A Study Of Religious Factors In Inter-ethnic Conflicts In Southeast Asia

After the Cold War,inter-ethnic violence in the region,behind most of which religious factors and religious forces can be seen,has become a main mode of conflict worldwide.The complex ethnic and religious relations in Southeast Asia have made religious factors play an important role in inter-ethnic conflicts and become an important variable factor affecting inter-ethnic conflicts in Southeast Asia.Why does religion cause conflict? How do religious factors play a role in ethnic conflicts? This thesis attempts to analyze the ethnic conflicts in Southeast Asia from a religious perspective and analyze the mechanism of religious factors in ethnic conflicts.Owing to the large number of ethnic groups in Southeast Asian,many countries in the region are basically multi-ethnic ones composed of a dominant ethnic group and several ethnic minorities.Such an ethnic composition has made the relations and conflicts between the dominant ethnic group and those minorities the focus of the inter-ethnic relations and conflicts around Southeast Asia.The inter-ethnic conflicts in Southeast Asian countries are mainly manifested by two approaches: one is that indigenous peoples exclude foreign peoples;the other is that the main ethnic groups exclude minorities,and the discrimination of the main ethnic groups against minorities is a common phenomenon shared by most countries in Southeast Asia.There are many factors justifying the inter-ethnic conflicts,such as failures of ethnic policies,legacy of historical problems or the religious diversification while the last factor is widely accepted as the most typical one.Religion plays an important role in the inter-ethnic conflicts in Southeast Asia.Inter-ethnic conflicts caused by dissidence among different religious beliefs often occur in Southeast Asia.This is closely related to the strong religious atmosphere and profound religious history in the region.The culture in Southeast Asia is essentially a religious one,because all three major religions in the world can be found there,which include Christianity,Islam and Buddhism.They are distributed in Southeast Asia with following characteristics: Most Peninsula countries mainly believe in Theravada Buddhism form a " Theravada Buddhist cultural circle";Island countries and some peninsula areas are mainly influenced by Islam,which contributing to the inhabitants’ belief in Islam and the formation of an Islamic society;Christian faith is mainly concentrated in the Philippines and East Timor.Based on the ethnic and religious characteristics of Southeast Asia,inter-ethnic conflicts caused by discrimination of those people with dominant religion against those with non-mainstream religions have become a prevalent phenomenon in Southeast Asian countries.This thesis believes that religious factors have played an important role in the inter-ethnic conflicts in Southeast Asia,and the dissidence among religious beliefs has become the main reason for the outbreak of inter-ethnic conflicts.Therefore,this paper attempts to analyze the role played by religious factors in the inter-ethnic conflicts in Southeast Asia by case study.First of all,through the identity theory,this paper analyzes the function of religion in the inter-ethnic conflict,then discusses the influence of religious factors on the inter-ethnic conflict from the geopolitical effect of religious emotion,establishes the function influence mode of religion in the inter-ethnic conflict,and theoretically constructs the mechanism of religious factors in the inter-ethnic conflict.Secondly,according to the characteristics of inter-ethnic conflicts in Southeast Asia,that is,the conflicts between the main ethnic groups and ethnic minorities in Southeast Asia,taking religion as the dividing dimension,the conflicts involving Buddhism and Islam represented by the Malays separation movement in Southern Thailand,the conflicts involving Catholicism and Islam represented by the Filipino Moro separation movement,and the conflicts involving Myanmar Taking the conflict between Buddhism and Christianity as a case,this paper analyzes the mechanism of religious factors in the inter-ethnic conflict in Southeast Asia.Through the analysis of theory and cases,this paper holds that religion can play a role in the inter-ethnic conflict in Southeast Asia,and play an important role in promoting or intensifying the inter-ethnic conflict.The mechanism of religion’s role in the inter-ethnic conflict is determined by its identity function and emotional geopolitical effect.Religion,as a complex cultural phenomenon that integrates religious belief,religious consciousness,religious emotion,religious etiquette and religious organization,has become the identification standard of many groups,and has brought together members of the same religious belief into a close community.Among different groups of religious belief,religion has the function of mutual exclusion,compared with identity the exclusion of religion leads to the estrangement and conflict between groups.This kind of inter-ethnic exclusion and identification of religion embodies the duality of religious functions.Under the dual function of religious identity,religion has become an important intermediate variable influencing inter-ethnic conflict.The most important reason why religion can be involved in inter-ethnic conflict is that there are complex interactions among religious identity,national identity and national identity.On the whole,when religious identity is consistent with national identity and national identity,religious identity will unite the related ethnic groups who believe in religion and enhance the national identity,so as to promote national unity and national stability.When religious identity is contrary to national identity and national identity,religious identity will lead the ethnic group that believes in religion to produce centrifugal force to the country,and weaken the national identity to the country,thus leading to national conflict and national division.