ABSTRACT
Ethnic conflicts have been among the most-reported international events in the early 1990s. While some observers may have expected the decline or demise of ethnicity in industrialized and in post-industrialized nations and the weakening of ethnic ties in Third World countries undergoing nation-building, ethnic conflicts continue to underlie social cleavages in many countries. In the economic, social, political, and cultural upheavals around the globe, ethnicity remains important; ethnic conflict is continuous; and ethnic loyalties are a major axis of social definition. Ethnicity is a powerful source of intergenerational stratification and a key factor in the control of resources.
