Political marginalization of “Others” in consociational regimes.

Polities that follow the consociational model of democracy adopt power-sharing provisions, guaranteeing a certain number of seats to representatives of their societies’ main ethnic groups. Yet in all hardcore (“corporate”) consociational systems—Belgium, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Burundi, Lebanon, Northern Ireland, and South Tyrol—we also find “Others”: citizens who do not belong to any of the main ethnic segments. These Others are typically subjected to patterns of political marginalisation and exclusion that are problematic for a liberal democracy. In some cases, such patterns have been deemed discriminatory by courts, most notably in several rulings of the European Court of Human Rights concerning the position of Others in Bosnia and Herzegovina. This article provides a conceptual framework for identifying Others in consociational systems and presents the first comprehensive overview of the legal and political status of Others in the six corporate consociations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]