Repressing Democracy? Independence Referendum Violence and Support for Independence Public

Abstract

This paper examines the impact of state violence on public perceptions of democratic norms. Though states that are more democratic have been shown to engage in fewer human rights abuses, they are not always so well behaved. Notably, the vast literature surrounding public response to violence largely hasn't considered how violence affects the state's domestic perception as a democracy. Focusing on independence movements, I explore the democratic norms intrinsic to independence referenda, and how the state's repression of these movements impacts support for independence by affecting the state's democratic legitimacy. Crucially, I predict that when such violence is against an independence movement that is centered around a referendum, support for independence will increase and perception of democracy will decrease, as the state's use of violence signals to individuals living in the breakaway region that the state is not supportive of democratic political processes. By conducting an original survey experiment in the Indian state of Tamil Nadu, this study contributes to the literature on independence movements by theoretically linking violence, democratic norms, and public opinion in the context of secession.

Table of Contents

1 Introduction 3

2 Determinants of Support for Independence 5

3 Democratic Legitimacy During Secession 6

3.1 The Independence Movement . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 6

3.2 The Parent State . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 9

3.2.1 Strategic Violence . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 9

3.2.2 Public Response to State Violence . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 9

4 Hypotheses 11

5 Survey Design 12

5.0.1 Sample . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 13

5.0.2 Setting . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 14

5.1 Pre-Vignette Questions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 15

5.2 Vignettes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 17

5.2.1 Stage One: Independence Movement . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 17

5.2.2 Stage Two: State Response . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 17

5.3 Outcome Variables . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 19

5.4 Analysis . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 20

6 Discussion and Conclusion 28

7 Appendix 32

7.1 Principal Component Analysis . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 32

7.2 Power Analysis . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 33 

About this Master's Thesis

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School	Laney Graduate School
Department	Political Science
Degree	M.A.
Submission	Master's Thesis
Language	English
Research Field	Political Science, International Relations Peace Studies
Mot-clé	secession violence protest independence democracy nationalism ethnic conflict
Committee Chair / Thesis Advisor	Dr. Dan Reiter, Emory University
Committee Members	Dr. Danielle Jung, Emory University Dr. Renard Sexton, Emory University

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