benefits,
and the monitoring of members’ ‘compliance with the movement’s goals and
procedures’ (Hechter, 1985).
The politics of the peripheral regions are controlled by the core.
Influential positions in the state are disproportionately occupied by people
from the core community. This applies to the central state apparatus as well
as to its local arms in the minority areas. Political organizations seeking
to represent the interests of minority cultures may be restricted or banned.
The repressive instruments of the state may be used selectively to counter
expressions of dissent by a nationalist group. Such repression has often
been justified by means of a racist ideology.
In addition to such economic discrimination, the marginalization and exclu-
sion of an ethnic or regional minority may take the form of cultural discrimi-
nation, by stereotyping the cultural group as backward, uncivilized, unreliable,
inferior or dangerous. Such claims can easily become self-fulfilling prophecies
when, because of economic and social discriminaton, a disproportionately
large number of people from the minority group are found to be suffering from
unemployment, low incomes, poor health, bad housing, illiteracy, low life-
expectancy, high crime rates, high rates of suicide and other indicators of social
disadvantage. Discrimination may be more overt, as when minorities are
denied the use of their own language in education, the media and local admin-
istration. Indirect measures include requiring that education, information and
social advancement generally are only available to those using the official lan-
guage (‘Kendal’, 1980). Discrimination may even involve attempts by the core
group to deny any ethnic distinctiveness, as in the case of Turkish efforts to
prove the Turkishness of the Kurds, or the Iranian government’s claim that the
Kurds are ‘pure Iranians’ (Bulloch and Morris, 1993, p. 51). Discrimination
may well escalate as regimes retaliate against the agitation of nationalist
groups, involving forced migration and even attempted genocide.
204 Understanding Third World Politics