The Art of Coercion
The Primitive Accumulation and Management of Coercive Power

Provides a new approach to thinking about security forces and their relationship to state building by examining the past two centuries of armed conflict.

The Art of Coercion offers a new approach to thinking about the role of security forces, in their broadest sense, in this transition between state formation and state-building. While focussing largely on the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, Giustozzi discusses coercive power throughout history, from the Carolingian empire to the Boer War, from Zapata's Mexico to China's Warring States. He scrutinises the role of armies, guerrilla bands, mercenaries, police forces and intelligence services, analyses why some coups fail and some succeed, and examines the ways in which the monopoly of violence decays.