Democratizing the Hegemonic State

Ilan Peleg is the Editor-in-Chief of Israel Studies Forum (since 2000), the author of Begin's Foreign Policy, 1977–1983: Israel's Turn to the Right (1987) and of Human Rights in the West Bank and Gaza: Legacy and Politics (1995, selected as Choice Outstanding Academic Title in 1996), and many other scholarly books and articles. His recent studies have appeared in journals including Nations and Nationalism, the Middle East Journal, and Nationalism and Ethnic Politics. Dr Peleg's expertise is in ethnic relations in deeply divided societies, Middle East politics, Israeli society, and US foreign policy, and he has spoken on these topics on CNN, Voice of America, and National Public Radio. Dr Peleg is the Charles A. Dana Professor of Government and Law at Lafayette College in Easton, Pennsylvania.

• 1. Ethno-national conflict in multinational polities; 2. The crucial triangle: democracy, statehood, and hegemony in multinational settings; 3. Classifying multinational states; 4. Transforming uninational hegemony in divided societies: the gradual option; 5. Transforming uninational hegemony: mega-constitutional engineering; 6. The reverse trend - sustaining or strengthening ethnic hegemony; 7. Beyond hegemony in deeply divided societies: transforming hegemonic systems; Epilogue: genuine democracy for the 21st century.

'This book contributes to our current understanding of democratisation in the context of ethnic politics. … [it] is a book well worth reading and should be required of any student of ethnic politics and ethnic conflict.' John Ishiyama, Journal of Politics