The Militarisation–Extrajudicial Killings Nexus: A Cross-National Analysis, 2011–2021

This article examines whether the militarisation of policing undermines states’ commitments to human rights, focusing on extrajudicial killings as a severe form of state-led violence. Although militarisation is frequently justified as a necessary response to crime threats that exceed conventional police capacities, its broader implications for democratic governance remain insufficiently examined. Drawing on theories of repression, environmental criminology, and Bourdieusian perspectives on police habitus, we argue that militarisation reshapes the organisational logics of coercive institutions by normalising power projection, intensifying threat perception, and weakening institutional and normative constraints on the use of lethal force.Using Structural Equation Modelling (SEM) on a global country–year panel dataset, the analysis demonstrates that higher levels of militarisation are associated with increased rates of extrajudicial killings, even after controlling for governance capacity, economic conditions, and political violence. These findings suggest that militarisation constitutes a distinct dimension of state power, associated with weaker constraints on lethal force and with shifts away from legitimacy-based policing practices, potentially eroding due process and normalising the use of lethal force. The study advances debates on policing, state violence, and human rights by providing cross-national evidence of a structural relationship between militarisation and extrajudicial killings.