Liquid Legitimacy: Lessons on Military Violence from the Israeli Occupation in the West Bank

During the past decades, militaries have increasingly used force against civilians and armed adversaries in operational settings other than war. Theories about legitimacy for the use of military force often focus on macro variables such as international law, government policy, and structural political contingencies. The strength of such theories in explaining military violence during conventional wars notwithstanding, this article argues that they fail to explain the legitimization of the use of force in situations that cannot be categorized as “classic” warfare, where institutional and international norms seem to fade, rational calculations become unclear, and governments often do not hold themselves accountable for soldiers’ violent behavior. When such conflicts linger, they often develop into situations in which sovereignty is fragmented and statehood is limited in ways that further undermine institutional legitimacy. Using the accounts of Israeli soldiers deployed in the occupied Palestinian territories in the last two decades, this article broadens the analytical perspective on military violence's legitimacy by depicting its micromechanisms and local factors. In doing so, it identifies three clusters of factors: emotions, space and time, and informal organizational culture. We posit that, during intense friction between soldiers and civilians in the context of prolonged occupation, the structural variables and formal powers that typically dictate the use of force give way to more fluctuating dynamics that shape the patterns of military violence and, ultimately, influence its legitimacy.