MANUEL VOGT
Professor of International Security, University College London
Inequality and civil violence in multiethnic states
Why are some multiethnic countries more prone to civil violence than others? This strand of my research examines the historical roots of ethnic inequality and how distinct cleavage types affect peaceful or violent ethnic conflict.
Bormann, Nils-Christian, Lars-Erik Cederman and Manuel Vogt. 2026. "Getting Religion Wrong: A Response to Toft’s 'Getting Religion Right'." Journal of Conflict Resolution 70(9):1728-1744. (Link)
Pischedda, Costantino and Manuel Vogt. 2025. "When Do Religious Organizations Resort to Violence? How Local Conditions Shape the Effects of Transnational Ideology." Ethnopolitics 24(1):1-26. (Link)
This article analyzes the changing role of religion in political violence, integrating various existing explanations at different levels of analysis (transnational, national, and organizational). We focus on how the Iranian Revolution has created a new transnational zeitgeist that has transformed the relationship between religion and political violence. Relying on the EPR-Organizations dataset, we show that ethno-political organizations with religious demands are more likely to resort to anti-government violence post-1979 than before this historical turning point, and we also analyze the national-level conditions and organization-level attributes under which this new transnational zeitgeist is most likely to foment violence.
Vogt, Manuel, Kristian Skrede Gleditsch and Lars-Erik Cederman. 2021. "From Claims to Violence: Signaling, Outbidding, and Escalation in Ethnic Conflict." Journal of Conflict Resolution 65(7-8):1278-1307. (Link)
Introducing the new EPR-Organizations (EPR-O) dataset, this paper advances and empirically substantiates a theory of ethno-political claim-making and civil conflict. We show that organizational fragmentation within ethnic movements leads to more radical political demands and that such radical demands increase the risk of political violence.
Vogt, Manuel. 2018. "Ethnic Stratification and the Equilibrium of Inequality: Ethnic Conflict in Postcolonial States." International Organization 72(01):105-37. (Link)
This paper introduces and tests my theory of ethnic conflict in post-colonial states. Challenging existing accounts of civil violence, which expect ethnic inequality to increase the risk of ethnic civil conflict, it shows that extreme degrees of inequality, coupled with high social integration of ethnic groups, make non-violent direct action a more viable strategy than violence for marginalised groups. This finding thus explains why some of the most unequal societies in today’s world experience mostly peaceful ethno-political contention.
Bormann, Nils-Christian, Lars-Erik Cederman and Manuel Vogt. 2017. "Language, Religion, and Ethnic Civil War." Journal of Conflict Resolution 61(4):744-71. (Link)
In this paper, we theoretically and empirically examine the claim that religious divisions are particularly conflict-prone. Our findings refute this widespread belief and, instead, suggest that ethnic civil conflict is more likely to occur along linguistic divisions than along religious ones. Thus, our study highlights how language often forms the basis for both nationalist policies of exclusion, creating grievances within affected groups, and networks of anti-state armed mobilisation.
Cederman, Lars-Erik and Manuel Vogt. 2017. "Dynamics and Logics of Civil War." Journal of Conflict Resolution 61(9):1992-2016. (Link)
This article reviews the literature on civil war. Identifying three key theoretical perspectives that have dominated much of this literature - focusing on greed, grievances, and opportunities respectively - we evaluate the arguments and findings of these theoretical approaches with respect to each of the main phases of war: outbreak, wartime dynamics, conflict termination, and postwar recovery.
Vogt, Manuel, Nils-Christian Bormann, Seraina Rüegger, Lars-Erik Cederman, Philipp Hunziker and Luc Girardin. 2015. "Integrating Data on Ethnicity, Geography, and Conflict: The Ethnic Power Relations Data Set Family." Journal of Conflict Resolution 59(7):1327-42. (Link)
This paper introduces the updated version of the Family of EPR Datasets, the most widely used dataset on ethnic groups in the social sciences and beyond.