BARIS CAYLI MESSINA
I am a comparative-historical sociologist and social and political theorist studying power, violence, authoritarianism, repression, and collective resistance. At the centre of my research lies a question about the making and unmaking of political and social orders. Why do some political and social orders endure despite generations of conflict, while others are fundamentally transformed? I investigate the historical and social processes through which authority is established, violence is legitimised, and repression becomes embedded in institutions and everyday life. Yet history is never made by those who govern alone. Equally central to my scholarship are the struggles of communities that refuse to accept injustice, preserve the memory of resistance, defend human dignity, and seek to change the conditions under which they live.
I am Associate Professor at the School of Law, Politics, and Society, University of Lincoln. I am the author of four research monographs, published or forthcoming with McGill-Queen's University Press, Cornell University Press, the University of California Press, and Temple University Press. My research projects have been funded by prestigious organisations and in 2026, I received the Sakip Sabanci International Research Award.
My editorial leadership roles include Book Series Editor for Temple Studies in Criminalization, History, and Society, published by Temple University Press, Editor-in-Chief of the International Social Science Journal (Wiley/UNESCO), Editor of Sociology Compass for original article submissions.
I am very happily married to Gioacchino Messina.
Across continents, societies have perfected a system for destroying queer lives. Queer Under Siege is the first book to map this as a unified global process of repression, tracing its transformations from the 1950s to the present through archives, court records, suicide letters, and activist testimony. As the assault on queer existence intensifies worldwide, this book bears witness to both the cruelty of repressive social orders and the rebellions that refuse to surrender across Europe, the United States, Asia and Africa.
A sharp, global narrative revealing how autocrats weaponize morality and strategically splinter communities to consolidate power. Drawing on archival research as well as social, political, and historical analysis, the book moves from Nazi Germany and Maoist China to East Germany and apartheid South Africa, and from contemporary Turkey and Poland to the United States, Iran, Israel, Russia, and beyond.
A sweeping history of Sicilians’ resistance to the mafia, from the 1850s to the present. Drawing on extensive archival research and longitudinal ethnography, the book reconstructs nearly two centuries of struggle, from individual acts of defiance to collective movements against entrenched mafia power. It reveals how violence, institutional betrayal, and extraordinary civic courage have shaped the modern history of Sicily and Italy, offering a new understanding of why some revolutions unfold not over years or decades, but across generations.
The first comprehensive comparative historical study of militant violence, tracing its evolution from Ottoman rebellions to contemporary jihadist organisations across Afghanistan, the Middle East, and Europe. Drawing on archival research spanning centuries and geographical boundaries, the book examines how armed movements emerge, evolve, and respond to changing political, social, and historical conditions. The book offers a historically grounded understanding of how militant organisations adapt and transform, illuminating both the continuities and significant differences that shape political violence across generations and societies.
I wrote for Social Europe regarding the on-going student protests in Paris. Read here:
France’s Student Revolt Exposes a State That Cannot Provide but Can Police
