The Rise of Organised Brutality: A Historical Sociology of Violence

ISBN-13: 9781107479494 / Angielski / Miękka / 2017 / 346 str.

Sinisa Malesevic

Opis

Challenging the prevailing belief that organised violence is experiencing historically continuous decline, this book provides an in-depth sociological analysis that shows organised violence is, in fact, on the rise. Malesevic demonstrates that violence is determined by organisational capacity, ideological penetration and micro-solidarity, rather than biological tendencies, meaning that despite pre-modern societies being exposed to spectacles of cruelty and torture, such societies had no organisational means to systematically slaughter millions of individuals. Malesevic suggests that violence should not be analysed as just an event or process, but also via changing perceptions of those events and processes, and by linking this to broader social transformations on the inter-polity and inter-group levels he makes his key argument that organised violence has proliferated. Focusing on wars, revolutions, genocides and terrorism, this book shows how modern social organisations utilise ideology and micro-solidarity to mobilise public support for mass scale violence.

Recenzje

'The book is an excellent example of an insightful historical sociological analysis that highlights the need for further empirical research of organised violence.' Andrej Cvetić, Journal of Regional Security

Spis treści

Acknowledgements; Introduction: the faces of violence; 1. What is organised violence?; 2. Violence in the long run; 3. How old is human brutality?; 4. The rise and rise of organised violence; 5. Warfare; 6. Revolutions; 7. Genocides; 8. Terrorisms; 9. Why humans fight?; Conclusion: the future of organised violence; References; Index.