JimBowie1958, would you mind telling me what you find funny about my having cited the findings of
extreme bounds analysis (EBA) of coup d'etat determinants as the refutation to the OP-er's assertion?
Sure. You referenced
this doc in stating that the conditions for a coup were not present by denying Stratfords claim that conditions are indeed good for a coup.
Your document states around page 5:
staging a coup would seem to be more attractive (and B should hence be larger) if one or more of the following three conditions are fulfilled. First, control over the state promises control over resources (which is, 5 for instance, the case if property rights are not secure, natural resources are abundant, inequality is high and the state apparatus is large).4 Second, the status quo of the elites or the military has been negatively affected by government policies that could be reversed easily in the aftermath of a coup (for instance, reduced military expenditure or liberalized economic sectors). In a similar vein, Tullock (2005) has argued that dictators maintain control by paying out benefits to those on whose loyalty they depend (see also Wintrobe 2012). If these payments are reduced by the incumbent regime, the net benefits of staging a coup may become positive for some actors. And third, the state does not depend financially on foreign governments being well disposed toward it (e.g., low dependence on foreign aid, not being under programs of the IMF or the World Bank, limited foreign trade).
ALL THREE CONDITIONS ARE MET TODAY here in the USA with an angry political establishment elite shocked that Trump won the last election and determined to do everything that they can to stop him, neutralize him and to remove him.
But about this use of statistical models to tell us what can happen as opposed to what is merely more plausible, it doesnt work that way. The past historical record does not have DETERMINANTS in it, but only indicators as to future plausibility, not possibility.
We are talking about the plausibility of a coup in a specific case, here in the USA. Mathematical/statistical models of what makes the conditions most likely for such an event cannot be used as a refutation for any specific event in a specific time and place. I took you to say it cant happen here because of the modeling for coups show that it is very unlikely to happen here.
As an analogy. Suppose we are playing some parlor game and to win the game, in some final end game situation, you have to roll 2 six sided dice and beat a nine. Were I to tell you I have already won the game because the odds are much more likely that you will roll an 8 or less because that is how dice operate would be premature. Even though dice do usually roll 8 or less you could still roll a 12.
Using statistics like this tells us about more fruitful methods, means, situations, etc, but it does not tell us what can happen, normally. You are saying that there is no determinant cause here, but that is conjecture based on incomplete information. For all we know the essential factors are there, but hidden from the public. Also, the events that are occurring are following many past chains of events that led to destabilized nations. That these mathematicians state that the past record of similar events has upper and lower ceilings and floors is at best dealing in mere plausibility. "Black Swan" events are always outside the record of known events and do happen.
You are an educated and intelligent person, and I am sorry if my lol was insulting, but it was all I could do at the moment.
I took you to say it cant happen here because of the modeling for coups show that it is very unlikely to happen here.
That is absolutely not what I wrote/said. It's not even close to what I said.
What I wrote is that the other member's assertion is not supported by the extreme bounds analysis. Reviewing the OP-er's OP, one observes that s/he identified a single criterion --
the society there must be very well divided -- and even your own read of the document reveals that no single criterion is sufficient to militate for a coup. At that point in the discussion, that terse point is the one I had to make.
More specifically and to the point I made earlier, you surely noticed that of the 66 criteria evaluated, the robustly related variable that comes closest to the one the OP-er identified is a compound one, "Political Stability and Absence of Violence." That variable really doesn't apply to the situation currently observed in the U.S.
Sure as we Americans prattle a lot about violence, the fact is that we quie literally do not have the sort of violence referred to -- violence against the government
a la Boston Tea Party, Boston Massacre, Tiananmen Square, the
Pine Tree Riot, or some other such violence, such as that happening in Venezuela, whereby material segments and quantities of the polity repeatedly and frequently rise up against their own government. The violence we have in the U.S. is one non-governmental group fighting another, with the government intervening as needed to stop the violence and arrest the perpetrators.
Even the BLM folks griping about the police aren't at that stage of violent revolt. Ditto the white supremacists/nationalists and the non-racist Trumpkins. They're pissed, but they don't want a coup or anything close to it, they just want comparatively minor changes, not the complete overthrow of the U.S. government and its Constitution, which is what a coup would be.
Obviously, absent the sort of violence described above, the U.S. is politically stable. Political instability and political contentiousness just aren't the same things. The U.S. has been politically stable since 1776 and there's been political contentiousness between/among the various political parties since 1776. It's a difference of degrees, and again, we're nowhere near being politically unstable as was, say, the USSR when Berlin Wall came down and the USSR dissolved, imploded, whatever you want to (for now) call it, or when the Bolsheviks overthrew the Tsar.
In short the differences I've highlighted are ones of nature and extent. Sure, a coup is possible anywhere, but the "political stability and violence" conditions that, in concert with other conditions, foster/support one simply don't at the requisite level exist in the U.S. right now, and as is shown in the referenced document, "political stability and violence" alone is insufficient. Thus, as I initially wrote, the OP-er's statement is not supported by extreme bounds analysis.
Top political expert wouldn't say better.
