Law is not born of nature, beside the springs frequented by the first shepherds; law is born of real battles, of victories, of massacres, of conquests that have their dates and their heroes of horror; law is born from cities set ablaze, from ravaged lands; it is born with the famous innocents who agonize in the breaking dawn. —Michel Foucault, ‘Society Must Be Defended’: Lectures at the CollĆØge de France, 1975–76 , trans. David Macey, New York 2003 [1997], p. 50. La loi ne naĆ®t pas de la nature . . . la loi naĆ®t des batailles rĆ©elles, des victoires, des massacres, des conquĆŖtes qui ont leur date et leur hĆ©ros d’horreur: la loi naĆ®t des villes incendiĆ©es, des terres ravagĆ©es; elle naĆ®t avec les fameux innocents qui agonisent dans le jour qui se lĆØve. —Michel Foucault, ‘Il faut dĆ©fendre la sociĆ©tĆ©’ footnote
“The West won the world not by the superiority of its ideas or values or religion (to which few members of other civilizations were converted) but rather by its superiority in applying organized violence. Westerners often forget this fact; non-Westerners never do.” —Samuel P. Huntington, The Clash of Civilisation and the Remaking of the World Order, 1996, p. 51