2013: The Year Of Social Protest And Repression In Colombia (Pt 2)
2013: The Year Of Social Protest And Repression In Colombia (Pt 2)
posted by Diego Melo
Dec 13, 2013
Is there a formula to describe why and how governments repress people who take to the streets to protest? Can we make sense of why tanks, anti-riots police and chemical weapons are often and increasingly used to control populations who speak truth to power?
Indeed, there is one, and it involves a crucial component: legitimacy—the popular acceptance of an authority, whether a governing law or a regime. In Colombia, the government’s legitimacy was weak in 2013, which gave rise to an unprecedented number of protests motivated by a heterogeneous set of reasons. Despite mobilizing against different issues, most shared the common challenge of governmental repression.
Constitutional lawyers claim there is an inversely proportional relationship between legitimacy and coercion. Broadly, legitimacy means popular approval while coercion usually means military and police repression. Inversely proportional, on the other hand, means that when one factor decreases the other one increases and vice versa.
Concretely, if those most affected by a policy perceive such policy to be fair, legitimacy is high. In that case there is no need for coercion. When the policy is perceived as unjust, however, states use coercion to fill in the void that the lack of legitimacy leaves behind. By the very principles upon which nation-states are founded, physical force will be used against the population to repress dissidence and legitimize the current rulers’ decisions.
The formula: repression will be high when policies are unpopular.
More:
http://colombiareports.co/2013-year-social-protest-repression-colombia-pt-1-2/