Assistant Professor Mathieu Deflem
Ph.D., University of Colorado, 1996
Email:  deflem@gwm.sc.edu

Mathieu Deflem studied sociology and anthropology at the Katholieke Universiteit te Leuven (Belgium) and the University of Hull (England). Receiving his Ph.D. from the University of Colorado in 1996, he previously held positions at Kenyon College and Purdue University. His main areas of research are law and social control, comparative-historical sociology, and theory.

Deflem has just completed a project, funded by the National Science Foundation, on the history of international policing, results of which are reported in his book, Policing World Society (Oxford University Press, 2002). Partly aided by a faculty grant from the Walker Institute, his current research applies the insights from his historical work to the contemporary context of police strategies in counter-terrorism. In the Fall of 2003, Deflem will teach a course on "Policing International Terrorism" in the Honors College.

Other scholarly activities with an international focus include research on the role of police institutions in African colonization; the function of law enforcement in the international war on drugs and with respect to border control; state formation in Zulu history; and popular support for European unification. Deflem also maintains the website of the Comparative and Historical Sociology section in the American Sociological Association (www.comphistsoc.org).