Crossing Frontiers to Chase Offenders: The Hardships of French and Belgian Police Collaboration at the Beginning of the 20th Century

Abstract

At the end of the long 19th century, the French and Belgian police forces experienced similar criticisms, stakes, and reorganization projects in many ways. The unification and centralization of judicial research, the teaching and modernization of questioning techniques, and the professionalization and specialization of law enforcement were significant issues in the public debate. Thus, they caused deep corporative divisions. The existence of increasingly dangerous and fewer and fewer repressed offenders — due to an increasingly fast mobility — who easily crossed frontiers was one of the main threats debated in the European spheres of criminal lawyers, legal practitioners, police officers, and other specialists.