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Replication Data for: Why Underachievers Dominate Secret Police Organizations: Evidence from Autocratic Argentina

Harvard Dataverse (Africa Rice Center, Bioversity International, CCAFS, CIAT, IFPRI, IRRI and WorldFish)

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Title Replication Data for: Why Underachievers Dominate Secret Police Organizations: Evidence from Autocratic Argentina
 
Identifier https://doi.org/10.7910/DVN/PGFOXW
 
Creator Scharpf, Adam
Gläßel, Christian
 
Publisher Harvard Dataverse
 
Description Autocrats depend on a capable secret police. Anecdotal evidence, however, often characterizes agents as surprisingly mediocre in skill and intellect. To explain this puzzle, this paper focuses on the career incentives underachieving individuals face in the regular security apparatus. Low-performing officials in hierarchical organizations have little chance of being promoted or filling lucrative positions. To salvage their careers, these officials are willing to undertake burdensome secret police work. Using data on all 4,287 officers who served in autocratic Argentina (1975-83), we study biographic differences between secret police agents and the entire recruitment pool. We find that low-achieving officers were stuck within the regime hierarchy, threatened with discharge, and thus more likely to join the secret police for future benefits. The study demonstrates how state bureaucracies breed mundane career concerns that produce willing enforcers and cement violent regimes. This has implications for the understanding of autocratic consolidation and democratic breakdown.
 
Subject Social Sciences
Autocracy
Secret service
Bureaucracy
Recruitment of employees
Promotions
State-sponsored terrorism
 
Contributor Scharpf, Adam
 
Source Figueroa, Abelardo Martín. 2008. Promociones Egresadas del Colegio Militar de la Nación (1873-2007). Buenos Aires: Sociedad Militar Seguro de Vida Institucion Mutualista.


Geddes, Barbara, Joseph Wright and Erica Frantz. 2014. “Autocratic Breakdown and Regime Transitions: A New Data Set.” Perspectives on Politics 12(2):313–331.


Lupu, Noam and Susan C. Stokes. 2009. “The Social Bases of Political Parties in Argentina, 1912-2003.” Latin American Research Review 44(1):58–87.


Ministerio de Justicia y Derechos Humanos (MJyDH). 2015. “El Batallón de Inteligencia 601.” http://www.saij.gob.ar/docs-f/ediciones/libros/Batallon_inteligencia_601.pdf.