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Ethnic violence is a form of political violence expressly motivated by ethnic hatred and ethnic conflict. Forms of ethnic violence which can be argued to have the character of terrorism may be known as ethnic terrorism or ethnically-motivated terrorism. "Racist terrorism" is a form of ethnic violence dominated by overt racism and xenophobic reactionism.
Ethnic violence in an organized, sustained form is known as ethnic conflict or warfare , in contrast to class conflict, where the dividing line is social class rather than ethnic background.
Care must be taken to distinguish ethnic violence, which is violence motivated by an ethnic division, from violence that just happens to break out between groups of different ethnicity motivated by other factors.
Violent ethnic rivalry is the subject matter of Jewish sociologist Ludwig Gumplowicz's Der Rassenkampf ; and more recently of Amy Chua's notable study, World On Fire: How Exporting Free Market Democracy Breeds Ethnic Hatred and Global Instability.Some academics would place all "nationalist-based violence" under ethnic violence, which would include the World Wars and all major conflicts between industrialised nations during the 19th century.