Dissertation Abstract: Andrea Grove

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Written at the Ohio State University, 1999
Advisor: Margaret G. Hermann
406 pages

This dissertation is a comparative longitudinal study of leadership mobilization of identity groups in Northern Ireland and Rhodesia/Zimbabwe. In the past decade, profound changes around the world have focused attention on issues of identity within states. How do societies achieve a sense of identity, what factors affect change in identity? As conflicts over identity become more visible in world politics and are treated increasingly as "international" issues, policy makers should understand if and how actors in the international environment can affect the debate over the definition of identity and "mission."

This study asserts that competition among leaders to define group boundaries and mission often emerges in times of uncertainty. In response to the "battle for the hearts and minds" of potential followers, support often shifts back and forth between more inclusive and more exclusive leaders. Looking at leadership competition over time in Northern Ireland and Rhodesia/Zimbabwe, this study examines the frames or strategies that are effective as leaders try to mobilize. As an indirect test of extant work, strategies are derived from literature on nationalism, international relations, and social psychology: Injustice, Enemy Image/Ally Image, Identity, Governance, and Storytelling. For each, a single factor is most important as the root cause of mobilization. Across seven cases, content analysis is used to compare systematically the strategies of competing leaders, in terms of individual strategy profiles and in terms of an exclusivity index. The success of a leader who uses more inclusive or more exclusive strategies is expected to be contingent on the context, which is analyzed in terms of political opportunities in the domestic and international arenas. Hypotheses are derived and evaluated concerning how repression, change in stability of elite alignment, international involvement/mediation, and regional integration affect the likelihood that a leader with more inclusive/exclusive strategies will win.

This research makes substantial contributions. Leaders do use the strategies derived from the extant literature. Further, both the use and success of the strategies are affected by the match between the more "objective" context and the leader's interpretation of that context. This research also demonstrates that external actors can not only push a leader toward more inclusive strategies by broadening the leader's constituency, but can also alter the context in a way that makes the leader's domestic audience more or less "susceptible" to the inclusive strategies. Finally, this study shows how leaders manipulate aspects of the international and domestic contexts to mobilize domestic audiences.

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