Research Catalog

Title

The rise and fall of repression in Chile / Pablo Policzer.

Author

Policzer, Pablo

Publication

Notre Dame, Ind. : University of Notre Dame Press, c2009.

Items in the Library & Off-site

Details

Additional Authors

Helen Kellogg Institute for International Studies

Description

xviii, 242 p. : ill.; 23 cm.

Summary

"In The Rise and Fall of Repression in Chile, Pablo Policzer tackles the difficult task of analyzing how authoritarian regimes utilize coercion. Even in relatively open societies, coercive institutions such as the police and military tend to be secretive and mistrustful of efforts by outsiders to oversee their operations. In more closed societies, secrecy is the norm, making coercion that much more difficult to observe and understand. Drawing on organization theory to develop a comparative typology of coercive regimes, Policzer analyzes the structures and mechanisms of coercion in general and then shifts his focus to the early part of the military dictatorship in Chile, which lasted from 1973 to 1990. Policzer's book sheds new light on a fundamental, yet little-examined, period during the Chilean dictatorship. Between 1977 and 1978, the governing junta in Chile quietly replaced the secret police organization known as the Dirección de Informaciones Nacional (DINA) with a different institution, the Central Nacional de Informaciones (CNI). Policzer provides the first systematic account of why the DINA was created in the first place, how it became the most powerful repressive institution in the country, and why it was suddenly replaced with a different organization, one that carried out repression in a markedly more restrained manner. Policzer shows how the dictatorship's reorganization of its security forces intersected in surprising ways with efforts by human rights watchdogs to monitor and resist the regime's coercive practices. He concludes by comparing these struggles with how dictatorships in Argentina, East Germany, and South Africa organized coercion."--Publisher's description.

Series Statement

Helen Kellogg Institute for International Studies

Uniform Title

• Project Muse UPCC books
• Helen Kellogg Institute for International Studies.

Alternative Title

Rise & fall of repression in Chile

Subject

• Chile. Dirección de Inteligencia Nacional
• Chile. Central Nacional de Informaciones
• Geschichte 1973-1990
• 1900-1999
• Geschichte 1973-1990
• Political persecution > Chile > History > 20th century
• Dictatorship > Chile > History > 20th century
• Chile > Politics and government > 1973-1988

Genre/Form

History

Note

• "Recent titles from the Helen Kellogg Institute for International Studies"--P. facing t.p.

Bibliography (note)

• Includes bibliographical references (p. 217-232) and index.

Processing Action (note)

• committed to retain

Contents

The dark spaces of politics -- The coercion problem -- The overthrow and turmoil -- The rise of the DINA (1973(74) -- The DINA in action (1974-77) -- The fall of the DINA (1977-78) -- Options and shifts -- The politics of organizing coercion -- Appendix A. Monitoring indicators, September-December 1973 -- Appendix B. Monitoring indicators, 1974-78 -- Appendix C. Monitoring indicators after 1978 -- Appendix D. Cross-country comparisons on monitoring indicators.

ISBN

• 9780268038359 (pbk. : alk. paper)
• 026803835X (pbk. : alk. paper)

LCCN

^^2008039253

OCLC

• 227031670
• SCSB-10763583

Owning Institutions

Harvard Library