Book reviews: Roadblock Politics: The Origins of Violence in Central Africa

political statements about state power, the shifting socio-political structures, and newly emerging cultural sensibilities. The Politics of Punishment is a strong book about prison policymaking in Scotland and Ireland. The strength of the book comes from its comparative and longitudinal approach. It critically analyzes two countries at the same time, guiding the reader through both places in a detailed way, with a deep understanding of the penal cultures of Ireland and Scotland. Besides, it relies on rich data, digging into under-research archives along with hours of interviews with people from key positions in both countries. It also contributes to the comparative penology literature by providing a new framework to compare different nations’ penal cultures with a great extent of scope. However, as a reader of this book, I expected to see how Ireland and Scotland, as two outliers within the Anglophone penalty, affected and were affected by the transformations in international penal culture. Moreover, it would be impressive to have at least an idea of how gender played a role in imprisonment regimes in both countries. Despite its minor drawbacks, it would be fair to conclude this review by recommending this book to anyone who has an interest in the sociology of punishment, prison policymaking, penal culture, and politics, along with comparative studies and historical sociology. With its accessible tone, it is for sure that the book will appeal to not just scholars from these fields but also ordinary readers who are interested in the histories of Ireland and Scotland.