Abstract
Democratic transitions in the Global South involve large-scale collective emotions, especially among freedom movements. During a dictatorship, fear and terror are the state’s weaponry to control its citizenry. Collective anger against this repressive state unifies and directs prodemocracy forces. Further, courage among agentic individuals and social movements stands as a liberating emotion that counters the silencing powers of state fear. Such transformative courage comes about as individual acts offer public inspiration for social courage. Religions likewise nurture collective courage through narratives of a protective omnipotent God, and post-death salvation as a reward for political self-sacrifice. After the dictator falls, intrastate conflict shifts from a vertical anti-state storyline to lateral dialectics among former united front allies, as they compete for positions in the new state. Collective emotions of respect versus competitive intolerance arise in lateral political relationships. This divergence in emotional overtones of inter-agentic relations becomes a crucial feature of post-transition peace and conflict.
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Montiel, C.J., Boller, A. (2017). Political Emotions During Democratic Transitions in the Global South. In: Seedat, M., Suffla, S., Christie, D. (eds) Enlarging the Scope of Peace Psychology. Peace Psychology Book Series. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-45289-0_13
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