Repressive Policies Research Articles

Cooperation and coercion: The quest for quasi-voluntary compliance in the governance of African commons

Abstract This article focuses on social control and states’ broadcasting of power over inhospitable terrains. It uses the case of conservation of wildlife in two African Peace Parks to explore how the involved states strike the balance between cooperation and coercion in their efforts to mold citizen behavior toward quasi-voluntary compliance. The case of wildlife management highlights pertinent issues related to compliance and collective action and have the potential to contribute substantially to the general literature on state capacity. More specifically, while the increased militarization of wildlife management has been criticized for justifying coercive and repressive policies, it can be seen as a result of the involved states’ lack of social control and ensuing inability to foster quasi-voluntary compliance through other means than coercive ones. Yet, while coercion is not a sufficient condition for fostering compliance, it is still important to recognize that it is indeed a necessary one. Building on unique interview data from two major transboundary parks – Kavango Zambezi Transfrontier Conservation Area and Great Limpopo Transfrontier Park – we explore how existing theoretical arguments play out in practice and how the challenge to foster quasi-voluntary compliance is being addressed. The results show that actors given the task to implement wildlife policy certainly show awareness about that coercion needs to be complemented with cooperative assurances in order to foster quasi-voluntary compliance. Furthermore, the study provides insights into how other social organizations such as traditional leaders might challenge the state in terms of being the predominant actors in setting up rules governing wildlife. We thank the Swedish Research Council for supporting this research. We would also like to thank two anonymous reviewers and the editor for constructive comments.

Liga Patriótica en el territorio pampeano. Notas sobre el accionar y el discurso represivos contra la clase trabajadora (1919-1922)

El presente trabajo analiza los mecanismos represivos y los dispositivos discursivos e ideológicos utilizados por la Liga Patriótica en el Territorio Nacional de La Pampa, con el propósito de realizar un aporte a la historiografía que, desde diversos enfoques, ha estudiado el accionar de esta organización. Buscamos hacer una aproximación a las formas que tomaron las prácticas represivas paraestatales contra los trabajadores movilizados durante el período 1919-1922. Para ello indagamos en la relación existente entre la Liga, las elites y las instituciones estatales, como la policía y el poder judicial del Territorio. Con este objetivo, estudiamos los casos de la represión contra los estibadores en las localidades pampeanas de Vértiz, en 1919, y Alpachiri, en 1921. Sostenemos que la Liga Patriótica, para instrumentar su represión, recurrió a la policía y al poder judicial territorial, quienes aplicaron en varias oportunidades, la ley de Defensa Social, dentro de la política represiva antimaximalista. Para realizar tal estudio acudimos a diversas fuentes (legislativas, periodísticas, prensas obreras, documentos policiales y judiciales), y analizamos los ideologemas con que se justificaba la represión, así como los mecanismos policiales y judiciales con que se efectivizó la misma.

The eviction of Polish and German population from the border regions of the Ukrainian SSR to the Kazakh SSR in 1935–1936

The aim of the article is to reveal the process of forced eviction of the Polish and German population from the border regions of the Ukrainian SSR to the Kazakh Autonomous Soviet Socialist Republic (since 1936 – the Kazakh SSR) in the period of 1935–1936 based on the analysis of little-known documents stored in the archives of the Security Service of Ukraine. The research methodology is based on historical and scientific principles, as well as the use of historical-genetic, problem-chronological and comparative methods. Results. In 1935–1936, the Soviet government pursued a policy of forced eviction of residents from the territories near the western border of the Ukrainian SSR. The border areas were under the supervision of the military command of the republic at that time. In the early 1930s the border began to be actively fortified, and the border area of 7,5 km was defined as esplanade (that is, a territory between military or fortified objects and settlements). According to the Soviet leadership, it was necessary to evict the local population from this territory, including Polish and German people. Residents of the western regions of the Ukrainian SSR came under special attention of the NKVD, who for the most part had a negative attitude towards the Soviet regime. Besides, they had relatives abroad, and in the case of a future armed conflict with neighboring countries, they could support foreign troops. There were 178 such settlements. They were home to 4 232 Polish and 1 357 German families with a total number of more than 27 000 people. But subsequently, the total number of planned migrants increased to 15 000 families, which amounted to 70 000 people. Due to the fact that all vacant lands in the southeastern regions of the republic were settled in the 1920s, it was planned to move the named number of Polish and German families mainly to Kazakhstan. Conclusions. In 1935–1936, the NKVD officers evicted not only the Ukrainian population, but also residents of Polish and German national regions. In 1936, more than 74 000 people were resettled from Vinnytsa, Kyiv and Odesa regions to the Kazakh SSR. Thus, forced eviction of population from the border areas became a continuation of the Soviet regime’s repressive policy as a means of overcoming the protest movements of the inhabitants of the Ukrainian SSR. Practical value. The results of the study outline a range of little-studied problems that can be investigated in the future with declassification of new documents of this period; the information presented in the article can be used in the development of educational programs. Originality. The study is based on little-known documents stored in the archives of the Security Service of Ukraine. Scientific novelty. The article supplements historical research on the national and repressive policies of the Soviet regime, which makes it topical and fills in the gaps in historical data on forced evictions of the mid-1930s. Article type: empirical.

Judicial statistics and corporate structure of the Russian courts

The subject of this research is the impact of assessment of judicial performance in accordance with the indicators of judicial statistics upon the organization of culture of the Russian court, which incorporates the shared by majority of judges informal rules of conduct, traditions, and values. The article describes such criteria for assessment of judicial performance as “quality”, “quantity”, and “terms”. In studying the historical origin of judicial performance assessment based on judicial statistics, it is demonstrated that the tradition of such assessment was founded in the 1930s, when political leadership who carried out repressive policy instigated “socialistic competition” between the courts and the judges. The article analyzes the impact of the “struggle for statistics” upon conduct of judges. Such circumstance that in consideration of cases the judges take into account judicial statistics violate the requirement of procedural fairness. There is a contradiction between the Russian legislation, which for the most part complies with the universally recognized international principles, and conservative organizational culture of the Russian courts. Mechanism of reproduction of the latter is the inertia of the “struggle for statistics”. In order to bring into compliance the representations of Russian judges on the acceptable conduct with the values of democratic justice, the system of assessment of judicial performance requires revision.

Victoria January to June 2020

The article discusses the political situation in Vicrotia during the first half of 2020 Topics covered include the formation of Fire Services Victoria (FSV) authority by Premier Daniel Andrews to deal with the bushfire crisis, the measures taken by the state government in response to the COVID-19 pandemic, and the strong community support obtained by the state government for its most repressive policies to contain the coronavirus

O direito fundamental ao bom governo e o dever de proteção estatal: uma análise das competências federativas à implementação de políticas de prevenção e repressão aos atos de malversação do patrimônio público

O presente trabalho expõe o resultado de uma pesquisa bibliográfica, concebida a partir do método dedutivo, para fins de abordagem, e monográfico, a título procedimental, acerca da necessidade de estabelecimento de políticas públicas e a consequente atribuição de competências para a prevenção e repressão de atos desonestos por parte dos agentes públicos, como medida indispensável ao dever de proteção do Estado na concretização do direito fundamental ao bom governo. Assim, a pesquisa justifica-se pela necessidade de esclarecimento de importantes pontos que cercam a problemática que motiva o estudo, como a seguinte questão: estabelecida a fundamentalidade ao direito ao bom governo e constatada a necessidade de políticas de prevenção e repressão aos atos desonestos no exercício do Poder emanado do povo, a quais Entes federativos compete o estabelecimento de normas objetivando a responsabilização administrativa, civil, penal e por atos de improbidade? Para tanto, o trabalho estrutura-se em duas partes. Na primeira, realiza-se um discurso de fundamentação acerca do direito fundamental ao bom governo, para, em um segundo momento, se realizar uma análise dos instrumentos internacionais que versam sobre as obrigações estatais de se estabelecerem políticas internas de prevenção e repressão aos atos corruptivos, estudando-se seus reflexos e quais dessas medidas foram implementadas no âmbito doméstico, a fim de, na última seção, fazer-se uma análise normativo-constitucional acerca das competências federativas à sua consecução, buscando-se a proteção do direito fundamental ao bom governo. Dentre os resultados encontrados, verificou-se que, quanto ao estabelecimento de normas objetivando a responsabilização civil e penal, a competência é privativa da União, enquanto as normas sobre direito administrativo são comuns a todos os Entes federativos, pairando controvérsia, entretanto, quanto à competência para legislar sobre improbidade administrativa, o que poderia ocorrer uma invasão de competências por parte da União, como se verá no decorrer do trabalho.

Deconstructing the Protestant Liberation of the Bible: The Case of the Low Countries

Abstract The Grand Narrative of the liberation of Scripture has long taken for granted that the late medieval Catholic Church took a negative, if not repressive, attitude towards vernacular Bible reading; that the Scriptures were only opened up for the masses with the advent of Luther and the Reformers; and that the Catholic authorities reacted by intensifying their repressive policy. Though explicitly criticized in scholarly literature over the last decade, this Grand Narrative, or Protestant Paradigm, continues to pop up in confessionally-colored scholarly publications, as well as in accounts of the Reformation that are destined for a general audience. The present essay examines three incarnations of the Grand Narrative in Dutch Protestant Bible culture. Firstly, it has been argued that the Bibles published by William Vorsterman (not only the edition of 1528, but all subsequent editions) betray sympathies with the upcoming Reformation; secondly, that the printer-publisher Jacob van Liesvelt was beheaded on account of the protestantizing marginal glosses in his Bibles, especially the 1542 edition; and thirdly, that his widow Maria Ancxt continued to print Protestant Bibles from the late 1540s until the early 1560s, in obvious violation of the anti-heresy edicts, yet without being harassed by the Antwerp authorities. The aim of this article is to debunk these incarnations of the Grand Narrative.

REPRESSION AGAINST SOVIET REPATRIATES AFTER WORLD WAR II: FORMATION OF THE POLICY OF OBLIVION IN THE USSR

Summary. The purpose of the study is to analyze the causes and features of the repressive policy of the Soviet government towards its own citizens, who, for various reasons, found themselves in the status of displaced persons outside the USSR during the World War II. The study also aims to identify the features of the formation of a policy of oblivion in the Soviet Union on the forms and methods of repatriation and repression against repatriates.The research methodology is based on the application of general scientific and special historical methods. The author adheres to the scientific principle and principles of historicism, systematization, verification, objectivity and value approach to the studied phenomena. Interdisciplinary research is focused on the involvement of historical-comparative and historical-system methods, techniques of microhistorical analysis. The scientific novelty lies in the continuation of studies initiated by domestic and foreign researchers, in particular, the repressive policy of the Soviet government towards its own citizens who were repatriated to the USSR after the Second World War from the western and the Soviet occupation zone.Conclusions. The Soviet leadership made every effort to return its own citizens who found themselves in Europe after the end of World War II as displaced persons. The degrading conditions of repatriation and filtration demonstrated the attitude of the Soviet regime towards repatriates. The Soviet totalitarian state did everything to isolate post-war Soviet society from "unreliable elements", for which purpose enormous funds were spent and considerable human and material resources were used. The myth of "a wonderful life in a socialist society" created for decades continued to be maintained after the war, and therefore it was dangerous to admit into Soviet society those who posed a partial threat to the myth. Citizens who had to go through repatriation and humiliating procedures of checks and filtrations, in fact, the war ended only at the gates of checkpoints. Above them, and their relatives, for several decades hung the brand "was in the occupied territories", which, in fact, in many ways limited the normal existence in Soviet realities. Repression against Soviet repatriates is another criminal page of the Soviet regime that deserves a comprehensive study and return from oblivion.

PRESENT-DAY UKRAINIAN MUSEUM NARRATIVES AS FACTORS OF DETRAUMATIZATION OF THE MEMORY OF THE XX CENTURY TOTALITARIANISMS

Summary. Museums, as a storage of memory and places of national consciousness shaping construct their exposition through narratives – a certain story about historical events. The purpose of the article is to analyze the practices of instrumentalization of historical knowledge about the World War ІІ and totalitarian repressions of the mid-twentieth century. The object of study is propaganda in museum activities in the USSR (on the example of the Memorial Complex "Ukrainian State Museum of the Great Patriotic War of 1941–1945"), as well as experience of presenting the main aspects of overcoming the repressive and totalitarian heritage of Lviv museums (The Museum of the Liberation Struggle of Ukraine, The National Museum-Memorial of Victims of the Occupation Regimes "The Prison on Łącki Street", The Museum complex "Territory of Terror"). The research methodology is based on Jan Assmann՚s theory of individual, communicative and cultural memory. The applied historical and cultural approach allows not to involve verification of historical events and facts in museum exhibitions but analyze museum activities as a historical and cultural phenomenon, its role in creating the latest politics of memory in Ukraine. The scientific novelty of the article lies in the critical analysis of previously unexplored aspects of the activities of museums as national cultural institutions with an educational mission. It was proved that the map of the collective memory of Ukrainians about the war and repressions of the middle of the twentieth century consists of often mutually exclusive narratives. The integration of Ukrainian cultural memory with European historical interpretations is slow and inconsistent. As a result of the study, conclusions were drawn. The long period of "compulsory oblivion" as well as the aggressive anti-Ukrainian policy of the memory of the Soviet Union caused hybrid historical narratives about the repressive policies of 1939–1953 in Ukrainian history. In the first decades of Ukraine՚s independence, the Soviet ideological burden was reflected in the activities of the Memorial Complex "National Museum of the History of the Great Patriotic War of 1941–1945" which peculiarities were the instrumentalization of the experience of war under the influence of current political events and timid attempts to anthropologize the war. Present-day The National Museum of History of Ukraine in the Second World War has undergone two narrative changes since its foundation in 1974 – the first, "fixing the Soviet narrative" in the mid-1990s, and the second, "Ukrainian-centric anthropologizing of the narrative" after 2015. The latest changes continue and are proof of the difficulty of changing the hitherto perceptions of war. The museums of the western part of Ukraine represented a different mnemonic narrative. The abandonment of imperial-Soviet models immediately after the proclamation of independence, the formation of the collective consciousness of Ukrainians as a counterweight to the Russian threat, consolidation around historical traumas and finding ways to overcome it was characteristic of three Lviv museums created at the beginning of the XXI century – The Museum of the Liberation Struggle of Ukraine, The National Museum-Memorial of Victims of the Occupation Regimes "The Prison on Łącki Street", The Museum complex "Territory of Terror".

The Politics of Fear: How the Russian Regime Confronts Its Opponents

ABSTRACT The article attempts to analyze the mechanisms of political control used by the Kremlin vis-à-vis its rivals. Russian authorities had opted the politics of fear, which include overt intimidation and public discrediting of the regime's critics, and selective persecution and open harassment of opposition activists and/or supporters. This approach to political control to some degree reproduced similar mechanisms that had enabled regime survival in the late-Soviet period, and fit general trends of repressive policies in a number of contemporary authoritarian regimes. The article discusses causes and mechanisms of the politics of fear in contemporary Russia, its roots in comparative and historical contexts, and strengths and weaknesses of repressive policy in Russia from the viewpoints of the regime, the opposition, and Russian society.

O cárcere brasileiro e o perfil social do sistema prisional do Maranhão

O Brasil elevou sua taxa de aprisionamento em aproximadamente 200% nos últimos 20 anos. O presente trabalho tem dois objetivos: primeiro, o de caracterizar o sistema carcerário do Brasil por estado, a partir da análise de indicadores fornecidos pelo Ministério da Justiça e Departamento Penitenciário Nacional – DEPEN. Segundo traçar o perfil socioespacial das unidades prisionais do Estado do Maranhão com base nos dados do Tribunal de Justiça e Secretaria Estadual de Administração Penitenciária - SEAP. Em consonância com outros estudos, nossos resultados apontam para o “buraco negro” que se tornou o sistema prisional brasileiro. Já no Maranhão, o aumento progressivo da população carcerária deve-se mais a uma política de repressão e criminalização à pobreza, do que a uma política capaz de reduzir as ocorrências criminais letais ou não letais.

Iz istorii «nacional'nyh operacij» NKVD 1937—1938 gg. v Kyrgyzstane. Repressii v otnoshenii etnicheskih men'shinstv (na primere nemeckoj nacional'nosti)

To analyze the repressive policy of the ruling party and NKVD organs towards the foreigners who lived in Kyrgyzstan in 1937-1938 years. The real materials being used in this research make it possible to think over the events of that complicated period in a new way and give them certain appreciation. Therefore the main aim of the article is to bring together new materials to through the light on the nature of the mass repressions towards a number of soviet citizens as foreign nationals.

Review of Policing Life and Death: Race, Violence, and Resistance in Puerto Rico by Marisol LeBrón (University of California Press)

Using a multifaceted and transdisciplinary approach, Marisol Lebrón analyzes the development of punitive governance in Puerto Rico. Lebrón’s approach pays particular attention to how capitalist colonial settings in Puerto Rico lead to the categorization of racialized, gendered, and classed populations as problematic subjects who then become the target of state violence as public policy. Intertwined with the state and its legitimacy, the book also looks at how these populations resist repressive policies and affect social relations of power on the island.

Litigating Identity in Fascist and Post-Fascist Romania, 1940–1945

This paper examines legal mobilization and resistance to efforts through law to delineate ethnic identities during World War Two in Romania. Anti-Semitic legislation adopted under the fascist regime attempted to create and classify Jewish identity, while the end of war legislation formally reversed all discriminatory statutes and decrees and more broadly banned all inquiries into the ethnicity of Romanian citizens. Under both legal regimes, one’s identity, whether de jure or de facto, was decisive for repressive state policies that targeted Romanian citizens based on their ethnic identity. The concept and content of ethnic identity, however, were far from a clear matter. I explore in this paper how the local administrative court in the city of Timisoara (both first instance and appeal) constructed ethnic identity based on the wartime racial legislation, and how the court continued to apply this judge-made identity to the newly disfavored groups, primarily Germans, at the end of the war.

The economic consequences of decriminalizing sex work in Washington, DC

Abstract Background Under repressive policies, sex workers are at disproportionate risk for violence, HIV, and sexually transmitted infections. The decriminalization of sex work between consenting adults provides increased social and health benefits to both sex workers and society at large. Proponents of decriminalization advocate for these added human rights; this is the first research that complements these arguments with a quantifiable economic impact of such a law and a model for future calculations. This research assesses the potential economic consequences of decriminalizing sex work in the District of Columbia (DC) in three areas: (1) income tax revenue, (2) criminal justice system savings, and (3) health sector savings (violence, HIV, gonorrhea, and herpes). Methods An economic model is developed and utilized based on a literature review and records from local and federal agencies. Results The decriminalization of sex work in DC will generate $5,191.61 per sex worker and $2.49 per client annually, plus an additional $20,118.17 in total criminal justice system savings a year. Per sex worker, $4,906.39 will be gained from income tax revenue, and $285.46 will be generated through health sector savings. Per client, decriminalization will generate $0.05, $2.28, and $0.16 from HIV, gonorrhea, and herpes respectively, or $8,311.67 annually after considering the total number of clients. Estimates are reported in 2019 US dollars. Conclusions The potential economic impact of decriminalizing sex work is widespread. In DC, this legislation should be implemented to not only promote the city's human rights but also economic growth. The presented model, in conjunction with a rights-based foundation, should urgently be used by advocates, sex workers, decision-makers, and other researchers. Key messages An economic analysis of a policy to decriminalize sex work in DC demonstrates its widespread economic impact across sectors. The economic model generated in this research should be utilized in other regions to strengthen human rights-based arguments in support of these policies.

A Escola Superior de Guerra e as raízes da repressão política aplicada a militares após o golpe de 1964

O artigo analisa a lógica das políticas repressivas aplicadas a militares após o golpe de 1964. O objetivo é demonstrar que as raízes desse processo mantém uma relação direta com os conflitos políticos-ideológicos pelo controle do Estado brasileiro, ocorridos no pós-Segunda Guerra Mundial, e que as justificativas para o seu emprego foram formuladas ao longo dos debates políticos ocorridos a partir de fins dos anos 1940. Em particular, objetiva-se comprovar que, nos cursos da Escola Superior de Guerra (ESG), tendo por base seus princípios básicos e as doutrinas de segurança nacional e de guerra revolucionária, encontramos as fundamentações ideológicas, políticas e econômicas para o “saneamento” executado no interior das Forças Armadas.

The Yorùbá God of Drumming: Transatlantic Perspectives on the Wood that Talks edited by Amanda Villepastour

The Yorùbá God of Drumming: Transatlantic Perspectives on the Wood that Talks edited by Amanda Villepastour

Local Path Dependency and Scale Shift in Social Movements: The Case of the us Immigrant Rights Movement

This paper examines how social movement organizations shift scale through the case of the immigrant rights movement. This was largely a local movement for the first decades of its existence. However, in the late 1990s, repressive federal policies increased the salience of national politics for many organizations. While recognizing the importance of national politics, many organizations remained mostly engaged in local politics for nearly a decade. The aim of this paper is to examine why immigrant rights organizations stayed local for so long after the threat shifted to the federal level and why they actually shifted to the national scale when they did. It does so by focusing on the case of Los Angeles.

Službenici u Bosni i Hercegovini 1878. – 1918.

U radu se analizira austrougarska civilna uprava u Bosni i Hercegovini od 1878. do 1918. godine. Ipak, nije riječ o instituciji nego o službenicima, često strancima, koji su ondje radili. Činovnici višega i nižega reda bili su odgovorni za provođenje svih odluka koje su donijeli političari u Beču ili Sarajevu. Oni su bili mostovi koji su spajali stanovnike Bosne i Hercegovine sa Zemaljskom vladom. U članku će se razmatrati njihov položaj u zemlji te njihov rad, ali i svakodnevni život jer su oni bili nova elita koja je modernizirala Bosnu i Hercegovinu na prijelazu iz XIX. u XX. stoljeće.

Omsk Industrialist Georgy Yakovlevich Serebryakov in the Conditions of a Civil War

The publication is a biographical study dedicated to a prominent representative of the pre-revolutionary Siberian industrial and commercial bourgeoisie, tobacco manufacturer George Yakovlevich Serebryakov. The work illustrates the social adaptation of a person to the conditions of state and political disasters caused by the events of the Revolution and the Civil War in the east of Russia, using the example of the personality of this figure, very famous in the circles of commerce and power. Based on the specifics of the study the theory of social adaptation, as well as the historical and biographical method, became the methodological basis for the preparation of this article and determined its genre. A connection is made between the question presented in the study and the historiography of the problem, with an emphasis on unexplored plots in the biography of the hero of the story, which allows us to confirm the novelty of this publication. To write the article, a complex of historical sources was used, concentrated in the case of G.Ya. Serebryakov as a justice of the peace (from the funds of the Historical Archive of the Omsk Region) and criminal case 1920-1921 initiated by the Cheka in relation to our hero (from the archive of the FSB of Russia in the Omsk region). This work is addressed to researchers of social history, the Civil War in Russia, the repressive policies of the Soviet state at an early stage and genealogy-practices.