The scientific significance of Collins's Violence.

The author discusses the problem of human aggression as addressed in the book "Violence: A Micro-sociological Theory," by Randall Collins, a noted sociologist. How Collins's book advances the scientific understanding of violent human behavior is questioned. The principal strengths of the book include a departure from a criminological perspective of violence, a consideration of violent acts from all structural levels of human behavior, and the formulation of an original theory of violence based on sociological perspective. The book's weak points are described as an unsatisfactory distinction between violence and non-violence in individual situations, a failure to discern predatory from moralistic violence, and the notion that violence is rare because it is "difficult."