How gun control policies evolve: Gun culture, ‘gunscapes’ and political contingency in post-Soviet Georgia
| Autor: | Matthew Light, Eugene Slonimerov |
|---|---|
| Rok vydání: | 2019 |
| Předmět: |
Sociology and Political Science
media_common.quotation_subject 05 social sciences Gun control 0506 political science Pathology and Forensic Medicine Politics State (polity) Political economy Political science 050602 political science & public administration 050501 criminology Contingency Law 0505 law media_common |
| Zdroj: | Theoretical Criminology. 24:590-611 |
| ISSN: | 1461-7439 1362-4806 |
| DOI: | 10.1177/1362480618822832 |
| Popis: | We analyse the influence of gun culture and exogenous political events on gun regulation in post-Soviet Georgia. While neighbouring states retain restrictive Soviet-era gun laws, in Georgia, state failure, armed conflict and proliferation of weapons during the 1990s all impelled recent governments towards moderate gun policies, including liberal rules on handgun ownership, strict rules on gun carriage and a national gun registry. We conceptualize gun policy as the product of relatively durable institutional legacies and underlying social attitudes—in this case, a distinctive post-communist ‘gunscape’—which constrain future policy development; and specific political conjunctures, which provide opportunities for limited policy experimentation. While Georgian gun owners desire weapons for self-defence, sport and the affirmation of masculinity, they do not seek to defy the state or replace its role in collective security, leading to a moderate ‘harm reduction’ approach to regulation that may be applicable in other post-conflict societies. |
| Databáze: | OpenAIRE |
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