World Histories of Crime, Culture and Violence – serie

Authorities often fear societal change as it implies finding a new balance to live together within society. Whether it is defined by economic, political, social or cultural factors, the transformation of life in society is considered by authorities as a 'risk' that needs to be framed and controlled. The state's response to this situation of transformation can be analysed through the prism of the police. Informally or not, police systems adapt their regulatory frameworks, their structures and their practices in order to respond risks, new threats and new rules. This process, which is mostly of a contemporary nature, is also deeply historic. Analysing it on the long run is therefore particularly relevant. From the late nineteenth-century until the second half of the twentieth-century, Policing New Risks in Modern European History provides a panorama of political and police reactions to the 'risks' of societal change in a Western European perspective, focusing on Belgium, France, and The Netherlands, but also colonial perspectives.

This book illuminates the neglected history of the Dublin Metropolitan Police – a history that has been long overshadowed by existing historiography, which has traditionally been preoccupied with the more radical aspects of Irish history. It explores the origins of the institution and highlights the Dublin Metropolitan Police’s profound influence on the colonial forces, as its legacy reached some of the furthest outposts of the British Empire. In doing so Anastasia Dukova provides much needed nuance and complexity to our understanding of Ireland as a whole, and Dublin in particular, demonstrating that it was far more than a lawless place ravaged by political and sectarian violence. Simultaneously, the book tells the story of the bobby on the beat, the policeman who made the organisation; his work and day, the conditions of service and how they affected or bettered his lot at home and abroad.

This book illuminates the neglected history of the Dublin Metropolitan Police – a history that has been long overshadowed by existing historiography, which has traditionally been preoccupied with the more radical aspects of Irish history. It explores the origins of the institution and highlights the Dublin Metropolitan Police’s profound influence on the colonial forces, as its legacy reached some of the furthest outposts of the British Empire. In doing so Anastasia Dukova provides much needed nuance and complexity to our understanding of Ireland as a whole, and Dublin in particular, demonstrating that it was far more than a lawless place ravaged by political and sectarian violence. Simultaneously, the book tells the story of the bobby on the beat, the policeman who made the organisation; his work and day, the conditions of service and how they affected or bettered his lot at home and abroad.

This book combines the approaches of history and criminology to study parricide and non-fatal violence against parents from across traditional period and geographical boundaries, encompassing research on Asia as well as Europe and North America. Parricide and non-fatal violence against parents are rare but significant forms of family violence. They have been perceived to be a recent phenomenon related to bad parenting and child abuse often in poorer socioeconomic circumstances – yet they have a history, which provides insights for modern-day explanation and intervention. Research on violence against parents has concentrated on child abuse and mental illness but, by using a rich array of primary and secondary documents, such as court cases, criminal statistics, newspaper reports, and legal and medical literature, this book shows that violence against parents is also shaped by conflicts related to parental authority, the rise of children’s rights, conflicting economic and emotional expectations, and other sociohistorical factors.

This book combines the approaches of history and criminology to study parricide and non-fatal violence against parents from across traditional period and geographical boundaries, encompassing research on Asia as well as Europe and North America. Parricide and non-fatal violence against parents are rare but significant forms of family violence. They have been perceived to be a recent phenomenon related to bad parenting and child abuse often in poorer socioeconomic circumstances – yet they have a history, which provides insights for modern-day explanation and intervention. Research on violence against parents has concentrated on child abuse and mental illness but, by using a rich array of primary and secondary documents, such as court cases, criminal statistics, newspaper reports, and legal and medical literature, this book shows that violence against parents is also shaped by conflicts related to parental authority, the rise of children’s rights, conflicting economic and emotional expectations, and other sociohistorical factors.

​This book analyses the legal literacy, knowledge and skills of people in premodern and modernizing Europe. It examines how laymen belonging both to the common people and the elite acquired legal knowledge and skills, how they used these in advocacy and legal writing and how legal literacy became an avenue for social mobility. Taking a comparative approach, contributors consider the historical contexts of England, Finland, France, Germany, Italy and Sweden.This book is divided into two main parts. The first part discusses various groups of legal literates (scriveners, court of appeal judges and advocates) and their different paths to legal literacy from the Middle Ages to the nineteenth century. The second part analyses the rise of the ownership and production of legal literature – especially legal books meant for laymen – as means for acquiring a degree of legal literacy from the eighteenth to the early twentieth century.

This book is a comparative quantitative analysis of the administration of justice across four English and three Welsh counties between 1760 and 1830. Drawing on a dataset of over 22,000 indictments, the book explores the similarities and differences between how the so-called Bloody Code was administered between, on the one hand, England and Wales, and, on the other, individual English and Welsh counties.  The book is structured in two sections that trace the criminal justice process in England and Wales respectively. The first chapter in each section examines the pattern of indictments in the respective counties, and explores the crimes for which men and women were indicted, the verdicts handed down, and the sentences passed. The second chapter then explores patterns of sentences of death, executions and pardons for those capitally convicted of serious crimes against the person and forms of property offences.

This book explores the judicial treatment of suicides in early modern Sweden, with a focus on the criminal investigation and selective treatment of suicides in the lower courts in the seventeenth and early eighteenth centuries. Riikka Miettinen shows that reactions and attitudes towards suicides varied considerably despite harsh condemnation by officials. The indictment, investigation, and classification of suspected suicides and the mental state of a person already deceased were challenging, and depended on local co-operation and lay testimonies. Not all suicides were considered alike; a widespread view on the heinousness of suicide was not the same as agreement about specific cases, and did not result in uniform handling of them. The social status and local ties of the deceased influenced the interpretations and responses at the local lower courts and communities. Esteemed local community members had a better defence and greater chance to escape the shameful penalties.

This book offers a global history of civilian, military and gendarmerie-style policing around the First World War. Whilst many aspects of the Great War have been revisited in light of the centenary, and in spite of the recent growth of modern policing history, the role and fate of police forces in the conflict has been largely forgotten. Yet the war affected all European and extra-European police forces. Despite their diversity, all were confronted with transnational factors and forms of disorder, and suffered generally from mass-conscription. During the conflict, societies and states were faced with a crisis situation of unprecedented magnitude with mass mechanised killing on the battle field, and starvation, occupation, destruction, and in some cases even revolution, on the home front. Based on a wide geographical and chronological scope – from the late nineteenth century to the interwar years – this collection of essays explores the policing of European belligerent countries, alongside their empires, and neutral countries. The book’s approach crosses traditional boundaries between neutral and belligerent nations, centres and peripheries, and frontline and rear areas. It focuses on the involvement and wartime transformations of these law-enforcement forces, thus highlighting underlying changes in police organisation, identity and practices across this period.

This book offers a global history of civilian, military and gendarmerie-style policing around the First World War. Whilst many aspects of the Great War have been revisited in light of the centenary, and in spite of the recent growth of modern policing history, the role and fate of police forces in the conflict has been largely forgotten. Yet the war affected all European and extra-European police forces. Despite their diversity, all were confronted with transnational factors and forms of disorder, and suffered generally from mass-conscription. During the conflict, societies and states were faced with a crisis situation of unprecedented magnitude with mass mechanised killing on the battle field, and starvation, occupation, destruction, and in some cases even revolution, on the home front. Based on a wide geographical and chronological scope – from the late nineteenth century to the interwar years – this collection of essays explores the policing of European belligerent countries, alongside their empires, and neutral countries. The book’s approach crosses traditional boundaries between neutral and belligerent nations, centres and peripheries, and frontline and rear areas. It focuses on the involvement and wartime transformations of these law-enforcement forces, thus highlighting underlying changes in police organisation, identity and practices across this period.

This book explores sexual violence and crime in Australia in the 1970s and 1980s, a period of intense social and legal change. Driven by the sexual revolutions, second wave feminism, and ideas of the rights of the child, there was a new public interest in the sexual assault of women and children. Sexual abuse was studied, surveyed and discussed more than ever before in Australian society. Yet, despite this, there remained substantial inaction, by government, from community and on the part of individuals. This book examines several difficult questions of our recent history: why did Australia not act more firmly to eradicate rape and child sexual abuse? What prevented our culture from looking seriously at trauma? How did we fail to protect victim-survivors? Rich in social and legal history, this study takes readers into the world of victims of sexual crime, and into the wider community that had to deal with sexual violence. At the core of this book is the question that resonates deeply right now: why does sexual violence appear seemingly insurmountable, despite significant change?

This book explores sexual violence and crime in Australia in the 1970s and 1980s, a period of intense social and legal change. Driven by the sexual revolutions, second wave feminism, and ideas of the rights of the child, there was a new public interest in the sexual assault of women and children. Sexual abuse was studied, surveyed and discussed more than ever before in Australian society. Yet, despite this, there remained substantial inaction, by government, from community and on the part of individuals. This book examines several difficult questions of our recent history: why did Australia not act more firmly to eradicate rape and child sexual abuse? What prevented our culture from looking seriously at trauma? How did we fail to protect victim-survivors? Rich in social and legal history, this study takes readers into the world of victims of sexual crime, and into the wider community that had to deal with sexual violence. At the core of this book is the question that resonates deeply right now: why does sexual violence appear seemingly insurmountable, despite significant change?

This book analyses the process of ‘reshaping’ liberated societies in post-1945 Europe. Post-war societies tried to solve three main questions immediately after the dark times of occupation: Who could be considered a patriot and a valuable member of the respective national community? How could relations between men and women be (re-)established? How could the respective society strengthen national cohesion? Violence in rather different forms appeared to be a powerful tool for such a complex reshaping of societies. The chapters are based on present primary research about specific cases and consider the different political, mental, and cultural developments in various nation-states between 1944 and 1948. Examples from Italy, France, Norway, Denmark, Greece, Ukraine, Lithuania, Belarus, Czechoslovakia, and Hungary demonstrate a new comparative and fascinating picture of post-war Europe. This perspective overcomes the notorious East-West dividing line, without covering the manifold differences between individual European countries.

This book analyses the process of ‘reshaping’ liberated societies in post-1945 Europe. Post-war societies tried to solve three main questions immediately after the dark times of occupation: Who could be considered a patriot and a valuable member of the respective national community? How could relations between men and women be (re-)established? How could the respective society strengthen national cohesion? Violence in rather different forms appeared to be a powerful tool for such a complex reshaping of societies. The chapters are based on present primary research about specific cases and consider the different political, mental, and cultural developments in various nation-states between 1944 and 1948. Examples from Italy, France, Norway, Denmark, Greece, Ukraine, Lithuania, Belarus, Czechoslovakia, and Hungary demonstrate a new comparative and fascinating picture of post-war Europe. This perspective overcomes the notorious East-West dividing line, without covering the manifold differences between individual European countries.

This book focuses on the history of the provision of legal aid and legal assistance to the poor in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries in eight different countries. It is the first such book to bring together historical work on legal aid in a comparative perspective, and allows readers to analogise and contrast historical narratives about free legal aid across countries. Legal aid developed as a result of industrialisation, urbanization, immigration, the rise of philanthropy, and what were viewed as new legal problems. Closely related, was the growing professionalisation of lawyers and the question of what duties lawyers owed society to perform free work. Yet, legal aid providers in many countries included lay women and men, leading at times to tensions with the bar. Furthermore, legal aid often became deeply politicized, creating dramatic conflicts concerning the rights of the poor to have equal access to justice.

This book focuses on the history of the provision of legal aid and legal assistance to the poor in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries in eight different countries. It is the first such book to bring together historical work on legal aid in a comparative perspective, and allows readers to analogise and contrast historical narratives about free legal aid across countries. Legal aid developed as a result of industrialisation, urbanization, immigration, the rise of philanthropy, and what were viewed as new legal problems. Closely related, was the growing professionalisation of lawyers and the question of what duties lawyers owed society to perform free work. Yet, legal aid providers in many countries included lay women and men, leading at times to tensions with the bar. Furthermore, legal aid often became deeply politicized, creating dramatic conflicts concerning the rights of the poor to have equal access to justice.

Suicide by Proxy became a major societal problem after 1650. Suicidal people committed capital crimes with the explicit goal of “earning” their executions, as a short-cut to their salvation. Desiring to die repentantly at the hands of divinely-instituted government, perpetrators hoped to escape eternal damnation that befell direct suicides. Kathy Stuart shows how this crime emerged as an unintended consequence of aggressive social disciplining campaigns by confessional states. Paradoxically, suicide by proxy exposed the limits of early modern state power, as governments struggled unsuccessfully to suppress the tactic. Some perpetrators committed arson or blasphemy, or confessed to long-past crimes, usually infanticide, or bestiality. Most frequently, however, they murdered young children, believing that their innocent victims would also enter paradise. The crime had cross-confessional appeal, as illustrated in case studies of Lutheran Hamburg and Catholic Vienna.Winner of The 2024 Natalie Zemon Davis Prize.“What to do about women (and sometimes, men) who gruesomely murdered children because of their own “weariness with life?” This was a dilemma faced by elites in German-speaking lands during the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, and engaged by Kathy Stuart in this strikingly original monograph. A pervasive, if not largely forgotten behavioral pattern featured women who wished to end their lives but feared the doctrine held by Catholics and Protestants alike, that their souls would then face certain damnation. Instead, they would murder a child: their own, someone else’s, even one chosen at random, and immediately turn themselves into the authorities. This form of “suicide by proxy,” as Stuart terms it, resulted in their execution to be sure, but gave them a chance to repent beforehand. To elucidate this troubling history, she mines an impressive array of primary sources from archives throughout Germany and Austria, as well as broadsheets and other forms of art. She draws penetrating insights from law, gender studies, religion, and medicine. To her sophisticated use of empirical research and interdisciplinary perspectives Stuart adds a sense of compassion for these desperate women and the parents of the children murdered during this time of religious and social upheaval.”

Suicide by Proxy became a major societal problem after 1650. Suicidal people committed capital crimes with the explicit goal of “earning” their executions, as a short-cut to their salvation. Desiring to die repentantly at the hands of divinely-instituted government, perpetrators hoped to escape eternal damnation that befell direct suicides. Kathy Stuart shows how this crime emerged as an unintended consequence of aggressive social disciplining campaigns by confessional states. Paradoxically, suicide by proxy exposed the limits of early modern state power, as governments struggled unsuccessfully to suppress the tactic. Some perpetrators committed arson or blasphemy, or confessed to long-past crimes, usually infanticide, or bestiality. Most frequently, however, they murdered young children, believing that their innocent victims would also enter paradise. The crime had cross-confessional appeal, as illustrated in case studies of Lutheran Hamburg and Catholic Vienna.Winner of The 2024 Natalie Zemon Davis Prize.“What to do about women (and sometimes, men) who gruesomely murdered children because of their own “weariness with life?” This was a dilemma faced by elites in German-speaking lands during the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, and engaged by Kathy Stuart in this strikingly original monograph. A pervasive, if not largely forgotten behavioral pattern featured women who wished to end their lives but feared the doctrine held by Catholics and Protestants alike, that their souls would then face certain damnation. Instead, they would murder a child: their own, someone else’s, even one chosen at random, and immediately turn themselves into the authorities. This form of “suicide by proxy,” as Stuart terms it, resulted in their execution to be sure, but gave them a chance to repent beforehand. To elucidate this troubling history, she mines an impressive array of primary sources from archives throughout Germany and Austria, as well as broadsheets and other forms of art. She draws penetrating insights from law, gender studies, religion, and medicine. To her sophisticated use of empirical research and interdisciplinary perspectives Stuart adds a sense of compassion for these desperate women and the parents of the children murdered during this time of religious and social upheaval.”

This Palgrave Pivot examines the history of the largely urban offence once known as vitriol throwing because the substance most commonly used was strong sulphuric acid, oil of vitriol. A relatively rare form of assault, it was motivated largely by revenge or jealousy and, because it was specifically designed to blind and mutilate, commonly targeted the victim’s face. The incidence of what was thus widely acknowledged to be an exceptionally cruel crime plateaued in the period 1850–1930 amid a sometimes surprisingly lenient legal response, before declining as a result of post-war social changes. In examining the factors that influenced both the crime and its punishment, the book makes an important contribution to criminal justice history by illuminating the role of gender, law and emotion from the perspective of both victim and perpetrator.

This Palgrave Pivot examines the history of the largely urban offence once known as vitriol throwing because the substance most commonly used was strong sulphuric acid, oil of vitriol. A relatively rare form of assault, it was motivated largely by revenge or jealousy and, because it was specifically designed to blind and mutilate, commonly targeted the victim’s face. The incidence of what was thus widely acknowledged to be an exceptionally cruel crime plateaued in the period 1850–1930 amid a sometimes surprisingly lenient legal response, before declining as a result of post-war social changes. In examining the factors that influenced both the crime and its punishment, the book makes an important contribution to criminal justice history by illuminating the role of gender, law and emotion from the perspective of both victim and perpetrator.

This book explores the social roots, character, and consequences of paramilitary violence in Europe in the 1940s. Paramilitarism had an impact on the lives of millions of Europeans, yet knowledge about this important topic is partial and fragmented.The general perception of European paramilitary violence in the 1940s derives almost entirely from the resistance/collaboration paradigm. This dichotomous analytical framework makes a clear distinction between politically motivated violence and social violence, such as sexual, criminal, and structural violence. By contrast, in this book, Gareth Pritchard and Vesna Drapac recognise the mutual dependence of all kinds of violence. Their interpretative model, the Regimes of Violence paradigm, which takes account of the changing relationship between state, society, and organised violence, allows us to observe paramilitarism in the round. The Regimes of Violence framework reveals the interconnectedness of paramilitarism with other forms of violence during this period of unprecedented brutality.Today, paramilitary violence is a global phenomenon. It has resulted in the undermining of the rule of law and the erosion of civil society in many different countries on different continents, while at the same time traumatising the countless numbers of innocent people who are caught in its crossfire. With their compelling and timely study, Pritchard and Drapac provide an historical context and present a novel approach for understanding why paramilitarism shows no sign of abating.

This book explores the social roots, character, and consequences of paramilitary violence in Europe in the 1940s. Paramilitarism had an impact on the lives of millions of Europeans, yet knowledge about this important topic is partial and fragmented.The general perception of European paramilitary violence in the 1940s derives almost entirely from the resistance/collaboration paradigm. This dichotomous analytical framework makes a clear distinction between politically motivated violence and social violence, such as sexual, criminal, and structural violence. By contrast, in this book, Gareth Pritchard and Vesna Drapac recognise the mutual dependence of all kinds of violence. Their interpretative model, the Regimes of Violence paradigm, which takes account of the changing relationship between state, society, and organised violence, allows us to observe paramilitarism in the round. The Regimes of Violence framework reveals the interconnectedness of paramilitarism with other forms of violence during this period of unprecedented brutality.Today, paramilitary violence is a global phenomenon. It has resulted in the undermining of the rule of law and the erosion of civil society in many different countries on different continents, while at the same time traumatising the countless numbers of innocent people who are caught in its crossfire. With their compelling and timely study, Pritchard and Drapac provide an historical context and present a novel approach for understanding why paramilitarism shows no sign of abating.

This book presents alternative histories of the colonial prison in Bengal, 1860-1945, focusing on the experiences of the colonised subject as produced in literary writings including fiction, dramas, and life writings. The colonial prison, as defined by penal acts, jail codes, jail manuals, committee reports, administrative data, and statistics, was a modern punitive institution that evolved from the religio-local and the Company’s capricious system into an effective humanitarian machine for ‘the rule of law.’ However, it was the site of torture, humiliation, and repression, which was subsequently challenged, defied, and resisted. The book establishes a comprehensive linkage between the macro historical and the micro historical perspective of the colonial prison exploring its changing image in Bengali society, its extended contribution to the formation of individual and collective identity, intricate tempo-spatial regulations within jails, and various techniques of corporeal and mental torture. The book also highlights resistance tactics of the prisoners, both ordinary and political, and finally it addresses the gendered dynamics and the gender-specific modalities of resistance and subversion.

This edited collection examines the violence experienced by non-combatants during the civil wars which took place in Europe in the first half of the twentieth century. The determinants of violence in civil wars are highly complex and variable. By focusing on both the victims and perpetrators of violence in eight European countries, including Russia, Ireland, France and Spain, the book explores what happened when differing groups within a polity clashed, and in which ways internal conflicts manifested themselves and permeated societies. Divided into two parts, the chapters firstly identify and analyse how rearguard violence was produced and exercised during the European civil wars, and secondly, they examine the violence perpetrated by, and against, women. Shedding light on the violence that was inflicted upon European civilians in the early- to mid-twentieth century, this book presents insights for historians of Europe, political scientists, and international relations scholars alike.

This book brings together contributions from female authors on feminicide and violence against women. Steilneset Memorial in Finnmark, Norway was built by Norwegian Scenic Routes to commemorate the victims of the Finnmark witchcraft trials in the seventeenth century. The memorial was opened in 2011, and is based on three components: art, architecture, and history. The artist is Louise Bourgeois, who created an art installation. The architect is Peter Zumthor, who designed the memorial’s two buildings. The historian is Liv Helene Willumsen, who wrote one commemoratory text for each of the victims. The majority were women: of the 91 persons who were executed, 77 were women and only 14 were men. This book therefore uses Steilneset Memorial as a starting point to explore contemporary feminicide and violence against women, as the misogyny which was fundamental to the persecution of alleged witches in the 1600s is still seen today throughout the world.

This book offers a pioneering, interdisciplinary analysis of gender-based violence in Eastern Europe from the early modern period to the present. Through case studies of various Eastern European countries, the volume examines how empire, war, nationalism, socialism, and post-socialist transformation shaped legal, medical, and state responses to violence against women. It reveals how women’s suffering was repeatedly silenced, normalized, or politicized, particularly in times of conflict and authoritarian rule. Challenging Western-centric perspectives, the book positions Eastern Europe as a vital site for understanding the historical roots of contemporary debates on gender, justice, and memory.

This book investigates the forms that the aggression and violence of peasant elites could take in early modern Fennoscandia, and their role within society. The contributors highlight the social stratification, inner divisions, contradictions and conflicts of the peasant communities, but also pay attention to the elite as leaders of resistance against the authorities. With the formation of more centralised states, the elites’ status and room for agency diminished, but regional and temporal variations were great in this relatively drawn-out process, and there still remained several favourable contexts for their agency. Even though the peasant elite was not a homogenous entity, the chapters in this collection present us one uniting feature – the peasant elites’ tendency to assert themselves with an active and aggressive agency, even if this led to very different outcomes.

This innovative volume examines the nexus between war crimes trials and the pursuit of collaborators in post-war Asia. Global standards of behaviour in time of war underpinned the prosecution of Japanese military personnel in Allied courts in Asia and the Pacific. Japan’s contradictory roles in the Second World War as brutal oppressor of conquered regions in Asia and as liberator of Asia from both Western colonialism and stultifying tradition set the stage for a tangled legal and political debate: just where did colonized and oppressed peoples owe their loyalties in time of war? And where did the balance of responsibility lie between individuals and nations? But global standards jostled uneasily with the pluralism of the Western colonial order in Asia, where legal rights depended on race and nationality. In the end, these limits led to profound dissatisfaction with the trials process, despite its vast scale and ambitious intentions, which has implications until today.

This book reflects on the new histories emerging from the exhumation of mass graves that contain the corpses of the Republicans killed in extrajudicial executions during and after the conflict, nearly eighty years after the end of the Spanish Civil War (1936-1939). In the search for, location and unearthing of these unmarked burials, the corpse, the document and the oral testimony have become key traces through which to demand the recognition of past Francoist crimes, which were never atoned, from a lukewarm Spanish state and judiciary. These have become objects of evidence against the politics of silence entertained by national institutions since the transition to democracy. Working alongside archaeologists, historians, memory activists and families, this book explores how new versions of the history of the killings are constructed at the cross-roads between science, history and family experience. It does so considering the workings of truth-seeking in the absence of criminal justiceand the effects of the process on Spanish collective memory and identity.