Search results

Xavier Rousseaux, Civil and Military Justice and Civilians under the Directory : the Example of the 24th and 25th Military Divisions.
To reestablish public order troubled at once by banditry and by resistance to the Revolution, the Directory resorted to various forms of military jurisdictions. The recourse to these forms of military justice for civilian crimes has received little scholarly attention even for the West and the Midi. This article examines the practice throughout the 24th and 25th military divisions for the Belgian departments united on 9 vendémiaire IV to the French Republic. This study shows that recourse to these jurisdictions, above all to the « conseils de guerre » favored during the repression of the revolt of the year VII, might help to distinguish the treatment of « insurgents » compared with ordinary bandits. To judge civilians by military courts elicited certain reservations from civil and military authorities alike. The theory advanced here is that the experience of the « Belgian » departments contributed to the creation of Special Criminel Courts integrated into the civil judicial order, but composed of civilian and military judges.

«From 'violent incident' to 'heinous crime'». In Western history, homicide is regarded as a behaviour open to a variety of social reactions. A review of the literature reveals a model of social control without criminalization up to 1500, followed by strict criminalization of lethal agression (1550-1650) and a long decline in recorded homicides (1650-1960). The sociological works of Durkheim, Mauss, Weber and Elias discuss the place of homicide in social regulation and underline factors such as collective awareness, civilization of manners and the role of the formation of the State in the social construction of homicide.

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

Préface, dans Quentin VERREYCKEN, 'Pour nous servir en l'armée'. Le gouvernement et le pardon des gens de guerre sous Charles le Téméraire, duc de Bourgogne (1467-1477), Louvain-la-Neuve, Presses universitaires de Louvain, 2014 (coll. Histoire, justice, sociétés).

Préface, dans Quentin VERREYCKEN, 'Pour nous servir en l'armée'. Le gouvernement et le pardon des gens de guerre sous Charles le Téméraire, duc de Bourgogne (1467-1477), Louvain-la-Neuve, Presses universitaires de Louvain, 2014 (coll. Histoire, justice, sociétés).

States, Criminal Justice and History : a review and some Perspectives.
In the past 30 years, research on the State has followed various paraïlel paths. Beside Works of legal sociology, philos ophy and anthropology, a history of crime and criminal justice and a history of State formation have developped separately. This article attempts to assess the state of knowledge within these latter perspectives. In the course of the development of crime and criminal justice history the interest of historians has shifted from criminal behaviour to judicial institutions, and more recently to their political dimension.
On the other hand, social historians interested in the formation of modem States have neglected the role played by criminal justice in the process of State modernisation. Built on this dual approach (crime and criminal justice and history of State), the paper proposes a reading of the development of criminal justice and state power in Western Europe from the Middle-Age to the 20th Century. From this perspective there has been a progressive transition from a local judicial system controlled by citizens to one controlled by the prince, as an instrument of monarchie sovereignity, and then to a bureaucratie State judicial system. This transition has taken various forms depending on the type of political and territorial structure involved. Criminal justice is thus seen as a crucial aspect of modem State formation.