Balloting to Stop Bullets: A Look at Democratic Separatist Movements and their Proclivity for Non-Violence

Abstract

Referendum voting has become a new way in which separatist groups can gain popular support for independence movements in a democratic context. Rather than non-democratic countries with disenfranchised separatist groups that resort to violence, referendum voting has a track record of precluding violence. Using examples within Europe of Scotland, Catalonia and Northern Ireland, democratic institutions provide an avenue for groups to seek out solutions to their problems in politics, and gives them an avenue that does not automatically prime them to use violence.