User:Twospoonfuls/sandbox/2
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
A Letter of Denunciation is a form of document common to many societies intended to inform the authorities of the religious, moral, ideological or political unorthodoxy of the subject of the letter. Such a letter might be signed or anonymous and typically has no legal force (unlike a criminal complaint or indictment). Rather it is an illocutionary act intended to prompt an investigation by the authorities into the subject of the letter. Secret denunciations were perhaps first institutionalized during the principate period of the Roman Empire and the practice can be traced through many early modern states, however they came to have particular significance during the French Revolution and in the totalitarian regimes of the twentieth century where it was widely encouraged. Though informing of some kind or other is common to every society the practice is a salient characteristic of surveillance states and police states where it is pervasive.