From separatism to violence: A typology of interactions between the citizen and the state establishment

This paper suggests two new theoretical contributions: The first such contribution is a typology of interactions between the people and the authorities (central government, local municipalities, company managements, others). Looking inductively at various case studies dealing with this kind of relationship, the proposed continuum moves from separatism at one end (Catalunya, 2017, as an instance) to violence at the other end of the scale, while between the two poles other patterns of activity are indifference, identification, and protest. The second contribution is a model of four independent variables (policy; scale of policy’s implementation; external occasions relevant to the protest group; decision-making of group’s leadership) for explaining political violence. Additionally, political aspirations, ideologies, leader’s decisions, and responses from the authorities influence the final choice that any given group makes. Empirical case studies from different states (USA, Spain, Israel) illustrate the theoretical framework of this study.