Taking Lives: Genocide and State Power

Taking Lives is a pivotal effort to reconstruct the social and political contexts of twentieth century, state-inspired mass murder. Horowitz reexamines genocide from a new perspective, viewing this issue as the defining element in the political sociology of our time. This new fifth edition includes approximately 30% new materials and five new chapters.

The work is divided into five parts: “Present as History,” “Past as Prologue,” “Future as Memory,” “Toward a General Theory of State-Sponsored Crime,” and “Studying Genocide.” This new edition concludes with chapters reviewing the history of genocide studies from 1945 to the present, along with a candid self-appraisal of the author’s work in this field over four decades.

Taking Lives asserts that genocide is not a sporadic or random event, nor is it necessarily linked to economic development or social progress. Genocide is a special sort of mass destruction conducted with the approval of the state apparatus. This is a fundamental work for political scientists, sociologists, and all those concerned with the state’s propensity towards evil.