Grist to the mill of subversion: strikes and coups in counterinsurgencies

Abstract

Why are acts of organized resistance associated with coups? Inspired by the Arab Spring, a large literature suggests that militaries confronted with civil resistance tend to side with protesters and oust their government. In the historically most coup-prone environment of insurgencies, however, alliances between the military and protesters are implausible because soldiers suspect insurgents behind social dissent. Disentangling different types of resistance, this article analyzes whether and how strikes, demonstrations, riots, and guerrilla attacks affect the military’s disposition and ability to stage a coup during counterinsurgencies. We argue that only strikes trigger coup attempts. Soldiers interpret strikes as manifestations of a strengthening subversive enemy that threatens their victory over insurgents, while economic elites support a coup in the hope that the military will terminate costly walkouts. This interest alignment fosters military takeovers. We provide case-study evidence from Cold War Argentina and Venezuela to show our suggested mechanism at work. Demonstrating the scope of our argument, we quantitatively analyze coup attempts in counterinsurgency worldwide (1950–2005). Results show that strikes increase wartime coup risk, whereas demonstrations, riots, and guerrilla attacks do not. The findings highlight the backfiring potential of nonviolent resistance with important implications for post-coup political orders and democratization prospects.

Losing power safely: Explaining the variation in dictators' responses to anti‐regime protests

“…The second mechanism occurs when the military stages a coup d'état in response to being ordered by the dictator to repress protests (or because the military believes it very likely that such an order will be issued). The military is inclined to stage a coup d'état as the repression of protests incurs a high cost for the military; such a repression costs the military its reputation and legitimacy as the guardian of the state (Gläßel et al, 2020, p. 1035). Specifically, when protests are nonviolent, the military's intervention cannot be justified in the name of public order or security (Bellin, 2012, pp.…”

Media Freedom and the Escalation of State Violence

“…We thus control for other forms of ongoing dissent with binary indicators for either Armed conflict, Terror attacks or Nonviolent opposition. If we excluded these violent and nonviolent campaigns from the analyses, we could not rule out that the decision to escalate repression was guided by these other forms of dissent (Gläßel et al, 2020).…”

Subversion, cyber operations, and reverse structural power in world politics

“…Existing work examines various strategies of subversion rather than developing a theory of power (Beilenson, 1972; Blackstock, 1964; Kitson, 1971). More recent work also follows this pattern, examining the escalatory potential of (perceived) subversion through labor strikes (Gläßel et al, 2020), Russia’s subversive approach to foreign policy (Kurowska and Reshetnikov, 2021), subversion as a strategy to exploit incomplete state consolidation (Lee, 2020), and its strategic role in world politics (Wohlforth, 2020). In short, conceptualizing cyber power requires a theory of subversive power—which this is still lacking.…”

“…Scholarly interests in covert operations has surged recently, but primarily focuses on secret warfare (Carson, 2018; Cormac and Aldrich, 2018; Poznansky, 2019). An emerging body of work also examines subversive strategies and practices in different contexts of world politics (Gläßel et al, 2020; Kurowska and Reshetnikov, 2021; Lee, 2020; Wohlforth, 2020), yet apart from these context-specific investigations, the field still lacks a theory of subversion as power.…”