Violent Origins of Authoritarian Variation: Rebellion Type and Regime Type in Cold War Southeast Asia

2018 ◽  
Vol 55 (1) ◽  
pp. 21-40 ◽  
Author(s):  
Dan Slater
Keyword(s):  
Cold War ◽  
Southeast Asia ◽  
The State ◽  
Regime Type ◽  
Critical Question ◽  
Authoritarian Rule ◽  
Historical Case ◽  
Different Types ◽  
The Cold War ◽  
The Military

AbstractDictatorships are every bit as institutionally diverse as democracies, but where does this variation come from? This article argues that different types of internal rebellion influence the emergence of different types of authoritarian regimes. The critical question is whether rebel forces primarily seek to seize state power or to escape it. Regional rebellions seeking toescapethe state raise the probability of a military-dominated authoritarian regime, since they are especially likely to unify the military while heightening friction between civilian and military elites. Leftist rebellions seeking toseizethe state are more likely to give rise to civilian-dominated dictatorships by inspiring ‘joint projects’ in which military elites willingly support party-led authoritarian rule. Historical case studies of Burma, Indonesia, Malaysia and Vietnam illustrate the theory, elaborating how different types of violent conflict helped produce different types of dictatorships across the breadth of mainland and island Southeast Asia during the Cold War era.

Algeria: Military Past as Prologue

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Paul E. Lenze, Jr.
Keyword(s):  
National Identity ◽  
Cold War ◽  
Middle Eastern ◽  
The State ◽  
Foreseeable Future ◽  
Military Rule ◽  
Military Involvement ◽  
History Of ◽  
The Cold War ◽  
The Military

Algeria is a state in the Maghreb that has been dominated by military rule for the majority of its existence. The National People’s Army (ANP) used nationalism to justify its intervention into politics while ensuring that withdrawal would occur only if national identity were protected. Algeria, similar to other Middle Eastern states, underwent historical trajectories influenced by colonialism, the Cold War, and post-9/11 politics; briefly experimented with democracy; and as a result, experienced the military as the dominant institution in the state. The resignation of Algerian President Abdelaziz Bouteflika after 20 years of rule in April 2019, following six weeks of popular protest, has raised questions as to whether democratization is possible. Algeria’s history of military involvement in politics, the strength of the military as an institution, and its cooperative links with domestic elites and international actors portend the endurance of authoritarianism for the foreseeable future.

Cold War Monks

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Eugene Ford
Keyword(s):  
Cold War ◽  
Southeast Asia ◽  
National Security ◽  
Oral History ◽  
The State ◽  
Key Informants ◽  
Communist Revolution ◽  
The Cold War ◽  
Oral History Interviews ◽  
The U.S

How did the U.S. government make use of a “Buddhist policy” in Southeast Asia during the Cold War despite the American principle that the state should not meddle with religion? To answer this question, this book's author delved deep into an unprecedented range of U.S. and Thai sources and conducted numerous oral history interviews with key informants. The author uncovers a riveting story filled with U.S. national security officials, diplomats, and scholars seeking to understand and build relationships within the Buddhist monasteries of Southeast Asia. This fascinating narrative provides a new look at how the Buddhist leaderships of Thailand and its neighbors became enmeshed in Cold War politics and in the U.S. government's clandestine efforts to use a predominant religion of Southeast Asia as an instrument of national stability to counter communist revolution.

Conscientious Objection and the State

2017 ◽  
Vol 44 (4) ◽  
pp. 666-687
Author(s):  
Adi Livny
Keyword(s):  
Cold War ◽  
Federal Republic ◽  
Social Roles ◽  
Conscientious Objection ◽  
The State ◽  
Federal Republic Of Germany ◽  
The Cold War ◽  
The Military

The abundant writing on conscientious objection (CO) had kept one significant actor rather neglected—the state. Relatively unexplored is the question of how democracies shape their policies toward CO. This article wishes to address this gap, focusing in particular on states that maintain conscription, and examining what accounts for their different responses to CO. Based on the Israeli case study, while drawing on comparative insights from The Federal Republic of Germany and Switzerland during the Cold War, I argue that states’ treatment of CO depends primarily on the military’s status and the type of roles assigned to conscription. States in which these roles are mainly functional, and the military does not enjoy, accordingly, a high symbolic status will be more inclined to formally recognize CO than states in which the military fulfills civilian–social roles and enjoys a high symbolic status. Lack of recognition, however, does not necessarily imply harshness; states of the latter sort might nonetheless accommodate CO through unofficial means. Thus, when discussing the policy towards CO a distinction is ought to be made between accommodation and recognition.

scholarly journals Os Militares e a Guerra Fria no Brasil

Diálogos ◽  
2018 ◽  
Vol 22 (1) ◽  
pp. 176
Author(s):  
Paulo Ribeiro Rodrigues da Cunha
Keyword(s):  
Cold War ◽  
Present Article ◽  
Armed Forces ◽  
The State ◽  
Military Officers ◽  
Democratic State ◽  
The Cold War ◽  
The Military

O presente artigo procura resgatar um dos períodos mais intensos e menos estudados da Guerra Fria no Brasil, quando duas correntes militares antípodas política e ideológicas atuaram na perspectiva de influenciar através de suas entidades de classe um projeto de nação. Entretanto, essa reflexão tem por foco, os militares nacionalistas e de esquerda, oficiais e praças das forças armadas cuja intervenção foi bem sucedida ao final, com a vitória da Tese do Monopólio Estatal do Petróleo e não intervenção brasileira no conflito coreano, embora ao custo de uma repressão sobre centenas de militares, muitos deles presos e torturados e até hoje não anistiados, demonstrando em última instância, a fragilidade da democracia e do Estado Democrático e de Direito no Brasil. Abstract The Military and the Cold War in Brazil The present article seeks to recover one of the most intense and least studied period of the Cold War in Brazil, when two military antipodal political and ideological currents acted in the perspective of influencing through its class entities a nation project. However, this reflection is focused on the nationalist and leftist military, officers and squares of the armed forces whose intervention was successful in the end, with the victory of the Thesis of the State Petroleum Monopoly and not Brazilian intervention in the Korean conflict, although at cost of a crackdown on hundreds of soldiers, many of them imprisoned and tortured and still unamused, demonstrating in the last instance the fragility of democracy and the Democratic State and Law in Brazil. Resumen Los Militares y la Guerra Fría en Brasil El presente artículo busca rescatar uno del período más intensos y menos estudiados de la Guerra Fría en Brasil, cuando dos corrientes militares antípodas políticas e ideológicas actuaron en la perspectiva de influenciar a través de sus entidades de clase un proyecto de nación. Sin embargo, esta reflexión tiene por foco, los militares nacionalistas y de izquierda, oficiales y plazas de las fuerzas armadas cuya intervención fue exitosa al final, con la victoria de la Tesis del Monopolio Estatal del Petróleo y no intervención brasileña en el conflicto coreano, aunque al costo de una represión sobre cientos de militares, muchos de ellos presos y torturados y hasta hoy no aniquilados, demostrando en última instancia, la fragilidad de la democracia y del Estado Democrático y de Derecho en Brasil.

scholarly journals Masa-Depan Cerah, Bahaya Menunggu: Negara-Bangsa Baru dan Kekerasan Massal di Asia Tenggara

2017 ◽  
Vol 11 (2) ◽  
pp. 109
Author(s):  
Henk Schulte Nordholt
Keyword(s):  
Economic Growth ◽  
Cold War ◽  
Southeast Asia ◽  
Political Systems ◽  
Authoritarian Rule ◽  
Mass Violence ◽  
Middle Classes ◽  
Nation States ◽  
The Cold War ◽  
The Impact

In this article the impact of the Cold War in Southeast Asia is evaluated. The region was turned into the hottest battlefields of this conflict which costed the lives of about seven million people. The Cold War also terminated fragile attempts to turn newly independent nation-states into democracies. Instead every country in Southeast Asia experienced authoritarian rule by either capitalist of socialist regimes. In the capitalist countries middle classes emerged which profited from economic growth under authoritarian rule. Since democracy was associated with instability and mass violence and economic growth with authoritarian rule, middle classes were very late in supporting new attempts to democratize their political systems.

State Security, Information, and Repression: A Comparison of Communist Bulgaria and Ba'thist Iraq

2014 ◽  
Vol 16 (2) ◽  
pp. 3-31 ◽  
Author(s):  
Martin K. Dimitrov ◽  
Joseph Sassoon
Keyword(s):  
Cold War ◽  
Middle East ◽  
Eastern Europe ◽  
The State ◽  
Authoritarian Rule ◽  
Security Forces ◽  
State Security ◽  
Strong State ◽  
Security Information ◽  
The Cold War

The centrality of a strong state security apparatus to the maintenance of authoritarian rule via the threat or use of repression has been highlighted in classic studies of single-party regimes as well as in more recent analyses of authoritarian resilience in Eastern Europe and the Middle East. This article focuses on two other fundamental questions related to the operation of state security forces in single-party autocracies during the Cold War. First, how did the state security agencies of East Germany and Saddam Hussein's Iraq collect information? Second, how was this information used? The article underscores the importance of the recruitment of informants for the state security apparatus, and it also reveals how information affects decisions about the deployment of repression. These single-party autocracies continuously extracted information by recruiting ordinary citizens to participate (voluntarily or involuntarily) as informants in the state security networks and used the information gathered to mete out repression.

Reluctant Cold Warriors

2019 ◽  
Author(s):  
Vladimir Kontorovich
Keyword(s):  
Cold War ◽  
National Security ◽  
Soviet Economy ◽  
Accurate Analysis ◽  
Policy Makers ◽  
Large Numbers ◽  
The Us ◽  
Comprehensive Survey ◽  
The Cold War ◽  
The Military

The academic study of the Soviet economy in the US was created to help fight the Cold War, part of a broader mobilization of the social sciences for national security needs. The Soviet strategic challenge rested on the ability of its economy to produce large numbers of sophisticated weapons. The military sector was the dominant part of the economy, and the most successful one. However, a comprehensive survey of scholarship on the Soviet economy from 1948-1991 shows that it paid little attention to the military sector, compared to other less important parts of the economy. Soviet secrecy does not explain this pattern of neglect. Western scholars developed strained civilian interpretations for several aspects of the economy which the Soviets themselves acknowledged to have military significance. A close reading of the economic literature, combined with insights from other disciplines, suggest three complementary explanations for civilianization of the Soviet economy. Soviet studies was a peripheral field in economics, and its practitioners sought recognition by pursuing the agenda of the mainstream discipline, however ill-fitting their subject. The Soviet economy was supposed to be about socialism, and the military sector appeared to be unrelated to that. By stressing the militarization, one risked being viewed as a Cold War monger. The conflict identified in this book between the incentives of academia and the demands of policy makers (to say nothing of accurate analysis) has broad relevance for national security uses of social science.

Prologue

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Peter D. McDonald
Keyword(s):  
Cold War ◽  
Cultural Diversity ◽  
The State ◽  
The Political ◽  
Cultural Expression ◽  
Intangible Heritage ◽  
History Of ◽  
Definition Of ◽  
The Cold War ◽  
Print Literacy

The section introduces Part II, which spans the period 1946 to 2014, by tracing the history of the debates about culture within UNESCO from 1947 to 2009. It considers the central part print literacy played in the early decades, and the gradual emergence of what came to be called ‘intangible heritage’; the political divisions of the Cold War that had a bearing not just on questions of the state and its role as a guardian of culture but on the idea of cultural expression as a commodity; the slow shift away from an exclusively intellectualist definition of culture to a more broadly anthropological one; and the realpolitik surrounding the debates about cultural diversity since the 1990s. The section concludes by showing how at the turn of the new millennium UNESCO caught up with the radical ways in which Tagore and Joyce thought about linguistic and cultural diversity.

Vietnamese Historical Writing

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Patricia Pelley
Keyword(s):  
Cold War ◽  
East Asian ◽  
History Writing ◽  
Southern State ◽  
The Past ◽  
South Vietnam ◽  
Political Function ◽  
Different Types ◽  
The Cold War ◽  
North Vietnam

This chapter demonstrates how the process of decolonization and the ensuing separation of Vietnam into a northern and southern state as part of the Cold War in Asia led to different types of history-writing. In both Vietnamese regimes, the writing of history had to serve the state, and in both countries historians emphasized its political function. Whereas North Vietnam located itself in an East Asian and Marxist context, historians of South Vietnam positioned it within a Southeast Asian setting and took a determinedly anti-communist position. After 1986—over a decade after reunification—with past tensions now relaxed, the past could be revaluated more openly under a reformist Vietnamese government that now also permitted much greater interaction with foreign historians.

A Special Intermittence and Continuity in Local History: The Chinese Diaspora and Their Hometown in Battlefield Quemoy during 1949-1960s

2011 ◽  
Vol 7 (2) ◽  
pp. 169-186 ◽  
Author(s):  
Chiang Bo-wei
Keyword(s):  
Cold War ◽  
Local History ◽  
The State ◽  
Chinese Diaspora ◽  
Overseas Chinese ◽  
Military Rule ◽  
Close Attention ◽  
Community Power ◽  
The Military ◽  
The Relationship

Abstract From 1949, Quemoy became the battlefront between the warring Nationalists and Communists as well as the frontline between Cold War nations. Under military rule, social and ideological control suppressed the community power of traditional clans and severed their connection with fellow countrymen living abroad. For 43 long years up until 1992, Quemoy was transformed from an open hometown of the Chinese diaspora into a closed battlefield and forbidden zone. During the war period, most of the Quemoy diasporic Chinese paid close attention to the state of their hometown including the security of their family members and property. In the early 1950s, they tried to keep themselves informed of the situation in Quemoy through any available medium and build up a new channel of remittances. Furthermore, as formal visits of the overseas Chinese were an important symbol of legitimacy for the KMT, Quemoy emigrants had been invited by the military authority to visit their hometown since 1950. This was in fact the only channel for the Chinese diaspora to go home. Using official files, newspapers and records of oral histories, this article analyzes the relationship between the Chinese diaspora and the battlefield, Quemoy, and takes a look at the interactions between family and clan members of the Chinese diaspora during 1949-1960s. It is a discussion of a special intermittence and continuity of local history.

Sign in / Sign up

Export Citation Format

Share Document