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Europe in the 16th and 17th centuries was characterized by extreme violence. In his course at the Collège de France, Il faut défendre la société (1974/1975), M. Foucault has argued that the birth of the modern state, through the juridico-political theory of sovereignty, and Hobbes-style contractualism and Leviathan, falsely closed the problem. He offers an alternative based on counter-history, but disdains many of Montaigne 's materials that could reinforce his thesis.