Police state

A police state is "a political unit characterized by repressive governmental control of political, economic, and social life usually by an arbitrary exercise of power by police and especially secret police in place of regular operation of administrative and judicial organs of the government according to publicly known legal procedures." [1]

According to the Wikipedia, a police state is "a totalitarian state regulated by secret police; the police exercise power on behalf of the executive and the conduct of the police cannot be effectively challenged. In such regimes there is no significant distinction between the law and the will of the executive; there is no rule of law."

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Examples

"The best-known literary treatment of the police state is George Orwell's novel Nineteen Eighty-Four, which describes life under a totalitarian régime that uses the constant presence of eternal war as a pretext for subjecting the people to mass surveillance, constraining both freedom of action and of thought." [2]

A classic modern police state was East Germany, or the German Democratic Republic (GDR). The East German secret police force, the Stasi (or Ministerium für Staatssicherheit) maintained a close watch over East German citizens, to the point where virtually every residential building, place of employment or place of leisure was home to at least one Stasi informant. [3]

Some say that since the September 11, 2001 terrorist attack, especially with the passing of the Patriot Act I, the United States is becoming more and more of a police state in that the government now has expanded powers to surveil and detain people it considers potential terrorists without due process.

A proposed new act, the Domestic Security Enhancement Act of 2003, is feared to be likely to accelerate this process.

SourceWatch Resources

• Big Brother
• Hurricane Katrina: Police State Occupation of New Orleans
• Patriot Act I
• Patriot Act II
• REAL ID Act of 2005
• Shadow Government

External links

Profiles

• "corporate police state" in the Wikipedia.
• "police state" in the Wikipedia.
• "secret police": "policing organization operating in secrecy for the political purposes of its government, often with terroristic procedures." The Columbia Encyclopedia, Sixth Edition. 2001-05. Definition followed by brief essay.

Documents

• FM 3-19.40 (formerly FM 19-40). Military Police Internment/Resettlement Operations, Headquarters, Department of the Army, August 1, 2001.
• Army Regulation 210–35. Installations. Civilian Inmate Labor Program, Headquarters, Department of the Army, Washington, DC, January 14, 2005: "This regulation provides guidance for establishing and managing civilian inmate labor programs on Army installations. It provides guidance on establishing prison camps on Army installations. It addresses recordkeeping and reporting incidents related to the Civilian Inmate Labor Program and/or prison camp administration."

Websites

• Not In Our Name Project website.
• Police State Planning.com website.

On-going Coverage

• Refuse and Resist.org website.

Articles & Commentary

• "Israeli Prison Company eyeing land in Mississippi and Louisiana," Judicial-Inc., undated.
• Kelly Patricia O’Meara, "Police State," Insight Magazine (Free Republic), November 9, 2001.
• Ron Paul, "Is America a Police State?" U.S. House of Representatives, June 27, 2002; also posted on LewRockwell.com website.
• Michelle Goldberg, "'This is not America'. In Miami, police unleashed unprecedented fury on demonstrators -- most of them seniors and union members. Is this how Bush's war on terror will be fought at home?" Salon, December 16, 2003. Subscription or preview required.
• Ron Paul, "Police State USA," Antiwar.com, August 10, 2004.
• Frederick Sweet, "Bush's Police State," Intervention Magazine, October 3, 2004.
• Ron Paul, "It Can't Happen Here," LewRockwell.com, December 21, 2004.
• Paul Craig Roberts, "American Police State. Abandoning Liberty; Gaining Insecurity," CounterPunch, February 1, 2005.
• "Domestic Military Role Under Review," CBS News, June 20, 2002.
• Dave Lindorff, "Black Helicopters? The GOP's Police State," CounterPunch, May 21/22, 2005.
• Dan K. Thomasson, "What Price Freedom? Police State," Capitol Hill Blue, May 24, 2005.
• Joe Conason, "It Can Happen Here," AlterNet, February 23, 2007: "In light of the series of laws passed in Congress and precedents set by the Bush administration, people have good reason to doubt the future of democracy and the rule of law in America." Excerpted from Conason's It Can Happen Here. Authoritarian Peril in the Age of Bush (2007 book), Thomas Dunne Books, ISBN 0312356056.
• Gore Vidal, "America the Great ... Police State", Truthdig, July 28, 2009.

Books

• Tom Burghardt (ed.) Police State America: U.S. Military "Civil Disturbance" Planning (AK Press, 2002).

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Note: This article is based on a similar article at the Wikipedia.