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Politics of Law Enforcement: Policing and Police Reform in New Democracies

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Politics of Law Enforcement: Policing and Police Reform in New Democracies Politics of Law Enforcement: Policing and Police Reform in New Democracies Kyong Jun Choi A dissertation submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy University of Washington 2015 Reading Committee: Yong-Chool Ha, Chair James Caporaso Anthony Gill Gary Hamilton Program Authorized to Offer Degree: Department of Political Science © Copyright 2015 Kyong Jun Choi University of Washington Abstract Politics of Law Enforcement: Policing and Police Reform in New Democracies Kyong Jun Choi Chair of the Supervisory Committee: Yong-Chool Ha, Ph.D. Jackson School of International Studies Impartial law enforcement is necessary for the rule of law and the stable functioning of a democracy. The maintenance of public order and the enforcement of the law are the minimum requirements expected of a modern democratic state. This dissertation investigates the transformation of the police in new democracies and asks why they have difficulty building capable and impartial law enforcement agencies. Comparative case studies of Korea, Taiwan, and Mexico on the continuity and change of law enforcement illustrate how and why the timing and direction of the transformation occur differently in new democracies. To determine the reasons for the failure to establish capable and impartial law enforcement agencies, this dissertation investigates three factors that contribute to change and continuity at different levels: (1) political democratization (institutional level); (2) police reform initiated by the president (agency/policy level); and (3) international and domestic factors, such as geopolitics and the structure of local politics (structural level). The divergent routes taken by these three countries show that policing in a democracy is different from democratic policing and that the creation of impartial law enforcement agencies does not occur automatically after democratic transitions. Korea has accomplished only partial success in transforming its arbitrary enforcer into an impartial enforcer as it failed to eliminate all remnants of authoritarian policing or the arbitrary enforcement of law. Policing in Taiwan has been transformed from a limited arbitrary enforcer into a mediator, while policing in Mexico remained a palace guard during the period of democratic transition. Politics of police reform and the failure to establish democratic policing in new democracies reveal that democratization is not omnipotent, while the transformation of policing follows its own political logic, sometimes frustrating the desire of society. Table of Contents Chapter 1. Introduction: Policing New Democracies ·············································1 Chapter 2. Democratic Transition and Politics of Police Reform ······························37 Chapter 3. Formation of Authoritarian Policing ··················································67 Chapter 4. Reforming the “Arbitrary Enforcer” in Korea ·······································104 Chapter 5. Partial Transition to the “Impartial Enforcer” in Korea ····························134 Chapter 6. Reforming the Limited “Arbitrary Enforcer” in Taiwan ··························164 Chapter 7. Transition to the “Mediator” in Taiwan ·············································194 Chapter 8. Reforming the “Palace Guard” in Mexico ··········································223 Chapter 9. Continuity of the “Palace Guard” in Mexico········································254 Chapter 10. Democratization, State Coercion and the Rule of Law ··························283 Bibliography ································································································327 Chapter 1 Introduction: Policing New Democracies Democratization is not omnipotent. When the authoritarian regime collapses and free, fair, and competitive elections are introduced with the foundation of new democratic rules replacing oppressive ones of the past, people hope all good things will arrive ousting all existing evil things. However, the package delivered from the heavens soon proves to contain a mixed blessing of goods and evils when it opens. Agreed rules on fair and transparent political games are frequently infringed by arbitrary enforcement of law, while citizens tend to suffer aggravated public insecurity. Even countries that have been called the most successful examples of third-wave democracy, such as Korea, Taiwan, and Mexico, are not immune to the dark side of democratic transition. Gorgeous expressions for praising the miracle of democracy quickly disappear in vain as the fading mist around democracy reveals that the miracle was in fact a mirage. Democratic transition creates suffering for people living in a middle land between authoritarianism and mature democracy because nobody knows exactly which side is closer to them and how long it will take to reach a perfect democracy. This dissertation concerns these purgatorial sufferings of new democracies. The impartial enforcement of law is a stepping stone for the rule of law and the stable functioning of democracy. The maintenance of public order and the enforcement of law are the minimum requirements expected of a modern democratic state. If the state fails to provide public security, people’s liberties and rights to participate in politics and civil activities cannot be protected. The law should be capably enforced. If the state is unable to enforce the law, the rule of law will be simply a façade, resulting in the survival of the fittest as in a Hobbesian world. The law should also be enforced in an impartial manner to safeguard the rule of law and other crucial values of democracy, such as equality. If law enforcement agencies operate in an arbitrary and selective manner, even prejudiced against certain political, economic, or ethnic groups with minor positions in society, nobody will agree that democratic values, especially equality before the 1 law, are fulfilled in their society by the state. In such a case, the rules of the democracy cannot be fairly applied in practice, even when the legal and constitutional documents themselves are fair and impartial. This dissertation asks why new democracies have difficulty in building capable law enforcement agencies that successfully enforce the law in impartial ways. Contrary to an intuitive knowledge—or a wishful thinking—that democratic transition leads to the creation and functioning of impartial law enforcement agencies, the trajectories of change in law enforcement in new democracies illustrate that democratization is not a single package within which all positive things are packed together. In fact, impartial law enforcement does not always go hand-in-hand with political democracy. Many countries in a democratic transition still struggle to create police forces that can maintain public security and implement their duties of law enforcement in an impartial manner, even though they have already passed the hard tests of an electoral democracy, i.e., implementation of free, fair, and competitive elections and the occurrence of regime turnovers. Both capable and impartial law enforcement seems to be a hard goal for people living in the purgatory of a new democracy. Some new democracies successfully maintain public security through the capable functioning of police forces with the sacrifice of fairness in law enforcement. Other new democracies are equipped with police whose capacity to enforce the law fails to reach people living beyond the narrow area of the political center of state. To find reasons for the failure to found capable and impartial law enforcement agencies in new democracies, this dissertation will investigate three factors of change and continuity at different levels: (1) political democratization (institutional level); (2) police reform initiated by the president (agency/policy level); and (3) international and domestic intervening factors, such as geopolitics and the structure of local politics (structural level). Each exerts influence on the trajectories of change in law enforcement in fledgling democracies, either positively or negatively. In other words, political democratization and a president’s police reform are “independent” variables, while change or continuity of law enforcement (policing) is a “dependent” variable. International/domestic conditions in which a country is situated are “intervening” variables. The scope condition of causality is new democracies, especially third-wave democracies such as 2 Korea, Taiwan, and Mexico, in which democracy has not yet become entrenched in spite of their quite remarkable accomplishments in electoral democracy. First, the divergent effects of democratization on institutional change of law enforcement agencies will be investigated. Democratization does not exert any single and universal effect on each of the institutional components of the state in an equal manner. It causes multiple transitions (or processes of change) of state institutions that move at varying speeds, and at times, respond to different logics (Middlebrook, 2004: 2– 3). Democratization could exert positive effects on some institutional components of the state, while at the same time exerting negative and detrimental effects on other parts. Its effects on other remaining pieces of the state might be even neutral (non-effective). As a result, transformation of the state with democratization from the macro-level perspective is full of inconsistency and disharmony since not all of the constituent parts of the state change at an equal pace in the same
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