Transnationalizing the Moral Panic: Neoliberalism, State-Monopolized Violence, and Mano Dura in El Salvador

On August 30, 2004, the government of El Salvador, run by Elías Antonio Saca and the National Republican Alliance (ARENA), declared an expansion of its “war” on gangs to eliminate the insecurity in the country. “Your... [ view full abstract ]

On August 30, 2004, the government of El Salvador, run by Elías Antonio Saca and the National Republican Alliance (ARENA), declared an expansion of its “war” on gangs to eliminate the insecurity in the country. “Your party is over!” Saca declared on national television while two heavily armed men stood on each side of him. The “Súper Mano Dura” policies (Super Iron Fist), with its foundations in the prior Mano Dura policies, would expand the repressive apparatuses of social control while purporting to embrace a comprehensive approach to gang violence. Simultaneously, while tough on crime policies were being deployed, ARENA was also negotiating the Dominican Republic-Central America Free Trade Agreement (DR-CAFTA) with the United States. These trade agreements would provide U.S. capital increased access to the Salvadoran market by reducing tariff barriers and removing investment barriers- increasing the neoliberalization of the Salvadoran political economy. What is the relationship between the law and order policies and free trade agreements in El Salvador? What has produced the insecurity and gang violence in the country? This essay argues the production of a moral panic over street gangs, which has its origins in Los Angeles, was transnationalized to displace the contradictions and inequalities of neoliberalism in El Salvador to a local and deported racialized surplus labor population. By dealing with a real social problem of inequality, violence, and instability through law and order policies, the Salvadoran government legitimated its monopolization of violence and control of Salvadoran civil society while expanding transnational capital accumulation. The paper will describe the production of a new transnational racialized identity: the marero. This transnational racialized identity has become the scapegoat in which transnational capital displaces the fears and anxieties produced by political and economic insecurity in El Salvador and the region. This discussion will help inform the current Central American “refugee crisis” at the U.S. border and the violence emerging from street gangs in El Salvador.