1 Liberal Consociationalism in Theory and Practice: Power Sharing and Territorial Self-governance 1 Stefan Wolff Department of Political Science and International Studies University of Birmingham stefan@stefanwolff.com | www.stefanwolff.com Introduction Consociationalism as a theory managing conflict in divided societies has two predominant dimensions of institutional design that have emerged most clearly in its liberal consociational version—power sharing and self-governance. Territorial approaches to conflict management in divided societies are occasionally treated as a separate approach in the literature, even though empirically power sharing and (territorial) forms of self-governance frequently coincide, by design or otherwise (Wolff 2009a). However, especially proponents of (liberal) consociational power sharing have pointed out the important connections between, and complementarity of, consociational power sharing and territorial forms of self-governance, 2 thus seeking to fill a significant gap in conflict management theory. 3 While these empirical connections have been obvious for some time, conceptual links have only recently been established more systematically, 4 and I therefore examine them in more detail, including by empirical illustration. Engaging with critics of both power sharing and territorial self-governance, I offer a conditional theoretical and empirical defence of liberal consociationalism thus also contributing further to the development of liberal consociational theory and practice. Power Sharing and Self-governance in Consociational Theory In the middle of the 19 th century, the liberal philosopher John Stuart Mill in his Considerations on Representative Government expressed skepticism with regard to the possibility of democracy ‘in a country made up of different nationalities’ (Mill 1861, 230). While there clearly is empirical evidence that any system of government that permanently excludes specific segments of its citizens, on the grounds of race, ethnicity, religion, language or ideology, etc., eventually does so at its peril, democracy is the one system in which population diversity can be effectively accommodated without recourse to repression or assimilation. This is neither always easily accomplished, nor is there a blueprint for doing so. In fact, while Mill’s dictum has been taken up as a challenge by scholars and practitioners of institutional design in divided societies to find ways in which democracy and diversity can be combined in a legitimate system of government, there is little consensus on how to do so. Alongside centripetalism and power dividing, 5