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Effective Mask for Terror: Democracy, Death Squads, and Northern Ireland

NCJ Number
215277
Journal
Crime, Law and Social Change Volume: 44 Issue: 2 Dated: 2005 Pages: 181-203
Author(s)
Bill Rolston
Date Published
2005
Length
23 pages
Annotation
Examining specifically Northern Ireland, this article sought to examine the circumstances in which death squads and democracy can coexist.
Abstract
In Northern Ireland, as in a number of other places of conflict, democracy and death squads coexisted. Moreover, the relative strength of the democracy was in part reason for the emergence of death squads. In the course of a 30-year war against republican insurgency, the state derived a complex range of police, army, and intelligence units to gather intelligence, run agents, and engage in direct action, including assassination of insurgents. The existence of death squads or paramilitary groups involved in state sponsored or state-tolerated terror shows that the state can also be the terrorist. Even though death squads most commonly exist in non-democratic states, death squads and democracy are shown to also coexist, such as in Northern Ireland. In order to better understand why some democratic states turn to terror despite a strong society sector, this paper empirically analyzed Northern Ireland where state terror has occurred. References