State Violence Research Articles

Memorializing (violent) resistance to authoritarianism: challenges and tensions at Portugal’s Aljube Museum - resistance and freedom

ABSTRACT Museums play a critical role in constituting and communicating narratives about historical violence and connecting them to contemporary and future concerns. In this paper, we examine the memorialization of resistance movements, especially resistance to authoritarianism and state violence, as exemplified at the Aljube Museum – Resistance and Freedom in Lisbon, Portugal. We offer a methodological and theoretical discussion on storytelling and autoethnography in understanding the narratives of historical violence and war, focusing on representations of historical resistance movements and their uses of violence. We argue that the museum has avoided grappling with armed resistance as a method of effecting change and challenging authoritarianism by crafting a coherent and unitary narrative about oppression and non-violent resistance that downplays violent opposition to authoritarianism. After outlining some silences noted in the museum’s representations of resistance, we offer a counter-memory that discusses the role of non-state armed actors and shows multiple ways in which historical authoritarianism has been resisted and fought.

The Bhisho March and Massacre of September 1992: The ‘Leipzig Option’ and the Meanings of Mass Action in the South African Transition

ABSTRACT Amid repressive state violence and an escalating civil war in the Eastern Cape’s Border region, on 7 September 1992 more than 80,000 people marched to Bhisho, capital of the Ciskei Bantustan, to bring an end to the rule of its military ruler, Brigadier Gqozo. Widespread fears of a fatal showdown were realised when the Ciskei Defence Force opened fire, killing 29 and injuring more than 200. This critical event, understood as a most pivotal moment in South Africa’s transition to democracy, has rarely been subjected to historical scrutiny. This article casts new light on the events and politics surrounding the march, the contested meanings of mass action, the consequences of the massacre, and its subsequent narration by politicians in the wake of the tragedy. As the tragic culmination of the mass action campaign by the African National Congress (ANC), the Bhisho march became a theatre of the contested politics of mass action within the Tripartite Alliance. An initiative of local and regional alliance structures in the Border region, the march was exploited by national politicians to serve strategic agendas in the national negotiations, while the ANC’s narrative was carefully curated to legitimate its leaders and their national project.

Building decolonial nursing curricula to address disparities in Indigenous women's maternal health

Social and health inequities and inequalities are rising all over the world (Smith, 2012; McGibbon et al., 2014; Chinn and Falk‐Rafael, 2018). Nursing students should therefore be educated to understand the multifaceted factors creating health inequities and the degree to which non-biological elements can be embodied and become biological (e.g., environmental stress leading changes in health.). The need for innovative undergraduate nursing curricula reform is apparent. The lack of nursing courses highlighting the effects of colonization, environmental justice, upstream structural and social determinants of health, globalization, and state violence must be addressed. Colonization, broadly speaking, characterizes the Eurocentric project to “civilize” the rest of the world utilizing various forms of violence (McGibbon et al., 2014). The persistent and ongoing reproduction and recurrence of colonialism, enacting cycles of disenfranchisement and oppression, creates significant inequities in physical, mental, and emotional health and well-being for historically marginalized groups of people (Smith, 2012). Because gaps in nursing curricula and outdated teaching practices may support persistent inequities, scholars and students have advocated for decolonization of nursing curricula (Smith, 2012; McGibbon et al., 2014; Chinn and Falk‐Rafael, 2018). This analysis utilizes decolonial theory and postcolonial feminism to suggest pathways to decolonize nursing curricula and pedagogy through decentering the colonial knowledge structures and practices that harm Indigenous health and wellbeing.

Classrooms or Crackdowns? How Violence Affects Security Policy Preferences in Mexico

AbstractPenal policies have been the primary strategy of Latin American governments to combat crime, but preventative social policies such as youth education programmes may be more effective solutions. Penal and social policies are often treated as a trade-off by governments, who expect citizens—especially victims of violence—to be more supportive of punitive solutions. Using an original online survey experiment conducted in 2021 in Mexico, we challenge the idea of a trade-off between penal and social policies by studying how different policy solutions along the penal-welfare policy continuum affect victims’ support for increased state security presence. We unpack differences between victims of criminal perpetrators and state violence and those who are fearful of crime. Our vignette experiment reveals—in contrast to previous results—that crime victims are more supportive of state security presence when coupled with pre-emptive measures. Surprisingly, the same holds for victims of state violence and for those fearful of crime, including those residing in neighbourhoods with watch groups. Victimisation, by either crime or the state, raises demand for policies to increase employment and improve education.

Chicago Police Torture and the Limits of Human Rights Enforcement in Liberal Democracies

From 1972 to 1991, a network of Chicago Police detectives used torture to force confessions from over 100 criminal suspects. Almost all were Black men, and many were wrongly convicted, some for capital offenses. I synthesize insights from comparative research on human rights, state abuse, and police violence in democracies to explain why, for nearly two decades, liberal institutions in Chicago failed to stop the torture. I argue that the nature of state violence in this case—targeting marginalized individuals uninvolved in political activity—intensified the practical, affective, and informational obstacles that are inherent to activating liberal institutions—courts, elected officials, media, and civil society—to fulfill their roles as rights enforcers. Applying these literatures to a type of case they typically overlook—a wealthy liberal democracy—contributes to understanding why state violence persists in such states and why it tends to concentrate on marginalized populations.

Depicting truth and transition at national memorial museums in Chile and Peru

Comparative analysis of Peru’s Place of Memory, Tolerance, and Social Inclusion and Chile’s Museum of Memory and Human Rights reveals different perspectives on how to represent past truth commissions and processes of transitioning from violence in national memorial museums. Chile’s Museum of Memory and Human Rights displays a foundational truth about state violence established through the work of the country’s truth commissions. Peru’s Place of Memory, Tolerance, and Social Inclusion was conceived as a space for presenting locally situated experiences of the country’s internal war; it is also characterized by subtle efforts to distance the museum from the narrative of the Peruvian Truth and Reconciliation Commission. Owing in part to such departures, Peru’s Place of Memory, Tolerance, and Social Inclusion offers material for questioning the country’s post-transition present that has generally been absent in the human rights-focused exhibition of the Museum of Memory and Human Rights. An assessment of these contrasts, evident in the museums’ institutional histories and permanent exhibitions, potentially unsettles assumptions about the role of official memorialization in the aftermath of truth commissions.

Decriminalising terror: for a zemiology of counterterrorism

Over the past two decades, UK counterterrorism efforts have involved contentious legal and social measures aimed at preventing harm and increasing security. Critical scholars argue that these measures narrowly define security, risk, and harm, failing to recognise intervention itself as a potential threat to individuals and communities. Despite significant critical research, the legitimacy of the criminal justice model of counterterrorism persists in criminological scholarship. This article uses zemiology, the study of social harm, to critique contemporary counterterrorism’s impact. It employs UK counterterrorism as its case study, highlighting its ‘security first’ approach and its narrow definition of public interest. Three key arguments are advanced: first, counterterrorism is not an exceptional extension of criminal law but a form of hybrid governance; second, viewing this governance through a crime-centric lens obscures the harms of criminalisation and overlooks non-criminalised politically-motivated violence; third, examining counterterrorism through a social harm lens allows for a focus on social and racial structures, rather than state-defined categories of harm. The social harm perspective challenges the conceptualisation of terrorism as a crisis justifying exceptional measures, highlighting instead counterterrorism’s broader social impact. The zemiological approach highlights the role of law, not just as source of protection, but also as a means of repression and state violence, emphasising state accountability and providing a framework for identifying and preventing social harm. This perspective centres the broader implications of counterterrorism policies on social structures and racial dynamics, allowing for a more comprehensive understanding of security and harm.

Ruling the Borderlands: An Ethnography of the Pakistani State’s Everyday Practices in Dir

ABSTRACT This article analyses how and why the northwest borderland region of Pakistan has become one of the world’s most heavily militarised regions. Before 9/11, the area was a historical colonial frontier, experiencing significant militarism and violence during the Cold War. After the 9/11 attacks and the American and allied forces’ invasion and occupation of Afghanistan, however, the Pakistani military undertook a massive intervention and deployment in the region and established a chain of checkpoints aimed at filtering and disciplining the local population. Consequently, local inhabitants have endured severe treatment from the military and other coercive apparatuses. Using an ethnographic method, this article documents the daily experiences of the local people amidst pervasive militarisation. It contends that recent instances of state violence and militarisation cannot solely be attributed to 9/11 but are deeply rooted in the region’s historical treatment as a buffer zone during colonial times. In this context, Pakistan’s postcolonial state has heavily relied on its violent methods and securitised infrastructure to regulate both the region and its people.

Wound: creativity, the military and a sculpture inspired by faces, minds, and landscapes scarred by the weapons of war

ABSTRACT In reference to Alice Cree’s observation that the words ‘creativity’ and ‘military’ do not seem to ‘fit together comfortably’, the first section of this autoethnographic article critically explores my personal experiences and motivations as an artist working in close proximity to military culture. This creative practice-military relationship is examined in a variety of contexts, including designing war memorials, exhibiting in military museums, and actively participating in military, commemorative rituals. The potential risks – being co-opted by military agendas – and benefits – having a platform to use my creative voice to express the consequences of martial violence – are discussed. Focusing on one of my artworks, Wound (2022), the second section demonstrates the capability of creative practice to interrogate consequences of military (and by implication, state) violence. Wound is a bronze sculpture cast from an original First World War British Brodie helmet and a German Mauser rifle cartridge. By means of moulding, casting, and modelling processes, I reconfigured the original sources of armour and ammunition as a narrative site to metaphorically explore the ‘wounding’ and ‘healing’ of landscapes and human faces and minds. Through the allegorical interpretation of this artwork and by recounting personal experiences related to its research and creation, I discuss my creative practice as a memory artist and explain my motivations for making artworks that explore human violence and warfare. The article surveys other examples of visual art and human violence in war from classical antiquity to the present, with particular emphasis on the First World War.

Understanding right-wing populists’ anti-abortion politics in Turkey: The symbolic violence of the state

This study investigates how symbolic violence is shaping anti-abortion stances associated with legitimising right-wing populist policies. The prominent questions are as follows: What are the institutional and politico-administrative mechanisms that are impacting anti-abortion politics in terms of material and symbolic violence? How and to what extent does anti-abortion politics influence the interplay between symbolic and material state violence? The study argues that reproduction-centred policies and material and symbolic violence have intensified through anti-abortion politics in the discursive context of the social reproduction crisis in Turkey. It explores the institutional actions and the legitimation mechanisms of anti-abortion policies in relation to the penetration of right-wing populist politics after the authoritarian turn of 2010. This qualitative case study uses critical discourse analysis. It interprets the public speeches of representatives of the government and documentary data concerning the ruling party’s programmes, development plans and relevant legislation. The research provides a gendered perspective on the anti-abortion policies that anchor right-wing populism in terms of the crisis of social reproduction. It also contributes to critical state theory and pre-existing feminist scholarship on right-wing populism.

Stolen Identities, Suspended Lives. Embodied Active Imagination in Clinical Work with Victims of State Terrorism.

Each collective trauma holds its own particularities and forms of horror. When the violence is exerted by the government responsible for the care of the population it is termed state terrorism. The traumatic experience and its subsequent negation create a profound dissociation between two narratives: the explicit, which conceals the true facts, and the implicit, which remains unconscious and unbridgeable. In the gap between the two, life becomes suspended. From a Jungian perspective, this can be understood as the interruption of the process of translation and integration (terms that I will explore in some depth) from implicit sensory phenomena to an explicit representational narrative. This profoundly affects the development of the ego-self axis. In turn, it creates a special challenge for analytic technique that calls for new ways of listening to, and meeting the patient in, that non-verbal, unrepresented territory. Drawing upon clinical material, an embodied perspective of Jungian clinical work is offered to show how the inclusion of the body of patient and analyst enables access to the non-represented, though implicitly encoded, traumatic affective memories stored in the somatic unconscious.

State of exception, neoliberalism, and militarization of public security in Brazil

Brazil has historically employed a militarized strategy for public security, using violence as a means of social control over subordinate groups and repressing social and labor movements. The involvement of military personnel and state police in justice administration and politics reflects a distortion within the Brazilian state, which the 1988 Federal Constitution did not alleviate. Instead, since re-democratization, militarization has shifted from being an extraordinary measure to becoming the norm, representing an expansion of the state of exception. This trend has culminated in the military’s return to the political scene and the presidency. This article examines the complex relationship between the militarization of public security and the recent trend of radicalization in far-right political positions. The analysis centers on the theoretical debate regarding the relationship between a state of exception and neoliberalism. The research hypothesis posits a convergence between the militarization of politics, a state of exception, and state violence, which collectively impose limits on the rights enshrined in the country’s legal system.

Dossiê Terror e intimidade: perspectivas etnográficas e desafios conceituais

The Special Issue proposed here gathers five articles that, stemming from ethnographic research, propose a reflection on the radical relationship between terrorist practices and experiences of intimacy. The Special Issue focuses on the ways in which these two dimensions are linked, suggesting that terrorist practices involve technologies that directly affect experiences considered intimate, concerning bodies, homes, routines, and affections. We argue, with the present proposal, that this is also why the effects of such practices reverberate far beyond the time and place in which they occur. Starting from ethnographic contexts involving routines of state violence in the favelas of Rio de Janeiro; an episode of sexual violence in an agrarian conflict in Paraíba; experiences of forced displacement and exile related to the Colombian conflict; and the armed conflict in Brazil from its urban peripheries; we also want to investigate the political effects of the presence of terror in the midst of everyday life and intimate networks of relationships.

Defend the Nation, Crush the People: Desertion and Civil War in Greek Macedonia, 1916–17

ABSTRACT The creation of compact nation-states out of multi-ethnic empires in the Balkans was accompanied by bouts of ethnic cleansing. Critical histories of the emergence of the modern Balkan states have consequently tended to focus on ethnic violence. However, state violence often targeted the ‘dominant’ ethnic group as well, as its centralizing and modernizing agenda put it at loggerheads with traditional sources power and autonomy. Conscription was perhaps the most important dimension of state-building, as it sought to buttress the state’s military machine, all while demanding significant coercive power to register, draft, and discipline young men. Conscription thus came up against intense popular resistance, especially in the decade of total war of the 1910s. In Greece, this spiralled into episodes of virtual civil war. This article focuses on resistance to the draft during the first recruitment drive of the National Defence Government in Greek Macedonia, with special emphasis on the Chalkidiki revolt of 1916–17. It uses this case study to explore broader trends about the formation of the modern Balkan nation-states.

The Case of the DOXA Four: A Year in the School of Political Prisoners

AbstractThis paper explores media strategies used by the four former editors of the Russian independent student‐run journal DOXA during their year of pre‐trial domestic confinement between April 2021 and April 2022. This high‐profile case ended only two months after the beginning of Russia’s full‐scale war in Ukraine and the intensification of repressions against the internal political opposition. It also concludes a decade‐long phase in the conflict between the Russian state and its increasingly politicized youth. By maintaining a public presence during their house arrest despite the official prohibition, the DOXA Four entered into a media competition with police: Both groups were trying to reach an audience of Russian youth and shape the public image of oppositional students. While the state strove to intimidate, infantilize, and isolate the young people, the DOXA editors promoted collectivist forms of feeling and imagination to encourage political mobilization. In doing so, they aimed to break with the prevailing culture of ironic aestheticization of state violence and to re‐articulate political aesthetics for its generation.

Strategic state violence and migration in conflict

AbstractGovernments routinely wage civil conflicts in ways that disrupt civilians' lives and livelihoods, creating harmful externalities like internal displacement. Both fighting and displacement hinder economic activity, jeopardizing popular support for governments and reducing the future gains of governance. How do states fight when using force induces migration and thus risks popular discontent? I model a conflict where government efforts to control territory spur displacement, creating economic disruption that can spark tension between displaced civilians and government supporters. The risk of losing popular support leads the government to modify its tactics. While the government could mitigate the disruptive consequences of displacement by fighting less, I find another, more troubling, strategy. Governments may engage in preemptive violence to prevent migration. Moreover, economic downturns exacerbate migration incentives and, I find, can also increase violence against civilians. Governments anticipating displacement fight more intense conflicts today to see relatively less migration in the future.

Linguistic rights, translation, and State-sponsored violence in Mexican prisons

This article examines linguistic violence experienced by incarcerated indigenous-language speaking women in Mexico. Drawing from a survey of incarcerated individuals, we demonstrate that, despite constitutional guarantees for language access, non-Spanish speakers often lack access to translation services. This deprivation is a form of linguistic violence. Furthermore, we find that such linguistic violence correlates with predatory behavior from authorities—specifically physical and sexual violence. This predatory behavior is reported more frequently by female indigenous-language speakers than any other group. We propose two reasons why this might be the case: limited Spanish proficiency traps these women in prolonged legal limbo, increasing their interactions with potentially abusive authorities, and the language barrier fosters isolation, hindering their ability to report abuses. This phenomenon illustrates how linguistic violence can lead to physical violence.

COVID-19 pandemic and competitive authoritarian regimes: Human rights and democracy in the Philippines and Nicaragua

How do competitive authoritarian regimes in the Global South respond to the COVID-19 pandemic? How do these policy responses facilitate human rights deterioration in societies that are already facing democratic regression during the pre-pandemic period? Examining evidence from the Philippines and Nicaragua during the COVID-19 pandemic, this article demonstrates that competitive authoritarian regimes have reinforced the deterioration of democratic processes and disregard for their human rights commitments amidst the global pandemic. First, such regimes weaponize the legal system to consolidate the powers of the chief executive and their allies. Second, such regimes systematically disregard transparency and accountability when executing state leaders’ public actions and responsibilities. Third, such regimes increasingly empower military personnel and intensify state violence at the expense of science-based approaches to crisis policies, thereby embracing militarism as an overarching orientation.

Postgenocide and decolonizing approaches to peace education in the Anthropocene

ABSTRACT This article addresses the intersection of genocide studies, climate change, and peace education. It does so by examining the state of these connections, and proposes a fresh concept for considering the entanglements of contemporary violence in the Anthropocene. A notion of postgenocide sees the elements of geopolitical order, warlordism, climate change and resource exploitation. Postgenocide is an approach to mass violence occurring beyond the usual framing of state violence and intent. It aims to enrich the ongoing decolonization of peace education, as well as empower peace educators in conveying these often-complex relations in a violence-prone and climate changing world. Thinking outside of legal constraints of genocide or emotive fuzziness of climate change, educators can broaden their appeals and promote decolonized thinking of how violence works, its agents, and who it impacts in the Anthropocene. Postgenocide offers a transformative research and praxis link frame beyond globalizing Holocaust education as a stand-in for human rights education. Peace educators can leverage global concepts like postgenocide to cut through and examine the complexity of such entanglements.

Dangerous remembering in volatile spaces: Activist memory work in the Iranian context

This article studies the interrelations of memory work and activism in the Iranian context by focusing on the way remembering victims of state violence informs political activism. Due to constant repression, the recurrence of state violence and the criminalisation of oppositional activities and non-conforming lifestyles, the Iranian context is saturated with contentious memories that cannot be brought into public space. Oppositional memory work, especially regarding the victims of direct state violence, has thus become dangerous, counts as defiance and requires alternative spaces for taking shape. This article maps out and explains how activist memory work in this context entails carving out activist memoryscapes and intertwines personal suffering with acts of remembering the other and how memory is used as a resource in broader modes of oppositional politics, justice-seeking and endeavours towards social change. Examples of activist memory work in the Woman, Life, Freedom protests, a short documentary film and a commemorative exhibition are analysed in the article to showcase the different mnemonic dynamics at stake and to highlight the importance of mediation and cultural forms in the formation of activist memory work.