Virulent ethnocentrism: A major challenge for transformational conflict resolution and peacebuilding in the post‐cold war era¹

Introduction The purpose of this article is to discuss the origins and prospects for reduction of virulent ethnocentrism: a deep and violently aggressive sense of the ‘Other’, resulting from the apparent tendency of people across time and cultural space to subdivide others into ‘them’ and ‘us’ (see LeVine and Campbell, 1972). In the Balkans, this phenomenon has resulted in one world war plus the more recent ‘ethnic cleansing’ of the last ten years of the 20th century.