Skip to main page content
U.S. flag

An official website of the United States government

Dot gov

The .gov means it’s official.
Federal government websites often end in .gov or .mil. Before sharing sensitive information, make sure you’re on a federal government site.

Https

The site is secure.
The https:// ensures that you are connecting to the official website and that any information you provide is encrypted and transmitted securely.

Access keys NCBI Homepage MyNCBI Homepage Main Content Main Navigation
. 2023 Apr;49(2):372-394.
doi: 10.1177/0095327X211070035. Epub 2022 Feb 11.

Military Responses to the COVID-19 Pandemic Crisis in Latin America: Military Presence, Autonomy, and Human Rights Violations

Igor Acacio  1 , Anaís M Passos  2 , David Pion-Berlin  1
Affiliations

Military Responses to the COVID-19 Pandemic Crisis in Latin America: Military Presence, Autonomy, and Human Rights Violations

Igor Acacio et al. Armed Forces Soc. 2023 Apr.

Abstract

The military in Latin America has been extensively involved in pandemic relief operations. This paper analyses the impact of militarization of pandemic relief operations on human rights. It argues that not all militarization is equally harmful to individuals in the region. When troops assume responsibilities regarding medical care and logistical support, human rights violations do not follow. When involved in policing the stay-at-home orders, the extent of human rights violations is explained by the level of operational autonomy the military has in public security operations. The more autonomous the military, more likely abuses are to occur. Additionally, military exposure to judicial prosecution for human rights offenses contributes to the explanation. After gathering original empirical evidence from 14 Latin American democracies on military presence in pandemic relief, we draw our inferences from process tracing on four comparative case studies of Argentina, Brazil, Chile, and El Salvador.

Keywords: civil-military relations; covid-19 pandemic; human rights; military autonomy.

PubMed Disclaimer

Conflict of interest statement

The author(s) declared no potential conflicts of interest with respect to the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.

References

    1. Acácio I. (2021, June 7). Why Isn't Jair Bolsonaro Deploying Brazil's Military for Policing Missions? Political Violence at a Glance. https://politicalviolenceataglance.org/2021/06/07/why-isnt-jair-bolsonar...
    1. Agüero F. (1995). Soldiers, civilians and democracy: Post-Franco Spain in comparative perspective. Johns Hopkins University Press.
    1. Amnesty International (2020). When protection becomes repression: Mandatory quarantines under Covid-19 in the Americas. https://www.amnesty.org/download/Documents/AMR0129912020ENGLISH.PDF
    1. Armed Forces of El Salvador [@FUERZARMADASV]. (2020, May 9). 13 mil 23 militares estarán trabajando en el alerta Covid-19 [Tweet]. Twitter. Retrieved from: https://twitter.com/fuerzarmadasv
    1. Bell S.R., Clay K.C., Kiyani G., Murdie A. (2021). Civil-military relations and human rights. Armed Forces & Society. 10.1177/0095327X211006835 - DOI