scholarly journals Transgressing to teach: Theorising race and security through struggle

Politics ◽  
2021 ◽  
pp. 026339572110606
Author(s):  
Chris Rossdale
Keyword(s):  
International Relations ◽  
White Supremacy ◽  
Black Panther Party ◽  
Racial Violence ◽  
Security Studies ◽  
Global Politics ◽  
Important Work ◽  
Critical Security Studies ◽  
The Us ◽  
Self Defence

Recent interventions in critical security studies have argued that the field has struggled to account for the racialised/racist foundations of security politics. This article engages with the US Black Panther Party (BPP), arguing that the Party did important work to show how security politics is dependent on racial violence. The idea that we can theorise global politics through struggle (`struggle as method’) is becoming popular within disciplinary International Relations (IR), but has longer lineages in Black radical thought. The BPP were important advocates of struggle as method, with tactics and strategies intentionally designed with a pedagogical purpose; through Panther actions (including community self-defence and survival programmes), and the state’s response to these, the mechanisms of capitalist white supremacy were laid bare. The article therefore acknowledges BPP action as a series of theoretical interventions, which demonstrated how the terms of US/white security are rooted in and dependent on anti-Blackness. It also shows how Panther tactics prefigured alternative, radical, anti-statist approaches to security, these conceptualised as `survival pending revolution’. The article closes by arguing that scholarship on critical security studies - especially as related to the racialised politics of security - should do more to work with and acknowledge its indebtedness to struggle as method.

THE FIRST MODERN REALIST: FELIX GILBERT'S MACHIAVELLI AND THE REALIST TRADITION IN INTERNATIONAL THOUGHT

2015 ◽  
Vol 13 (3) ◽  
pp. 681-711 ◽  
Author(s):  
NICOLAS GUILHOT
Keyword(s):  
International Relations ◽  
Political Science ◽  
International Relations Theory ◽  
Security Studies ◽  
Historical Scholarship ◽  
Global Power ◽  
The Us ◽  
New Interpretation ◽  
International Thought

In the disciplines of political science and international relations, Machiavelli is unanimously considered to be “the first modern realist.” This essay argues that the idea of a realist tradition going from the Renaissance to postwar realism founders when one considers the disrepute of Machiavelli among early international relations theorists. It suggests that the transformation of Machiavelli into a realist thinker took place subsequently, when new historical scholarship, informed by strategic and political considerations related to the transformation of the US into a global power, generated a new picture of the Renaissance. Focusing on the work of Felix Gilbert, and in particular hisMachiavelli and Guicciardini, the essay shows how this new interpretation of Machiavelli was shaped by the crisis of the 1930s, the emergence of security studies, and the philanthropic sponsorship of international relations theory.

Making amends: Towards an antiracist critical security studies and international relations

2021 ◽  
Vol 52 (1_suppl) ◽  
pp. 8-16
Author(s):  
Navnita Chadha Behera ◽  
Kristina Hinds ◽  
Arlene B Tickner
Keyword(s):  
International Relations ◽  
Security Studies ◽  
Critical Security Studies

Poststructuralism and Security

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Lene Hansen
Keyword(s):  
Cold War ◽  
International Relations ◽  
War On Terror ◽  
September 11 ◽  
Security Studies ◽  
Power Structures ◽  
Important Work ◽  
Important Challenge ◽  
The Cold War ◽  
War Discourse

Poststructuralism is an International Relations (IR) theory that entered the domain of Security Studies during the Second Cold War. During this period, poststructuralists engaged with power, security, the militarization of the superpower relationship, and the dangers that the nuclear condition was believed to entail. Poststructuralism’s concern with power, structures, and the disciplining effects of knowledge seemed to resonate well with the main themes of classical realist Security Studies. At the same time, the discursive ontology and epistemology of poststructuralism set it apart not only from Strategic Studies, but from traditional peace researchers who insisted on “real world” material referents and objective conceptions of security. The unexpected end of the Cold War brought challenges as well as opportunities for poststructuralism. The most important challenge that arose was whether states needed enemies. The terrorist attacks of September 11 and “The War on Terror” also had a profound impact on poststructuralist discourse. First, poststructuralists held that “terrorism” and “terrorists” had no objective, material referent, but were signs that constituted a radical Other. They viewed the actions on September 11 as “terror,” “acts of war,” and “orchestrated,” rather than “accidents” committed by a few individuals. The construction of “terrorists” as “irrational” intersected with poststructuralist deconstructions of rational–irrational dichotomies that had also been central to Cold War discourse. These responses to “the War on Terror” demonstrated that poststructuralist theory still informs important work in Security Studies and that there are also crucial intersections between poststructuralism and other approaches in IR.

scholarly journals Conceptualizing Power in Dynamics of Securitization

2019 ◽  
Keyword(s):  
International Relations ◽  
21St Century ◽  
Art History ◽  
Focal Point ◽  
Cultural Anthropology ◽  
Point Of View ◽  
Security Studies ◽  
Historical Case ◽  
Critical Security Studies

This volume addresses the ‘question of power’ in current constructivist securitisation studies. How can power relations that affect security and insecurity be analysed from both a transdisciplinary and historical point of view? The volume brings together contributions from history, art history, political science, sociology, cultural anthropology and law in order to determine the role of conceptions of power in securitisation studies, which has tended to be dealt with implicitly thus far. Using conceptual theoretical essays and historical case studies that cover the period from the 16th to the 21st century, this book portrays the dominant paradigms of critical security studies, which mostly stem from the field of international relations and see the state as a major focal point in securitisation, in a new light.

scholarly journals Brzezinski and Mackinder theories: Role and influence on the political construction of Eurasia

2020 ◽  
Vol 13 (4) ◽  
pp. 527-535
Author(s):  
Akanksha Singh ◽  
Keyword(s):  
International Relations ◽  
Real World ◽  
American Foreign Policy ◽  
Primary Objective ◽  
Global Politics ◽  
The Political ◽  
Shanghai Cooperation Organization ◽  
The Core ◽  
One Belt One Road ◽  
The Us

International relations theories act as the guiding lantern to provide a simple yet powerful description of international phenomena such as war, expansionism, alliances and cooperation. Thus, the primary objective of this article is to analyze international relations theories, their roles and influence on global politics hereby bridging the gap between the abstract world of theory and the real world of policy. The article utilizes the Grand Chess Board and Heartland theories on the regional geopolitical processes in Eurasia. The core argument of the article is that theoretical perception creates regional identities, and states use these emerged identities to influence geopolitical traditions. The Grand Chess Board theory of Brzezinski states that in order to sustain its position as a global hegemon, the US needs to control and manage Eurasia. Moreover, this article analyses American foreign policy in Eurasia under the umbrella of the Grand Chess Board theory. The Chinese strategy towards Eurasia through the prism of Mackinder’s Heartland theory is also explored. By analyzing initiatives such as One Belt One Road (OBOR), the Shanghai Cooperation Organization and the energy push in Central Asia, this article can serve as an examination into the Chinese taking up the mantle of the heartland to emerge as the land power of the 21st century

scholarly journals My Critique is Bigger than Yours: Constituting Exclusions in Critical Security Studies

2009 ◽  
Vol 3 (1) ◽  
pp. 9-22 ◽  
Author(s):  
David Roger Mutimer
Keyword(s):  
Theory And Practice ◽  
Security Studies ◽  
Global Politics ◽  
Critical Security Studies ◽  
The Past ◽  
Critical Scholarship ◽  
Critical Insight

Critical Security Studies proceeds from the premise that words are world-making, that is that the ways we think about security are constitutive of the worlds of security we analyse. Turned to conventional security studies and the practices of global politics, this critical insight has revealed the ways in which the exclusions that are the focus of this conference have been produced. Perhaps most notable in this regard has been David Campbell's work, showing how the theory and practice of security are an identity discourse producing both insides and outsides, but the production of excluded others is a theme that runs through the critical scholarship on security in the past decade or more. This article turns the critical security studies gaze on itself, to explore the field's own complicity in the production of exclusions. The article reads three important instances of critical security studies for the inclusions and exclusions they produce: Ken Booth's Theory of World Securitv, the epilogue to David Campbell's Writing Security, and the CASE Collective Manifesto. The article concludes by asking about the nature of the inclusions and exclusions these divisions produce and the politics which those exclusions, in turn, (re)produce.

scholarly journals Surveillance under dispute: Conceptualising narrative legitimation politics

2020 ◽  
pp. 1-23
Author(s):  
Christopher Smith Ochoa ◽  
Frank Gadinger ◽  
Taylan Yildiz
Keyword(s):  
Narrative Analysis ◽  
Reference Points ◽  
Security Studies ◽  
Effect Change ◽  
Critical Security Studies ◽  
The Us ◽  
Security Practices ◽  
The Everyday ◽  
Pragmatic Sociology ◽  
Normative Consensus

Abstract Current debates about surveillance demonstrate the complexity of political controversies whose uncertainty and moral ambiguities render normative consensus difficult to achieve. The question of how to study political controversies remains a challenge for IR scholars. Critical security studies scholars have begun to examine political controversies around surveillance by exploring changing security practices in the everyday. Yet, (de)legitimation practices have hitherto not been the focus of analysis. Following recent practice-oriented research, we develop a conceptual framework based on the notion of ‘narrative legitimation politics’. We first introduce the concept of ‘tests’ from Boltanski's pragmatic sociology to categorise the discursive context and different moral reference points (truth, reality, existence). Second, we combine pragmatic sociology with narrative analysis to enable the study of dominant justificatory practices. Third, we develop the framework through a practice-oriented exploration of the Snowden controversy with a focus on the US and Germany. We identify distinct justificatory practices in each test format linked to narrative devices (for example, plots, roles, metaphors) whose fluid, contested dynamics have the potential to effect change. The framework is particularly relevant for IR scholars interested in legitimacy issues, the normativity of practices, and the power of narratives.

scholarly journals Assembling credibility: Knowledge, method and critique in times of ‘post-truth’

2018 ◽  
Vol 50 (1) ◽  
pp. 40-58 ◽  
Author(s):  
Claudia Aradau ◽  
Jef Huysmans
Keyword(s):  
International Relations ◽  
Knowledge Creation ◽  
Security Studies ◽  
Critical Security Studies ◽  
Critical Approaches ◽  
Knowledge Practice ◽  
Knowledge Claims ◽  
Scientific Standards ◽  
Critical Lines ◽  
Scientific Accomplishment

Critical approaches in security studies have been increasingly turning to methods and standards internal to knowledge practice to validate their knowledge claims. This quest for scientific standards now also operates against the background of debates on ‘post-truth’, which raise pressing and perplexing questions for critical lines of thought. We propose a different approach by conceptualizing validity as practices of assembling credibility in which the transversal formation and circulation of credits and credentials combine with disputes over credence and credulity. This conceptualization of the validity of (critical) security knowledge shifts the focus from epistemic and methodological standards to transepistemic practices and relations. It allows us to mediate validity critically as a sociopolitical rather than strictly scientific accomplishment. Developing such an understanding of validity makes it possible for critical security studies and international relations to displace epistemic disputes about ‘post-truth’ with transversal practices of knowledge creation, circulation and accreditation.

Simulating, marketing, and playing war: US–Jordanian military collaboration and the politics of commercial security

2017 ◽  
Vol 48 (5) ◽  
pp. 431-450 ◽  
Author(s):  
Benjamin Schuetze
Keyword(s):  
Department Of Defense ◽  
Human Subjects ◽  
Security Studies ◽  
Leadership Programs ◽  
Corporate Leadership ◽  
Private Business ◽  
Special Forces ◽  
Special Operations ◽  
Critical Security Studies ◽  
The Us

The King Abdullah II Special Operations Training Center (KASOTC) was financed and established by the US Department of Defense, is operated by a US private business, and is owned by the Jordanian army. It not only offers a base for the training of international Special Forces and Jordanian border guards, but also for military adventure holidays, corporate leadership programs, and stunt training for actors. This article provides an analysis of the processes and technologies involved in US–Jordanian military collaboration by investigating some of the ways in which war is simulated, marketed, and played at KASOTC. Particular focus is paid to the stark biopolitical judgments about the different worth of human subjects and their role in intersecting processes of militarization and commercialization. The article argues that US–Jordanian military collaboration at KASOTC is marked by the simultaneous blurring and reinforcement of boundaries, as commercial security is moralized and imagined moral hierarchies marketized. While war at KASOTC is an interactive and consumable event for some, it engenders deadly realities for others. The article is an empirically-grounded contribution to critical security studies based on interviews and observations made during a visit to KASOTC in early 2013.

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