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The military coup of March 1976 in Argentina ruptured the prevailing institutional order, with the greater part of its repressive strategy built on clandestine practices and tactics (death, torture and disappearance) that sowed fear across large swathes of Argentine society. Simultaneously, the terrorist state established a parallel, de facto legal order through which it endeavoured to legitimise its actions. Among other social forces, the judicial branch played a pivotal role in this project of legitimisation. While conscious of the fact that many of those inside the justice system were also targets of oppression, I would like to argue that the dictatorship‘s approach was not to establish a new judicial authority but, rather, to build upon the existing institutional structure, remodelling it to suit its own interests and objectives. Based on an analysis of the criminal and administrative proceedings that together were known as the Case of the judicial morgue, this article aims to examine the ways in which the bodies of the detained-disappeared that entered the morgue during the dictatorship were handled, as well as the rationales and practices of the doctors and other employees who played a part in this process. Finally, it aims to reflect upon the traces left by judicial and administrative bureaucratic structures in relation to the crimes committed by the dictatorship, and on the legal strategies adopted by lawyers and the families of the victims.
In the dying light of the nineteenth century, the world came to know and fear terrorism. This was a time of progress and dread, in which breakthroughs in communications and weapons were made, political reforms were implemented and waves of immigration bolstered the populations of ever-expanding cities. This era also simmered with political rage and social inequalities, which drove nationalists, nihilists, anarchists and republicans to dynamite cities and discharge pistols into the bodies of presidents, police chiefs and emperors. This wave of terrorism was seized upon by an outrage-hungry press that peddled hysteria, conspiracy theories and fake news in response, convincing many readers that they were living through the end of days. Against the backdrop of this world of fear and disorder, The Rise of Devils chronicles the journeys of the people who evoked this panic and created modern terrorism – revolutionary philosophers, cult leaders, criminals and charlatans, as well as the paranoid police chiefs and unscrupulous spies who tried to thwart them. In doing so, this book explains how radicals once thought just in their causes became, as Pope Pius IX denounced them, little more than ‘devils risen up from hell’.
This study interprets and interrelates the major political, economic and security developments in Europe – including transatlantic relations – from the end of World War II up until the present time, and looks ahead to how the continent may evolve politically in the future. It weaves all the different strands of European events together into a single picture that gives the reader a deep understanding of the continent, and of its current and future challenges. The first chapters trace European reconstruction and political, economic and security developments – both in the East and in the West – leading up to the dissolution of the Soviet Union in 1991. Later chapters examine the European Union's reform efforts, enlargement, movement to a single currency and emerging security role; the political and economic changes in central and Eastern Europe, including Russia; the break up of Yugoslavia and the wars that ensued; and the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation (NATO)'s enlargement and search for a new mission. Final chapters deal with forces affecting Europe's future, such as terrorism, nationalism, religion, demographic trends and globalisation.
This book presents a history of propaganda from the ancient world to the present day. The ancient Greeks, best remembered for their enduring contributions to civilization, recognized that propaganda was an essential ingredient of an organized and effective society. The book begins with the suggestion that it is the intention behind propaganda that needs scrutiny, not just the propaganda itself. It is intention that has caused and prolonged wars. Increased use of persuasive techniques intended to benefit humanity as a whole requires some fundamental rethinking about how people popularly regard propaganda. Differences of opinion between people and nations are inevitable, but they can only remain a healthy aspect of civilized society if violence, war and terrorism are avoided. Since 9/11, people need peace propagandists, not war propagandists: people whose job it is to increase communication, understanding and dialogue between different peoples with different perspectives. A gradual process of explanation can only generate greater trust, and therefore a greater willingness to understand our perspective. And if this dialogue is mutual, greater empathy and consensus will emerge. The historical function of propaganda has been to fuel that fear, hypocrisy and ignorance, and it has earned itself a bad reputation for so doing. But propaganda has the potential to serve a constructive, civilized and peaceful purpose if that is the intention behind conducting it.
Britain is often revered for its extensive experience of waging ‘small wars’. Its long imperial history is littered with high profile counter-insurgency campaigns, thus marking it out as the world's most seasoned practitioners of this type of warfare. Britain's ‘small wars’ ranged from fighting Communist insurgents in the bamboo-laden Malayan jungle, marauding Mau Mau gangs in Kenyan game reserves, Irish republican terrorists in the back alleys and rural hamlets of Northern Ireland, and Taliban fighters in Afghanistan's Helmand province. This is the first book to detail the tactical and operational dynamics of Britain's small wars, arguing that the military's use of force was more heavily constrained by wider strategic and political considerations than previously admitted. Outlining the civil-military strategy followed by the British in Palestine, Malaya, Kenya, Cyprus, Aden, Northern Ireland, Iraq and Afghanistan, Defending the Realm argues that Britain's small wars have been shaped by a relative decline in British power, amidst dramatic fluctuations in the international system, just as much as the actions of military commanders and civilian officials ‘on the spot’ or those formulating government policy in London. Written from a theoretically-informed perspective, grounded in rich archival sources, oral testimonies and a reappraisal of the literature on counter-insurgency and counter-terrorism, Defending the Realm is the definitive account of the politics of Britain's small wars. It will be of interest to political scientists and historians, as well as scholars, students, soldiers and politicians who wish to gain a more critically informed perspective of the political trappings of war.
This book considers the shifting boundaries of royal space as the flexible arena in which petitioning took place. It begins with the creation of a myth of accessibility and 'ordinariness' around the monarchy of George III in the 1780s. Historiographical interest in the monarchy is limited in its conceptual scope. Most studies focus on the enduring popularity and survival of the Crown, either with reference to its mythologies and 'invented traditions' or to the institutional conservatism of plebeian English patriotism. Petitioning is seen as increasingly inclusive and popular, facilitated by a developing public sphere and the mass platform, and associated with collectivity rather than individuality. Petitions of right are often overlooked and little distinction is noted between petitions to Parliament and petitions to the Crown. Historiographical approaches to troublesome subjects like Margaret Nicholson commonly accommodate eighteenth-century agendas of unquestioning madness, or else deploy twentieth-century terminologies like 'terrorism'. Franklin L. Ford has charted the classical roots of 'legitimate' tyrannicide from the ancient Greeks to the Red Army Faction, but has difficulty in accommodating the apparent ineptitude of English would-be assassins like Nicholson. Frank Prochaska's detailed account of the role of the Crown in welfare provision conjures unbroken lines of charitable royal largesse from George III to Elizabeth II. The book contains apocryphal tales of kindness to the poor from one monarch or another and is generally disapproving of contemporary radical critiques of royal idleness and narcissism.
anarchism’s merits, ahead of the inevitable revolution. As part of his commitment to this long-term strategy, Reclus eventually went back on his initial endorsement of Ravachol and turned to thoughts not unlike those of Kropotkin and Malatesta, seeing terrorism as a diversion on the road to anarchist utopia. As Reclus told Grave in 1895, Ravachol and Henry were gone, the hot-heads had proved dangerous to the cause and ‘times had changed’. Hit by a train whilst walking over a level crossing in London not long after Les Temps
Czolgosz attended made Goldman an accessory to his crime. In the end, even this notion faded away when it became clear that Czolgosz was a demented loner who, far from being instructed by Goldman, may have carried out the shooting partly as a means of grabbing her attention – a sad example of the hot-head archetype. 2 Kropotkin and Malatesta saw him this way. Bluntly, they told the New York Times that Czolgosz was ‘a common murderer’ whose terrorism would bring ‘more trouble to the innocent than to the guilty’. Most
their number tossed ‘three bombs into the midst of a squad of officers’. The Labor Enquirer insisted that the ‘bomb-throwing was the work of a single individual’, motivated by the bitter reality that ‘conservative elements have deserted the workingmen of this country’. The significance of murderous terrorism blending with the workers’ struggle at the Haymarket was recognised internationally, prompting the same politically divided responses to the bombing in Europe as there were in the United States. Le Cri du
the idea of entering a ‘war for the streets’ rehash of 1848, Orsini favoured using a simple act of terrorism to set Italy and, perhaps, all of Europe free from the conservative consensus forged in 1815. 5 Orsini’s plan was dramatic and ambitious, defined by the kind of fantastical dice rolling that is common to many terrorist plots. At the heart of his plan were two conclusions about Napoleon: firstly, that, as the head of what Orsini dubbed Europe’s premier ‘government based upon despotism and treason’, the