Skip to main content Accessibility help
×
  1. Home
  2. Books
  3. The Rise of Organised Brutality
  • Cited by 125
      • Show more authors
      • You may already have access via personal or institutional login
    • Select format
    • Publisher:
      Cambridge University Press
      Publication date:
      13 April 2017
      03 April 2017
      ISBN:
      9781316155332
      9781107095625
      9781107479494
      DOI:
      https://doi.org/10.1017/9781316155332
      Dimensions:
      (228 x 152 mm)
      Weight & Pages:
      0.61kg, 346 Pages
      Dimensions:
      (228 x 152 mm)
      Weight & Pages:
      0.49kg, 346 Pages
      • Subjects:
      Political Sociology, Politics and International Relations, International Relations and International Organisations, Sociology
    You may already have access via personal or institutional login
    • Selected: Digital
    Add to cart View cart Buy from Cambridge.org
    Subjects:
    Political Sociology, Politics and International Relations, International Relations and International Organisations, Sociology
    Information

    Book description

    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. Malešević 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. Malešević 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.

    Awards

    Winner, 2018 Peace, War, and Social Conflict Best Book Award, American Sociological Association

    Reviews

    ‘This is an extremely important book - proving against naive recent contentions that modernity and violence go hand-in-hand. It is empirically and theoretically sophisticated, and elegant and lucid as well.'

    John Anthony Hall - McGill University, Montréal

    ‘In this book Siniša Malešević brings together disparate phenomena - wars, revolutions, genocides, terrorisms - in a compelling historical narrative about the role of organised violence in modern society. Essential reading for all concerned with this fundamental problem.'

    Martin Shaw - Institut Barcelona d'Estudis Internacionals and Roehampton University, London

    '… important and informative …'

    Source: Anthropology Review Database

    'Among academics and the wider public, the progressive development of human society is widely understood to make violence and brutality one day obsolete. The publication of Siniša Malešević’s new book provides an opportunity to reflect on the prevailing orthodoxy that civilization and violence are mutually exclusive phenomena.'

    Babak Mohammadzadeh Source: Global Affairs

    'For those who believe that sociology can and should serve to increase our knowledge regarding these important topics, it must be said that the volume under review - The Rise of Organised Brutality - succeeds admirably.'

    Ilmari Käihkö Source: Journal of Political Power

    ‘Siniša Malešević has written a wide-ranging and compelling overview of organized violence. It combines a macrohistorical approach, comparing violence from the time humans were nomadic foragers up to the present, with an explanation of mechanisms of ’microsolidarity’ that allow people to overcome inherent inhibitions against killing fellow human beings … The Rise of Organised Brutality is a valuable and erudite contribution to a lively and important debate.’

    Source: Journal of Peace Research

    '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 Source: Journal of Regional Security

    Refine List

    Actions for selected content:

    Select all | Deselect all
    • View selected items
    • Export citations
    • Download PDF (zip)
    • Save to Kindle
    • Save to Dropbox
    • Save to Google Drive

    Save Search

    You can save your searches here and later view and run them again in "My saved searches".

    Please provide a title, maximum of 40 characters.
    Cancel
    ×

    Contents

    Contents

    Metrics

    Altmetric attention score

    Full text views

    Total number of HTML views: 0
    Total number of PDF views: 0 *
    Loading metrics...

    Book summary page views

    Total views: 0 *
    Loading metrics...

    * Views captured on Cambridge Core between #date#. This data will be updated every 24 hours.

    Usage data cannot currently be displayed.

    Accessibility standard: Unknown

    Why this information is here

    This section outlines the accessibility features of this content - including support for screen readers, full keyboard navigation and high-contrast display options. This may not be relevant for you.

    Accessibility Information

    Accessibility compliance for the HTML of this book is currently unknown and may be updated in the future.