The role of ethnicity in the social unrests

The number and diversity of various tribes with the different cultures in the demographic composition of the countries encounter the government to the challenges. In our country, Iran, ethnic subcultures are situated at the country margins that the geographical situation of tribes complicates the national security equation. These tribes in the most sensitive state strategic zones (margin of borders) are often under probable influence of neighbor countries and tend to them,therefore it may result in threat and vulnerability of national governing and is very important as regard to the national security strategy. This paper analyzes the role of ethnicity in the development of social crises therein four elements have been raised including relationship between ethnic convergence, institutional protection of being intergroup or out-group, sense of ethnic deprivation and social unrests, as well as the question of “if any relationship exists between the ethnicity and social unrests?” is answered. The research type is applied and its methodology is descriptive-survey. For testing the hypotheses, 989 students residing in border provinces were selected and out of them 165 students have been sampled according to Cochrane formula through stratified sampling procedure and were evaluated by researcher-made questionnaire. The reliability of questionnaire was obtained equal to 0.81 by Alpha coefficient of Cronbach.