The Geography of Repression and Support for Democracy

State repression is a prominent feature of non-democracies, but its effectiveness in quieting dissent and fostering regime survival remains unclear. We exploit the location of military bases before the coup that brought Augusto Pinochet to power in Chile in 1973, which is uncorrelated to pre-coup electoral outcomes, and show that counties near these bases experienced more killings and forced disappearances at the hands of the government during the dictatorship. Our main result is that residents of counties close to military bases both registered to vote and voted “No” to Pinochet’s continuation in power at higher rates in the crucial 1988 plebiscite that bolstered the democratic transition. Potential mechanisms include informational frictions on the intensity of repression in counties far from bases and shifts in preferences caused by increased proximity to the events. Election outcomes after democratization show no lasting change in political preferences.

Keywords: Dictatorship, Repression, Democratization, Military, Pinochet, Chile

JEL Classification: D72, N46

Suggested Citation: Suggested Citation

Bautista, Maria Angelica and González, Felipe and Martinez, Luis and Munoz, Pablo and Prem, Mounu, The Geography of Repression and Support for Democracy (April 24, 2020). University of Chicago, Becker Friedman Institute for Economics Working Paper No. 2019-105, Available at SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=3435816 or http://dx.doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.3435816