Death Squad: The Anthropology of State Terror

This is a good starting point for any reader interested in the subject of state terror. The book is really a series of chapters written by various authors about different examples of state sponsored terror like: Guatemala, Spain, and Northern Ireland. Sluka, who is the editor for the book, also wrote a chapter on Northern Ireland, where he lived during different periods of the war. Sluka's chapter addresses in depth the collusion between British security forces and the Protestant loyalist paramilitaries who murdered innocent Catholic people in order to create fear. They hoped that the Catholic population would simply give into Protestant demands and allow them to continue running the Northern Ireland government while continuing to discriminate against the Catholic minority. Ultimately, this strategy backfired and only drove more Catholics into the arms of the IRA, the only institution that was willing to stand against the British state terror. "Death Squad" gives a good overview of the different ways that different countries have used government terror to advance the state's goal of maintaining power. However, some of the contributing authors - like the one who wrote about Spain - have a dry, academic writing style. This doesn't make the subject matter any less important, just more difficult to read.