Democide

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Democide (from Greek δῆμος demos , people, population, and Latin caedere , morden, slaughter) is a term introduced by the American political scientist Rudolph Joseph Rummel , under which the deliberate mass killing of certain groups of people by a government is summarized.

definition

According to Rummel, democide is any form of action by a government that

  1. aims to kill people directly or bring about the death of people,
    1. because of their religion , race , language , ethnicity , national origin, class , politics , speeches , actions perceived as anti-government or socio-politically harmful, or because of the mere connection with people to whom the former conditions apply;
    2. to meet a planned target or system of requisitions;
    3. to promote a system of forced labor or slavery ;
    4. by massacre ;
    5. by the imposition of deadly living conditions;
    6. by taking direct action against non-combatants during war or violent conflict.
  2. cause death due to willful or deliberately reckless or negligent disregard for life (constitutive for intent qua practice ), including
    1. deadly prison , concentration camp , forced labor, prisoner of war , or recruitment camp conditions;
    2. fatal medical or scientific experiments on humans;
    3. Torture or corporal punishment ;
    4. Support or acquiescence of murder , rape , looting and arson resulting in death;
    5. Famines or epidemics during which government agencies withhold aid or deliberately contribute to increasing the death rate;
    6. fatal forced relocations and evictions
  3. meet the following qualifications and criteria:
  • (a) " government " includes de facto - rule , as shown by the Chinese Communist Party in the People's Republic of China ; or by the armies of warlords or rebels over a region and its population after it was conquered, such as the brief rule of Muslim revolutionaries during the second "Republic of East Turkestan" over small parts of the Chinese province of Xinjiang (1944-1946);
  • (b) “Actions by a government” includes official or authoritative actions on the part of government officials (including the police , the military, or even the secret service ); or those non-governmental acts (e.g., brigands , conscripts, or secret societies ) that the government approves, supports, or accepts;
  • (c) Point 1.6 includes, for example, direct and targeted action during a war or violent conflict arising out of hatred or vengefulness, or to depopulate a hostile region or to terrorize or force a population as a means of subjugating it; this would u. a. involve the indiscriminate bombing or shelling of urban residential areas or blockades to create mass starvation;
  • (d) “mere connection with people” (point 1.1) includes relatives, colleagues, employees, teachers and pupils or students;
  • (e) “Massacre” (point 1.4) includes the mass killing of prisoners of war or captured rebels;
  • (f) “Planned target” (point 1.2.) includes the random selection of people for their execution in order to achieve a predetermined number of executions; or arresting a certain number of people to meet a planned target, some of whom are then executed;
  • (g) System of “requisitions” (point 1.2) includes the complete confiscation of food from farmers or farmers, which leads to their starvation;
  • (h) and which exclude the following from the definition:
    • (h.1) Execution for acts that are internationally recognized as capital crimes , such as B. murder, rape, espionage , treason and the like, unless there is evidence that the allegations were fabricated by the government to execute the suspect (s);
    • (h.2) Taking action against armed civilians during a mob or riot (i.e. killing people carrying weapons is not democide);
    • (h.3) the death of non-combatants caused by attacks on military targets, provided that the primary target is military (e.g. during the bombing of hostile logistics infrastructure).

This definition excludes killings in international wars as well as in civil wars . Heinsohn's Lexicon of Genocides (see literature) sees it differently, however. B. the atomic bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki also as democide.

Likewise, killings are not understood as democides that are not considered deliberate, such as natural disasters, but also disasters that are caused by actions by governments, but are not intended (with their consequences) (this is controversial, e.g. for the Great Famine (1959–1962) in the PRC during the Great Leap Forward ).

The non-fatal forms of genocide that are not carried out by government agencies or not because the victims belong to one of the defined types of groups are also excluded from this definition.

Special forms

According to Rummel, special forms of democide are:

Rummel mentions the deadly forms of genocide, as the definition of genocide as given in the United Nations Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of Genocide also includes forms that do not necessarily have to be fatal.

Gunnar Heinsohn has proposed that these forms an add that includes victims who were killed in economic theory or reasons are: The term " Ökonomizid " z should. B. include groups of victims who were killed by the government because of their property (including kulaks , enemies of the Cultural Revolution ) and thus help to reduce the conceptual imprecision of the few legal provisions relating to these issues (Article 3 of all four Geneva Conventions only mentions “property “As a criterion that should not be used for discrimination) in the future.

literature

Web links

Wiktionary: Demozid  - explanations of meanings, word origins, synonyms, translations

Individual evidence

  1. ^ RJ Rummel: Definition of Democide
  2. RJ Rummel: Democide versus Genocide: Which is what?
  3. ^ Sources of Mass Death
  4. Heinsohn 1998, p. 20 f., As well as entries "Ökonomizid" and "Klassenmord"