Why Civil Resistance Works: Another Case Study

When Doctor Chenoweth, assistant professor of government at Wesleyan University, introduced her talk, “Why Civil Resistance Works,” she skirted around the meat of her thesis. A more apt title would have been “Why Civil Resistance Works Better.” Chenoweth posits that nonviolent campaigns are, in several key measurable ways, more successful than their violent counterparts. She boldly stated that this is always true in the following types of conflicts to which she limited the scope of her argument to: the toppling of regimes, the ending of foreign occupations, and the secession from a larger state. These conflicts are listed in respect to their likelihood of success in descending order. Professor Chenoweth measured success using several variables: peak membership, security force defection, government repression, aid from foreign governments, and the regime’s form of government. I will not further summarize Chenoweth’s talk since Alana has already done so quite skillfully. I point you to her blog post before my own. However, I will attempt to construct a counter-argument with the limited research and knowledge I have compared to the professor. I, like most people, become wary when arguments become absolutes.

Conveniently, an effective counter-example comes my own heritage as a child of Bangladeshi immigrants. In 1971, East Pakistan engaged in armed conflict with the politically dominant West Pakistan and eventually seceded, becoming Bangladesh. The Bangladesh Liberation War fits into the rigid prerequisites of Chenoweth’s research. The war was the very definition of an armed conflict. The West Pakistani military was pitted against the Bengali military, paramilitary, and civilians (a forced that became known as the Mukti Bahini or the “Freedom Fighters”). This conflict is also one of the more recent, large-scale secessions, fulfilling another imperative on Chenoweth’s mandate. The Bangladesh Liberation War is fair game. I would be very surprised if it was not including among the three hundred and twenty-three violent campaigns that constituted Professor Chenoweth’s empirical record.

Let us first examine one of Professor Chenoweth’s key variables - security force defection. Logically, the soldiers of a ruling regime are far less likely to follow orders to shoot and kill unarmed protesters rather than an armed rebel force. Chenoweth additionally asserts that nonviolent campaigns are more likely to illicit defection of security force members including as national armies for a simple reason. A security force member is more apt to switch loyalties when the opposing force is not shooting at them. However, the Mukti Bahini provides an exception to this idea. It was an armed force composed of both East Pakistani (Bengali) military, paramilitary, and civilian forces. Neither a state nor a rebel fighting force, the Mukti Bahini provides an interesting lens to view Chenoweth’s work. The core of the Freedom Fighters draws directly from constructivist theory. The Bengali army indentified more so with their ethnicity and heritage than their status as members of the Pakistani army. In fact, the movement was founded and galvanized retired then-Colonel in Pakistani army, M.A.G. Osmani. His forces were not motivated by the power/fear basis that Chenoweth dictates.

The Bangladeshi Liberation War remains an outlier in several of Chenoweth’s statistics and figures. The professor asserted that lasting democratic regimes rarely result from violent campaigns.  However, Bangladesh has remained a parliamentary democracy since it gained true independence in 1971.  Despite its extreme poverty, Bangladesh has never seen a civil war. Chenoweth also asserts that violent campaigns are less likely to succeed when facing governmental repression. Once again, this rule does not apply to the Liberation War. International media sources and textbooks report causalities of between two hundred thousand and three million for Bangladesh in addition to between eight and ten million refugees who fled to India.  Much of the Bangladeshi intelligentsia was murdered and buried in mass graves.  Many Bengali women were raped, tortured, and murdered throughout the war.  These atrocities prompt memories of the German and Japanese evils of World War II.  If absolute repression existed in a government, Bangladesh nearly experienced it.  Still, an armed force successfully seceded from such a regime. Bangladesh powerfully spites many of Professor Chenoweth’s notions.

If I had another chance to speak with Professor Chenoweth, I would ask her what she thought of my “case study.”  Since that probably will not happen, I ask the same of you.  Chenoweth asserted that where nonviolent campaigns fail, violent unrest would surely fail as well.  I wonder whether nonviolent protest would have been more effective in 1971 Bangladesh.  However, this is a question I cannot answer without a time machine and an alternate universe. One can only remain skeptical in times of absolute certainty.