ABSTRACT
Social scientists know that international conflict such as war lead, not surprisingly, to a profound deterioration in human rights practices, and to violent abuses of personal integrity rights (Mitchell and McCormick 1988; Poe and Tate 1994b, Poe et al. 1999).1 Yet, other factors, dealing with the particular political, economic and ideological traits of a nation-state or regime have also been successfully used to explain human rights abuse (Hibbs 1973; Kuper 1981; Mitchell and McCormick 1988; Poe and Tate 1994b; Muller 1995; Poe et al. 1997a; Poe et al. 1999; Paige 1998).2 While these variables present only a partial account of why states use violence as a mechanism of social control, they do point to more comprehensive theoretical paradigms that I will summarize in the next section.
