Path to Power: 2024 - Democracy Disrupted?
Frustration with established institutions of political representation around the globe is leading to the formation of extra-institutional political movements and resulting in a trend towards expanding political and politicised violence.
Directed towards candidates, representatives, and movements, political violence is the result of political goals being sought through alternative means. In contrast, politicised violence, often directed toward marginalised groups, has expanded as a result of growing exclusionary and illiberal narratives. In contexts where there is an established and powerful non-state structure of organised violence, political violence expresses itself as intra-elite violence over access to political power.
In systems with robust state control over organised violence, this manifests in the growth of movements outside established structures of political representation. This can lead to protest movements in cases where these movements are popular and non-violent, as well as extremist violence in cases where movements are small and atomized.
Despite an infamous 2021 report by the Commission on Race and Ethnic Disparities arguing that the UK no longer has a rigged system for minorities, politicised violence has been directed against marginalised groups. In the aftermath of the election, violent riots and anti-immigration demonstrations took place in 27 UK cities and towns sparked by a false claim that a Muslim asylum seeker was responsible for a triple murder in Southport, a tragic escalation associated with a wider misinformation environment that frames immigration as a threat to British culture.
The historical context of prior fraudulent election results set the stage for heightened tensions between people in contested regions and the ruling party. During the 2024 election campaign, violent confrontations erupted between FRELIMO supporters and opposition groups in key contested areas such as Nampula and Sofala, marked by widespread voter intimidation, especially in rural regions. This unrest culminated in the first nationwide protest against the disputed election results on 21 October. State forces responded with violent repression, dispersing demonstrators with live ammunition in several cities and targeting journalists with tear gas canisters while they interviewed independent presidential candidate and anti-government protest leader Mondlane in Maputo. As violence escalated, high profile figures accused of escalating the protests, and citizens accused of participating, fled the country, and many sought refuge in South Africa and Malawi. This explosive reaction to the election results underscores how frustration with political exclusion and a lack of representation can lead to violent resistance against the state.
The January 6 Capitol insurrection serves as a stark example of frustrations over political representation resulting in violent protests. Driven by false claims of widespread election fraud in the 2020 election, Trump supporters broke into on the US Capitol building to attempt to prevent the certification of the election results. The riots saw a range of groups – from the Proud Boys to the Oath Keepers – each influenced by conspiracy theories that portrayed a deep state as preventing authentic political representation. Supporters of QAnon were also deeply involved, driven by the belief in a vast, shadowy cabal controlling the government and society, which they saw as suppressing the people’s rightful control over political processes. This narrative of widespread fraud and elite manipulation resonated with those in the Stop the Steal movement, who falsely claimed that the 2020 election had been stolen through rigged processes orchestrated by this same deep state. For them, these conspiracy theories provided justification for a belief that their voices and votes had been systematically suppressed, and that violence was the necessary response.
The 2024 election was marred by heightened political violence, significantly influenced by the aftermath of the 2020 election and Trump’s continued rhetoric about election fraud – he was himself the target of an assassination attempt on the campaign trail. Shortly after the election, Luigi Mangione was arrested for the alleged shooting of UnitedHealthcare CEO Brian Thompson. Traditional media outlets were shocked to discover that Mangione would swiftly become a social media folk hero, as his alleged motivation – frustration with the exploitation and greed of the American private healthcare industry and the lack of political will to regulate it due to lobbying – chimed with the experience of many American citizens (Schmerling, 2021).
Due to xenophobic perceptions of minority groups and the complicity of media in stoking these underlying tensions, South Africa has had an unfortunate recent history in terms of (misplaced) political violence. In 2019, Nigerian immigrants were the victims of xenophobic violence. Many South Africans, especially the poor, blamed foreigners for taking jobs and resources, exacerbating tensions as Nigerians were unfairly associated with criminal activity. Political leaders and media also played a role in inflaming these sentiments, and the government’s inadequate response allowed the violence to escalate, culminating in widespread protests, strained diplomatic relations between South Africa and Nigeria as families fled (Tade, 2019) and celebrities from across the continent boycotted the country (BBC News, 2019).
The 2021 South African unrest, also known as the July riots or Zuma riots, was a wave of civil unrest that took place in the KwaZulu-Natal and Gauteng provinces from 9 to 18 July 2021. The unrest was triggered by the imprisonment of former President Jacob Zuma for contempt of court. Protests against his incarceration led to widespread rioting and looting, much of which was attributed to individuals not necessarily supporting Zuma, but fuelled by economic hardships, including job layoffs and inequality exacerbated by COVID-19 policies. The unrest began in KwaZulu-Natal on 9 July and spread to Gauteng on 11 July and marked the worst violence South Africa had seen since the end of Apartheid.
Despite analysts fearing violence in the immediate aftermath of the election results (Dolley, 2024), its relative absence may be attributed to the notion that under conditions where citizens feel adequately represented through the electoral system, violent means of expressing dissent dissipate.
In a system with established and powerful non-state structures of organised violence, a variety of military and militant groups vie for political power and control. Violence by non-state actors, such as armed militant groups, during general elections has also been a recurrent trend in Pakistan. This has been most prominent in the politically marginalised regions and provinces beset with separatist insurgencies such as Khyber Pakhtunkhwa and Balochistan, which have limited access to central political power structures. The 2024 elections were marked by heightened tensions and violence, including attacks by these insurgent groups on polling infrastructure. These groups also targeted political candidates, polling stations, and voters, resulting in multiple deaths and injuries.
Political violence during the 2024 election in Mexico marked the worst period of electoral violence ever recorded in the country’s history, with 320 reported attacks on political candidates, including the assassination of at least 37 individuals (El País, 2024). This violence was primarily driven by intense intra-party rivalries and the involvement of organized crime groups, which sought to co-opt political figures to safeguard their criminal interests (Hernandez Huerta, 2020; BBC, 2024). These groups, often operating with impunity, have been particularly focused on local candidates, as their primary concern is securing influence in the regions where they conduct illicit activities. Such localized targeting not only destabilizes the electoral process but also severely undermines democracy in Mexico, fostering a climate of fear and preventing many potential candidates from entering the political arena. The involvement of criminal groups in politics serves to exacerbate the challenges facing the country’s fragile democratic institutions.
A notable instance of electoral processes descending into violence in Indonesia occurred in 2019, when Subianto’s challenge to the election results sparked riots in Jakarta. The outburst demonstrated that when large segments of the population feel disenfranchised and believe they are not represented by the government, their frustration may escalate into violence as they seek to have their voices heard. In the lead-up to the 2024 elections, there was some apprehension regarding the potential for similar unrest. Increased police presence during key moments played a preventative role, but there was also a significant political shift. “Jokowiism” has solidified itself as the dominant political paradigm in Indonesia, with hard-right nationalist populism now widely viewed as discredited and ineffective. Importantly, the inclusion of Subianto in Jokowi’s second government likely played a pivotal role in reducing the chances of violence in the 2024 election, as many of Subianto’s followers felt their grievances were being addressed within the framework of the ruling government.
India’s control of organised violence is largely robust but some provinces and regions have established and powerful non-state structures. Electoral violence has been a consistent feature of India’s politics, especially in regions such as Jammu and Kashmir and the country’s northeastern states, in addition to the states where Maoist-Naxalite insurgency has had a strong presence. This violence often involves violent insurgent attacks on polling stations, clashes between rival political parties and voter intimidation as these extra-state groups attempt to exert influence over the political system.
Although, in recent years, the intensity and frequency of this violence has decreased, clashes between the supporters of various political parties was recorded during this election in the states of West Bengal and Bihar, leading to deaths and injuries. States reeling with armed conflict, such as Manipur, also reported instances of violence during the 2024 elections. In Manipur, a rerun of the election was ordered for 11 polling stations after violent clashes and armed violence was recorded within them. In the state of West Bengal, clashes were recorded between supporters of the BJP and TMC parties. Similarly, in the state of Bihar, violence broke out between supporters of rival parties leading to death of one person and injuries to several others.
The Georgian election has been a focal point for Georgia’s transition towards greater authoritarianism through the expansion of state and extra-legal violence. Pre-election, large-scale protests against the transparency of foreign influence bill had been met with excessive force from the police and security services, which served to disrupt demonstrators’ democratic right to express opposition to law-making.
Post-election, however, with the manipulated result a final nail in the coffin for Georgia’s mechanisms of political representation, direct action, in the form of mass protest, has become the only means of expressing political frustrations.The response to this protest has, in turn, greatly exceeded the levels of violence seen in the pre-election environment. Amnesty has produced evidence of more than 300 cases of torture of arrested protestors, with targeted extra-legal violence towards journalists, opposition politicians and civil society activists, allegedly carried out by titushky, pro-government enforcers with no legal recourse to the state.
This represents a shift from Georgian Dream’s subversion of democracy, to a clearer anti-democratic system of repression, with direct and frontal assaults on the free press, political plurality, and the grassroots of civil society. In this sense, the violence towards protestors is reactionary – it represents the state’s response towards the frustration with the political system as manifested in the largely peaceful protests which have emerged since the election.