When Do Governments Resort to Election Violence?

Abstract

When are governments most likely to use election violence, and what factors can mitigate government incentives to resort to violence? How do the dynamics of election violence differ in the pre-and post-election periods? Our central argument is that an incumbent's fear of losing power as the result of an election, as well as institutionalized constraints on the incumbent's decisionmaking powers, are pivotal in her decision to use election violence. While it may seem obvious to suggest that incumbents use election violence in an effort to fend off threats to their power, it is not obvious how to gauge these threats, and a central purpose of our research is to identify sources of information about the incumbent's popularity that can help predict the likelihood of election violence. The observable implications of our argument are tested using newly available cross-national evidence on elections, government use of pre-and post-election violence, and post-election protests from 1981 to 2004.2 When Do Governments Resort to Election Violence? 1 On paper, Azerbaijan is a multiparty democracy, and has held periodic multi-party presidential and parliamentary elections since the country regained independence in 1991. Despite the nominal existence of democratic institutions, tactics of electoral manipulation used by the government include overt election fraud, violence, and intimidation. Opposition supporters, opposition candidates, and journalists risk torture, arbitrary arrest, and political imprisonment-all strategies the government uses to "win" elections. 2 For example, in the run up to the 2005 parliamentary elections in Azerbaijan, facing the possibility that the "colour revolutions" of Georgia and Ukraine would spread, the government arrested journalists and attempted to prevent the opposition from campaigning.The police detained over a thousand activists before the election, and jailed hundreds without cause. 3 After the election, amid accusations of fraud, the government announced that the ruling party won an overwhelming majority, 4 Opposition supporters began to protest the results, assembling more than 7,000 people. Riot police and military forces disbursed the protesters using clubs and water cannons, and several opposition politicians were beaten. 5 In the end, despite international and domestic backlash, the incumbent remained in power. 6 Government-sponsored election violence-events in which incumbent leaders and ruling party agents employ or threaten violence against the political opposition or potential voters before, during, or after elections-is common. 4(including threats of violence such as harassment), we present and test a theory of when an incumbent government is likely to use election violence prior to or after an election. Our central argument is that an incumbent's fear of losing power as the result of an election, as well as institutionalized constraints on the incumbent's decision-making powers, are pivotal in her decision to use election violence. While it may seem obvious t...

Electoral violence prevention: what works?

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“…52 These granular data are well-suited to measuring changes in the level of electoral violence since they are continuous counts of the number of reported events, and information is not lost via aggregation or the introduction of thresholds. In the CREV dataset, states at risk of electoral violence include only those whose "Polity" score from the Polity IV dataset has at some point during the period in question fallen below 10,53 indicating that democracy is not fully consolidated in that state. The CREV data divide electoral violence events into "threats and coercion", where "threats, incitement and coercion falling short of actual bodily harm" and "physical violence" where "violence taking the form of assaults and violent physical confrontations".…”

Electoral Institutions and Electoral Violence in Sub-Saharan Africa

“…7 Cf. Arriola and Johnson (2012) on power-sharing in post-conflict societies; Daxecker (2012) on electoral monitoring; and Hafner-Burton, Hyde and Jablonski (2013) on the effect of electoral violence on leadership tenure.…”

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