But there are still some comparative works, based partly on national research or inspired by the latter's questions. This concentration on the nation-state suggested itself, since the state monopoly on violence stood in the center of research on violence. Historical research on violence has so far privileged the national context and has seldom conducted international comparisons. Heinz-Gerhard Haupt, in International Encyclopedia of the Social & Behavioral Sciences (Second Edition), 2015 An International Comparison of Violence Comparative studies permit discussion of the charged question of modern research on violence: whether private and public violence dwindles in or is compatible with the functioning of modern society. It elaborates the similarities as well as the differences between the violence of the National Socialist and that of the Stalinist systems of rule. Dietrich Beyrau has presented a critical, detailed analysis contrasting and comparing violent state measures (Beyrau 2000). Finally, research on totalitarianism has pinpointed state terror as a central instrument of totalitarian systems. The only exception is Arno Mayer's study that contrasts the violence of the French and the Russian Revolutions (Mayer 2000).
In comparative research on revolution, violence has often not been accorded central importance. Since forms of protest and criminality take different cultural shapes in different societies, views of reality are often grasped as reality itself. According to Tilly, proactive violence is exercised within those organizations that acquire, and seek to defend, their political power.Īll these investigations face the problem of having to work with unequal and incomplete national data. He uses the term ‘reactive violence’ to designate resistance against state interference in the citizens' way of life. Charles Tilly formulated a typology of collective violence in Europe, in which he names the parochial conflicts-the feuds between geographical communities (Tilly 1975). Spierenberg describes behavior toward victims, the weak, and animals to demonstrate a general increase of empathy in Europe (Spierenburg 1991). Among these is the long-term comparison of the period from the thirteenth to the nineteenth centuries, in which P. This concentration on the nation state suggested itself, since the state monopoly on violence stood in the center of research on violence. Haupt, in International Encyclopedia of the Social & Behavioral Sciences, 2001 3.1 An International Comparison of Violence