In a word: Coup

Coup, 19th century: a sudden decisive exercise of force in politics and especially the violent overthrow of an existing government

There are times when people feel that their native tongue lacks a word, so they grab it from another language. One such is “coup”, which is a shortening of “coup d’état”: word for word, a “blow of state”. Most of us know that it’s French because we pronounce it as “coo”, and as we might expect from French words, it has Latin origins: colpus, meaning a blow or hit.

Today the meaning is a blow against the state, but it was first used – in 1646, according to the Oxford English Dictionary – to mean an act of state. Its first insurrectionary usage may be in the London Morning Chronicle in 1804, referring to Napoleon crowning himself as emperor of the French.

“There was a report in circulation yesterday of a sort of coup d’état having taken place in France, in consequence of some formidable conspiracy against the existing government.”

Since then, world history has been full of coups – some failed, some successful, and some denied. Famously, President Trump denies that the attack on the Capitol Building following the election of Joe Biden in 2020 was an attempted coup. Given that Trump was still in office at the time, any efforts to stop the transfer of power would actually be termed a “self-coup”, or “autogolpe”, which derives from Spanish. It refers to an illegal action against others in a regime – for example, the courts or parliament – with the goal of extending the leader’s stay in office or expanding their power.

A more recent example comes from South Korea, where President Yoon Suk Yeol declared emergency martial law in December. Weeks later, he was suspended from office and is now undergoing trial. He has been charged with leading an insurrection.

The number of coups d’état around the world has increased in the last several years, especially in the so-called “Coup Belt” in Africa, covering parts of the Sahel and west and central Africa. So, it’s hardly cynical to say that that the word and its derivatives will be needed for a long time to come.

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