What is defined as homicidal state violence, whereby a single person or a specified group of people is designated for elimination?
Select one: a. Torture b. Genocide c. Warfare d. Assassinations
The correct answer and explanation is:
The correct answer is b. Genocide.
Genocide refers to the intentional and systematic extermination of a particular group of people based on their ethnicity, religion, nationality, or other defining characteristics. It is often carried out by the state or a powerful group with the aim of eliminating the group entirely. Unlike warfare, which typically involves conflict between armies or states, genocide is focused on the mass killing or persecution of civilians.
To clarify the other options:
- Torture involves the infliction of severe pain or suffering, usually to extract information or punish someone, but it doesn’t necessarily involve the systematic elimination of a group.
- Warfare is a broader term that refers to conflict between states or groups, often involving both combatants and civilians, but it is not necessarily focused on the extermination of a specific group.
- Assassinations refer to the targeted killing of specific individuals, usually for political reasons, rather than the mass killing of an entire group of people.
Genocide is a particularly extreme form of violence, recognized internationally, with legal definitions such as those provided in the 1948 United Nations Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide.