Chapter I outlines distinctions between criminal and civil law on the one hand and public and private enforcement on the other. It places criminal copyright in its broader context with a discussion of international efforts to criminalize copyright infringements. The purpose of this chapter is to lay the foundation for the core argument of the book: copyright law is in the midst of a criminalization process that could result in a paradigm shift from civil to criminal copyright. It will acquaint the reader with the international context of criminal copyright and proper tools for evaluating the movement toward public enforcement models as exemplified by the case studies of the United Kingdom and the United States.