1. Introduction -- 2. War, Hope, and Fear. – 3. Writings on Violence at the End of a Long Life -- 3. Figurational Analysis of Michael Haneke’s Time of the Wolf -- 4. Violence and Civilité: The Ambivalences of the State -- 5. Elias’ Civilizing Process and the Janus-faced of Modernity -- 6. Civilisation and Violence at the Periphery of Capitalism: Notes for Rethinking the Brazilian Civilizing Process -- 7. Self-Inflicted Wound: On the Paradoxical Dimensions of American Violence -- 8. Norbert Elias and State-building after Violent Conflict -- 9. Figurational Approach and Commemorating Violence in Central and Eastern Europe -- 10. Parliamentary Form of Government, Habitus, and Violence: The Case of Iran (1906-1925).This book presents key conceptualizations of violence as developed by Norbert Elias. The authors explain and exemplify these concepts by analyzing Elias’s late texts, comparing his views to those of Sigmund Freud, and by analyzing the work of filmmaker Michael Haneke. The authors then discuss the strengths and shortcomings of Elias’s thoughts on violence by examining various social processes such as colonization, imperialism, and the Brazilian civilizing process—in addition to the ambivalence of state violence. The final chapters suggest how these concepts can be used to explain difficulties in implementing democracy, grappling with memories of violence, and state building after democracy. .