Death Squads in Global Perspective

Whether in the form of quasi-state or rogue groups, armed factions engaged in violence have played important roles in atrocities across time and place. This collection examines the actions, roles and influence of death squads in such countries as Weimar Germany, El Salvador, South Africa and the Balkans. With ethnic conflict and the implosion of states an on-going cause of instability, this book provides insights and should appeal to such classes as comparative genocide, ethnic conflict and generally violence. Death squads have become an increasingly common feature of the modern world. In nearly all instances, their establishment is tolerated, encouraged or undertaken by the state itself, which thereby risks its monopoly on the use of force, one of the fundamental characteristics of modern states. Why do such a variety of regimes, under very different circumstances, condone such activity? This text hopes to answer that question and explain not only their development, but also why they can be expected to proliferate in the early 21st century.