Dragaera

Assassination as a means of policy change

Howard Brazee howard at brazee.net
Thu Mar 10 11:40:31 PST 2005

On Wed, 09 Mar 2005 12:05:25 -0800, megan loughran <mirrinn at hotmail.com>
wrote:

> Overall, I'd say assassination alone is not a particularly effective way  
> to enact policy change... I think most assassinations come about as a  
> result of single individuals or small groups of individuals (or military  
> coups) which are not largelyl representative of majority opinions.  If  
> enough members of a society are not in support of the change in  
> policy/government, short of forceful take-over by the assassinating  
> party, a meaningful form of social/policy change is not likely to be  
> achieved by assassination alone.  If people are not ready for a change  
> in the status quo, even if a leader is killed, he/she will most likely  
> just be replaced by someone similar.

I think you're thinking of ours society today where the ruler has to have
the consent of the ruled.    In a strong dictatorship, a prince might
assassinate the king, take over, and make significant policy changes.
Because it doesn't matter what others think.

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