KRM 220 - Exam - Section B part 1.pdf

KRM 220 - Exam - Section B Chapters 11-13 ─ Study unit 4 Define the concept assassination ● ● ● ● Part of social reality since the emergence of communal frameworks. Used by leaders of tribes and villages to defend their statuses. ○ Featured in the rise and fall of empires (i.e Alexander the great...

KRM 220 - Exam - Section B Chapters 11-13 ─ Study unit 4 Define the concept assassination ● ● ● ● Part of social reality since the emergence of communal frameworks. Used by leaders of tribes and villages to defend their statuses. ○ Featured in the rise and fall of empires (i.e Alexander the great’s ascendance to power). Continue to play an important role in modern times Assassinations are understudied and poorly understood. ○ Political assassination is defined as the deliberate, premeditated, murder of a prominent figure for political reasons Discuss the causes of assassinations. 1. Restrictions on political competition and strong polarization and fragmentation. 2. Lack of consensual political ethos and homogenous populations. 3. Politically deprived groups which results in a decline in the legitimacy of political leadership and systems – direct attack against political leaders. 4. Domestic violence during election periods. 5. Territorial fragmentation of a country – loss of control over some parts of a country to opposing groups. Targets: 1. 2. 3. 4. Heads of state Lower- ranking political figures Legislators - acts of protection against an existing political order Vice head of states – rare but intended to promote highly specific policy changes and to prevent the vice from ascending to head of state position 5. Opposition leaders – especially in authoritarian systems, and more vulnerable during violent domestic conflicts. 2 Discuss the implications of an assassination of a political leader. “an action that directly or indirectly leads to the death of an intentionally targeted individual who is active in the political sphere, in order to promote or prevent specific policies, values, practices or norms pertaining to the collective, ● ● ● Intensify prospects of a state’s fragmentation and undermine its democratic nature. Assassination of heads of state: ○ Decline in the democratic nature of a polity ○ Increase in domestic violence ○ Instability and economic prosperity (rise of a more open economic power). Opposition leaders: ○ Increase overall unrest and domestic violence ● Legislators: ○ Public unrest (anti-government demonstrations) ○ Decline in legitimacy of the government. ○ Discuss the policy implications of political assassinations. ● ● Role of policy makers: ○ Promotion of political and social conditions (political participation) ○ Addressing political grievances ○ Stable and regulated succession mechanisms ○ Stable routines and protocols, and creation of institutions ○ Safety of political and opposition leaders. Law enforcers: ○ Most assassins previously involved in criminal activities ○ Veterans may be preferred to perform an assassination. 3 Study unit 5 Genocide according to the United Nations’ (UN) Convention Genocide means any of the following acts committed with intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnical, racial or religious group: ○ Killing members of a group; ○ Causing serious bodily harm or mental harm to members of a group; ○ Deliberately inflicting on the group’s conditions of life calculated to bring about its physical destruction in whole or in part thereof; ○ Imposing measures intended to prevent births within group; ○ Forcibly transferring children of a group to another group. The concept ‘ethnic cleansing’ and explain how it is related to genocide. ● ● Purposeful policy designed by one ethnic or religious group to remove by violent and terrorinspiring means the civilian population of another ethnic or religious group from certain geographic areas. It is carried out in the name of misguided nationalism, historic grievances and a powerful driving force for revenge. ○ Ethic cleansing has been carried out through murder, torture, arbitrary arrest, detention, extrajudicial executions, rape, etc. How genocide and ethnic cleansing are viewed by international humanitarian law. Genocide means any of the following acts committed with intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnical, racial or religious group, as such: (a) Killing members of the group; (b) Causing serious bodily or mental harm to members of the group; (c) Deliberately inflicting on the group conditions of life calculated to bring about itsphysical destruction in whole or in part; (d) Imposing measures intended to prevent births within the group;(e) Forcibly transferring children of the group to another group. ● Conspiracy, public incitement and attempt to commit genocide as well as complicity in genocide are equally punishable acts. 4 ● ● ● ● If state commits or contributes to genocide – international community only body able to intervene Convention impotent to convict governments if they did not actively perpetrate the crime. Politicide - An act of killing human groups because of “political opposition to the regime and dominant groups” ○ Multiple deaths based on politics ○ Can also entail other forms of serious physical or mental harm, deliberately aggravating surrounding living circumstances, displacement, and forced birth control Democide - An act of eliminating a group of people in general. ○ Includes politicide ○ He calls an act of indiscriminate murdering of a group of people by government for reasons other than nationality, ethnicity, race, religion or political opinions simply mass murder. 5 Exposition of Pramono’s classification of the degrees of genocide Ideological and pragmatic genocide. 1. First degree genocide a. Includes three requirements- mental element , material element and destruction of a human group. b. Also known as absolute genocide or intentional genocide c. Ethnic cleansing constitute intentional genocide i. Example Rwandan genocide. 6 2. Second degree genocide a. Mental element is missing (unintentional genocide) b. Committed typically under conditions of war (USA & Vietnam). 3. Third degree genocide a. Lacks both mental and material elements b. Occurs as a by-product of reckless or negligent policies (Brazil) c. Outcome of mass-death inducing acts and policies lacking intent & knowledge and direct genocidal acts d. Can be called genocidal mass death. ● Ideological genocide/politicides ○ Aim at achieving utopia ○ Divided into progressive and reactionary ○ Progressive – head towards a classless society in the totalitarian Marxist-Leninist tradition, most commonly, to secure results of a revolution ■ E.g Pol Pot’s Khmer Rouge regime. ○ Reactionary- strive for a “racially pure” nation-state or establishing capitalist economic regime at any cost ■ E.g killing of Jews by the Nazi empire in Germany ● Pragmatic genocide Three types: developmental, retributive and hegemonic. ○ Developmental genocide is a situation in which political leadership aims to eliminate “backward” people and their cultures. ■ When an ethnic minority or politically oppressed group seeks revenge of past injustice, the genocide is said to be retributive. ○ Retributive genocide is demonstrated by the Rwandan genocide in April-July 1994. ○ Hegemonic – seizing and maintaining political power ■ Get rid of particular group/party Overview of the factors that contribute to genocide. ● Factors leading to genocide: ○ Ethnicity, nationality, religion; ■ Ethnicity, nationality and religion may constitute a source of genocide 7 ○ Economic dependency, underdevelopment, destitution; ■ Underdevelopment and destitution are also key contributors to genocide. ○ Limited physical resources; ■ Limited resources and rapid population growth may lead to ethnic, regional or interpersonal rivalry for means of livelihood ○ Usurpation of political power, marginalisation; ■ Political power prone to marginalise other groups and strip them of their voice and means of influence ○ Quelling of insurgencies or threat of coup d’etat; ■ Genocide can act as a form of extinguishing ethnic rebellion or a threat of violent political upheaval. ● Earlier genocide; ○ Colonial and alien administrative systems; ○ Artificial national and subnational boundaries; ○ Role of colonial powers and world superpowers. ■ History also plays a key role in genocides – colonialism. The strategies that offenders of genocide use to conceal their actions 1. Deny genocide has taken place. 2. Belittle the scope of the crime if genocide has taken place. 3. Genocide can be presented as justified. 4. Banalise genocide by stigmatising it as a dispute between ethnic or religious groups or as a usual part of war. 5. When both sides commit the act- justify the former victims’ attempts of revenge.