Using event-history conditional risk-set models to examine daily event data in 98 countries over a period of fifteen years, this dissertation explores the relationship between contentious collective action and state repression. Specifically, it argues and finds support for the idea that the structural influence of regime type, the specific forms that state repression and contentious action take, and time effects all act together in order to define the dynamic ways in which state repression and contentious collective action act and react to one another.
Models of the effects of state repression on the hazard of contentious collective action show that, in the short-term, the application of state repression has a dampening influence on contentious collective action, but after a period of seven days, such dampening effects give way to a backlash of contention. In addition, violent and non-violent forms of state repression lead to different hazards of contentious collective action, while the structural influence of regime type is a marked determinant of the hazard of contention experienced in a country.
Similar results are found to be true when examining the effects of contentious collective action on state repression; in the short term, contentious collective action increases the hazard of state repression. Yet, when and the extent to which states respond to contentious action with repressive action varies greatly depending on the type of contention that actors resort to, the timing of such contention, and the structural context in which this action occurs, especially when taking into consideration regime type.
These results highlight the complexity of the relationship between these two variables and are indicative of the dangers of overly simplistic examinations of their effects on each other. Consideration of the multidimensional forms that state repression and contentious collective action can take, the influence of time on the process, and several geopolitical influences acting on the manner in which state repression and contentious collective action interact suggest that these are all important factors that researchers must consider if they hope to gain insight in to the true nature of the relationship between state repression and contentious collective action.
