Understanding Terrorism Charges against Protesters in the Context of Salvadoran History

Abstract

While nongovernmental organizations such as Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch have repeatedly warned of the dangers created by legislation modeled after the U.S.A. Patriot Act and the Military Commissions Act of 2006, a recent quantitative study by Todd Landman has found that the passage of such laws has not had a significant impact on abuses against human rights defenders. Examination in historical context of the use of El Salvador's Special Law against Terrorist Acts against peaceful protesters sheds light on Landman's findings. Serious violations of human rights in El Salvador have occurred under the new “antiterrorist” law, but there has been no dramatic increase since the passage of the law because violations had already been increasing before the law was enacted. Furthermore, the Salvadoran state has a long history of using the fight against terrorism to justify such violations. Landman's model tests for antiterrorist laws as a cause of human rights violations but does not address the fact that such laws are also a symptom of a deteriorating human rights situation.