The Death and Life of State Repression: Understanding Onset, Escalation, Termination and Recurrence with Benjamin Appel. Oxford University Press. Forthcoming.
INtro: Researchers, policymakers, advocates, activists and ordinary people have been interested with trying to reduce state repression/human rights violation for quite some time. Indeed, this has been something of a holy grail within this line of inquiry. We argue that such a search has been hindered by how we think about the problem and, directly following from this, how we study it.
Overview: The Death and Life of State Repression addresses a problem that dates back at least 75 years, if not before. Since World War II, individuals and institutions from around the world have been concerned with state repression/human rights violation and since about 1990 a robust empirical literature has emerged to investigate what drives this behavior up or down (i.e., exploring variation). While useful, this work has generally ignored important aspects of the “Death/Life cycle” of state repression: i.e., its onset, escalation, termination and recurrence. Such an approach is important because different explanations and policies might be relevant for different parts of the cycle.
Exploring a new database of repressive spells from 1976-2006 and new theory regarding spells, The Death and Life of State Repression breaks new ground in a variety of different ways. Within the book, it is argued that repression is a sticky process that is largely slow-moving and non-adaptive. Consequently, change in this behavior is rare unless the ruling cohort is perturbed in some manner. Now what perturbs is somewhat surprising. The Death and Life of State Repression does not argue or find support for the predominant variables/policies advanced by the international community (i.e., naming/shaming, international law, military intervention and economic sanctions). Rather, it advances and finds that political democratization plays a crucial role in reducing and stopping most aspects of repressive spells and democratization itself is influenced by non-violent direction action. The book has major implications for those who wish to study state repression as well as those who have an interest in trying to reduce as well as stop it from occurring across the Death/Life cycle. The path to less repressive behavior has never been clearer.
Contents
INtro: Researchers, policymakers, advocates, activists and ordinary people have been interested with trying to reduce state repression/human rights violation for quite some time. Indeed, this has been something of a holy grail within this line of inquiry. We argue that such a search has been hindered by how we think about the problem and, directly following from this, how we study it.
Overview: The Death and Life of State Repression addresses a problem that dates back at least 75 years, if not before. Since World War II, individuals and institutions from around the world have been concerned with state repression/human rights violation and since about 1990 a robust empirical literature has emerged to investigate what drives this behavior up or down (i.e., exploring variation). While useful, this work has generally ignored important aspects of the “Death/Life cycle” of state repression: i.e., its onset, escalation, termination and recurrence. Such an approach is important because different explanations and policies might be relevant for different parts of the cycle.
Exploring a new database of repressive spells from 1976-2006 and new theory regarding spells, The Death and Life of State Repression breaks new ground in a variety of different ways. Within the book, it is argued that repression is a sticky process that is largely slow-moving and non-adaptive. Consequently, change in this behavior is rare unless the ruling cohort is perturbed in some manner. Now what perturbs is somewhat surprising. The Death and Life of State Repression does not argue or find support for the predominant variables/policies advanced by the international community (i.e., naming/shaming, international law, military intervention and economic sanctions). Rather, it advances and finds that political democratization plays a crucial role in reducing and stopping most aspects of repressive spells and democratization itself is influenced by non-violent direction action. The book has major implications for those who wish to study state repression as well as those who have an interest in trying to reduce as well as stop it from occurring across the Death/Life cycle. The path to less repressive behavior has never been clearer.
Contents
- 1. Preface
- 2. Introduction
- 3. Old and New Directions in the Study of State Repression
- 4. Studying Spells: A New Unit of Analysis, Measure and Model
- 5. Starting Spells
- 6. Escalating Spells
- 7. Ending Spells
- 8. Recurring Spells
- 9. Cases
- 10. What We Can Do Better
- Appendices
