Writing a Global History of Crime and Punishment: The Great Challenge

To write a truly global history of any subject is a formidable task. That is why the word “challenge” figures in my title. For my part, I have made a few tentative steps toward this ambitious goal with respect to the theme of violence. Writing the global history of all crime and punishment surely has to be a collective enterprise, stretching over more than one generation of scholars. Up to now, violence, in its various manifestations, has indeed been the preferred subject when it comes to a w...