An enemy of the state is a person accused of certain crimes Crime is the breach of rules or laws for which some governing authority may ultimately prescribe a conviction. Individual human societies may each define crime and crimes differently. While every crime violates the law, not every violation of the law counts as a crime; for example: breaches of contract and of other civil law may rank as " against the state A sovereign state, commonly simply referred to as a state, is a political association with effective internal and external sovereignty over a geographic area and population which is not dependent on, or subject to any other power or state. While in abstract terms a sovereign state can exist without being recognised by other sovereign states,, such as treason In law, treason is the crime that covers some of the more serious acts of betrayal of one's sovereign or nation. Historically, treason also covered the murder of specific social superiors, such as the murder of a husband by his wife . A person who commits treason is known in law as a traitor. Describing individuals in this way is sometimes a manifestation of political repression Political repression is the persecution of an individual or group for political reasons, particularly for the purpose of restricting or preventing their ability to take part in the political life of society. For example, an authoritarian Authoritarianism describes a form of government characterized by an emphasis on the authority of state in a republic or union. It is a political system controlled by typically non-elected rulers who usually permit some degree of individual freedom regime may purport to maintain national security National security is the requirement to maintain the survival of the nation-state through the use of economic, military and political power and the exercise of diplomacy by describing social or political dissidents A dissident, broadly defined, is a person who actively challenges an established doctrine, policy, or institution. When dissidents unite for a common cause they often effect a dissident movement as "enemies of the state". In other cases, the individual in question may have legitimately endangered the country and/or its population. For example, a double agent Double agent is a counterintelligence term for someone who pretends to spy on a target organization on behalf of a controlling organization, but in fact is loyal to the target organization. Double agents may be agents of the target organization who infiltrate the controlling organization, or may be previously loyal agents of the controlling selling military or intelligence secrets could undermine a nation's security, and could therefore be considered an enemy not of just a person or entity within a state, but the state itself and all entities therein.

Examples

• Proscription Proscription is the public identification and official condemnation of enemies of the state. It is defined by the Oxford English Dictionary as a "decree of condemnation to death or banishment" and is a heavily politically-charged word frequently used to refer to state-approved murder or persecution. Proscription implies the elimination in Ancient Rome Ancient Rome was a civilization that grew out of a small agricultural community founded on the Italian Peninsula as early as the 10th century BC. Located along the Mediterranean Sea, it became one of the largest empires in the ancient world
• The term Enemy of the people The term enemy of the people is a fluid designation of political or class opponents of the group using the term. Its usage is derogatory, and meant to imply that the "enemies" are acting against society as a whole. It is similar to the notions of "public enemy" and "enemy of the state". The term has an extensive in the Soviet Union The Union of Soviet Socialist Republics was a constitutionally socialist state that existed in Eurasia from 1922 to 1991. The name is a translation of the Russian: Союз Советских Социалистических Республик (help·info), tr. Soyuz Sovetskikh Sotsialisticheskikh Respublik, IPA [sɐˈjʊs sɐˈvʲeʦkʲɪx səʦɪ during the period of Stalinism Stalinism is a term that refers to a "theory and practice of communism" utilised in the political system associated with Joseph Stalin, leader of the Soviet Union from 1928–1953. The term was originally coined in a positive sense by Lazar Kaganovich, but nonetheless rejected by Stalin himself.[citation needed].
• The fictional character Emmanuel Goldstein Emmanuel Goldstein is a fictional character in George Orwell's classic novel Nineteen Eighty-Four. Despite being a key part of the story, he is never actually seen or heard, and may in fact be nothing more than a propaganda fabrication of the Ministry of Truth in the novel Nineteen Eighty-Four Nineteen Eighty-Four , by George Orwell, published in 1949, is a dystopian novel about the totalitarian régime of the Party, an oligarchical collectivist society where life in the Oceanian province of Airstrip One is a world of perpetual war, pervasive government surveillance, public mind control, and the voiding of citizens' rights. In the.

See also

• Public enemy A public enemy, a term which was first widely used in the United States in the 1930s to describe individuals whose activities were seen as criminal and extremely damaging to society

Categories: Political repression Categories: Human rights abuses | Persecution | National security |