The Revolutionary Socialist Network, Workers
Most commonly cited cause of genocide is political upheaval
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Most commonly cited cause of genocide is political upheavalWilliams, 2016 (Timothy, research fellow at the Centre for Conflict Studies at Marburg University. “Why Genocide Occurs” October 6, 2016. https://kh.boell.org/en/2016/10/06/why-genocide-occurs /// MF) Political Upheaval The most commonly cited determinant of genocide occurrence, in both qualitative and quantitativestudies, is political upheaval and direct threats to governments which also finds a prominent position in Harff’s study.3 Harff defines political upheaval as "an abrupt change in the political community caused by the formation of a state or regime through violent conflict, redrawing of state boundaries, or defeat in international war."4 In this context, Melson and Krain emphasise the importance of revolutions,5 but it is also a category in which decolonisation or other radical system changes or collapses would equally be well placed. The logic behind all these is that political upheaval provides a context and a political opportunity structure which is conducive to starting genocide. With the constraints of a previous system removed, the legitimacy of the political community and its identity (including which groups constitute it) can be called into question.6 Political upheaval provides the opportunity to re-define the demos, the circle of people included as constituents of the state, in a deinstitutionalised setting.7 In the context of political upheaval, rules of conduct between the state and its population can become re-defined and enable a regime intent on genocide to implement a new eliminationist policy. The period of transition, and the often concurrent chaos, can also serve as a smokescreen for action against the targeted group, given that internal and external observers could be distracted by other macro-political transformation processes. Besides providing a contextual background, political upheaval can also be a motivational impulse and thus trigger genocide. In the throes of political upheaval, reigning elites may feel particularly threatened by certain groups they believe could try to exploit the upheaval to topple them, and thus desire to have these groups removed. The empirical founding of the impact of political upheaval since World War II is immense and Harff finds a significant impact on the risk of genocide occurrence, while Krain suggests that extra-constitutional changes (a similar concept) have a significant impact on this likelihood.8 Download 2.09 Mb. Share with your friends:
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