This book examines the many faces and roles of police intelligence in practices of law enforcement and crime control, in line with new approaches in the history of bureaucracy and information management and, above all, in the history of the police and policing. It addresses the largely unexplored question of the production and uses of police intelligence, the institutions and tools involved, its contents, and how all these elements have changed over time from the late eighteenth century – when modern police systems and a transregional security culture focused on political surveillance started to develop – to the present day, a time of unprecedented use of information and communication technologies in policing. The book examines these developments on a global scale, analysing transnational information exchange and circulation of knowledge and intelligence techniques, and how they play out at regional and local levels. 'Intelligence' is not merely situated in its traditional context of high-level political policing and criminal investigation, but also in everyday practices of 'street-level policing', outside the strict political and judicial spheres, in both exceptional and ordinary contexts. Thus, several chapter discuss aspects of 'grass-roots' intelligence and its sources – citizens, but also the procedures behind it, such as complaints, testimonies, and neighbourhood enquiries – in the context of local surveillance practices.

Antoine Renglet is Associate Professor at the Catholique University of Louvain, Belgium. He published Policing Cities in Napoleon Europe with Palgrave Macmillan in 2022.

Margo De Koster is Director of the Amsab-Institute of Social History and Visiting Professor at Ghent University, Belgium.

Jonas Campion is Professor at the University of Trois-Rivières, Canada. He published European Police Forces and Law Enforcement in the First World War with Palgrave Macmillan in 2019 (co-edited with Laurent López and Guillaume Payen).

Xavier Rousseaux is Emeritus Professor of History and Honorary FNRS Research Associate at the Catholic University of Louvain, Belgium. He published Youth and Justice in Western States, 1815-1950: From Punishment to Welfare with Palgrave Macmillan in 2018 (co-edited with Jean Trepanier).