As part of the executive power's efforts to bring social claims under its own control, institutions were recruited, the legal mechanism was strengthened and new, more wide-reaching forms of suppression were consolidated. First among these was recourse to the measure known as 'stage of siege' and the later Idionym law of 1929, which gradually developed into the most effective means of defence, not with regard to 'external security' any more but rather 'domestic order'. It gave the state the authority to arrest and imprison anyone promoting 'ideas propagating the violent overthrow of the existing social order'.
The reasons for this new intransigence on the part of state authority were not only to do with the economic structure and the political development of the country, but the overall character of the inter-war period, which was marked by dramatic economic changes, violent social confrontations and the rise of fascist movements. At the same time, the legislative framework of the 1920s regulated certain crucial issues in the development of the unionist movement, contributing in a variety of ways to its closer control.