So what do Cypriots (Greek Cypriots and Turkish Cypriots) want in terms of solving the Cyprus issue? (5)

Heterogeneity within each community...

In the interdisciplinary framework I am proposing as Genetic Social Psychology (GSP) understanding heterogeneity within each of the antagonistic groups and wider regional dynamics is of vital importance. Understanding change in different timescales, from seconds in intergroup contact (microgenenesis) to a life time of development (ontogenesis) to historical change (sociogenesis) is also a key concern of GSP. I will have to say much more about ontogenetic and sociogenetic change when my future posts will have covered well beyond the start of this research programme in 2007. However, those who followed the first posts already hopefully see the crucial importance of microgenetic processes of social interactions in the form of intergroup contact to reduce prejudice, build trust and create a renewed wish for co-existence and co-operation with the other community. In this sense the late Gerard Duveen, my PhD supervisor in Cambridge was very right in calling microgenetic processes the motor of both ontogenetic and sociogenetic change.

But today I will focus on heterogeneity within each community because in identifying a variety of positions in each community and the processes of their construction can help us make an educated guess about how things could evolve in the future and also evaluate the prospects of conflict transformation.

From the large scale representative survey of 2007 we proceeded with a Two Step Cluster analysis in both communities to identify the ideological or identity positions in the representational field of the Cyprus problem. It was noteworthy as can be seen below that in both communities 3 positions (pro-reconciliation, communitarianism, ethno-nationalism) where automatically detected with a lot of structural similarities. You can read the whole paper here

The motor of the growth of the pro-reconciliation position is indeed high quantity and good quality of intergroup contact (microgenesis). The communitarian and ethnonationalist positions are supported by low or no contact and low quality of intergroup contact and also a one sided and exclusive form of victimization fed by history teaching . Interestingly we identified two forms of identification related to negative intergroup attitudes. One was a Cypriocentric but exclusive of the other community ( I am a Cypriot but i claim the superordinate identity of Cypriot only exclusively for by subgroup[GC or TC]) and the other the historical extension of Greek and Turkish nationalism in Cyprus ( I feel Greek/ Turkish). This was a contribution in the literature of the Cyprus issue back in 2007 because until then the sociological, anthorpological and political literature only discussed the traditional Cypriocentric vs Helleno/Turco centric tension. The consequences of the identification of the communal position is very important for projecting future changes. The communitarian position is essentially fed by partition dynamics but keeps distance from so called motherlands (Greece and Turkey). In the case of GCs it takes the form of majoritarianism, in the case of TCs it takes the form of supporting a secular TC identity which keeps distance both from Turkey and GCs. These are positions that could in the future be enhanced whilst the ethno-nationalist positions are in the historical decline (unless of course in the north of Cyprus Turkey injects population from Turkey but this as we have seen recently will not go down without resistance from both the pro-reconciliation and communitarian position of TCs which is the majority).