Terrorism, Risk and International Security

Security Dialogue
http://sdi.sagepub.com/ Terrorism, Risk and International Security: The Perils of Asking 'What If?'
Gabe Mythen and Sandra Walklate Security Dialogue 2008 39: 221 DOI: 10.1177/0967010608088776 The online version of this article can be found at: http://sdi.sagepub.com/content/39/2-3/221
Published by:
http://www.sagepublications.com
On behalf of:
International Peace Research Institute, Oslo
Additional services and information for Security Dialogue can be found at: Email Alerts: http://sdi.sagepub.com/cgi/alerts Subscriptions: http://sdi.sagepub.com/subscriptions Reprints: http://www.sagepub.com/journalsReprints.nav Permissions: http://www.sagepub.com/journalsPermissions.nav Citations: http://sdi.sagepub.com/content/39/2-3/221.refs.html
>> Version of Record - Mar 20, 2008 What is This?
Downloaded from sdi.sagepub.com at b-on: 00500 Universidade de Coimbra on May 28, 2012
Special Issue on Security, Technologies of Risk, and the Political
Terrorism, Risk and International Security: The Perils of Asking What If?
GABE MYTHEN & SANDRA WALKLATE*
School of Sociology and Social Policy, University of Liverpool, UK

In this article, we explore the ways in which cross-disciplinary theories of risk can enable us to grasp salient issues that arise out of the construction, assessment and regulation of terrorism in contemporary society. First, we demonstrate how risk society theory can be utilized to unpack the changing nature of terrorism. Second, deploying Furedis work on the culture of fear, we show how the discourse of terrorism nestles into a broader politics of risk that is disproportionately directing economic and political policies and encouraging a climate of public anxiety. Third, utilizing the tools of the governmentality perspective, the linkages between measures designed to combat the terrorist threat and authoritarian domestic law and order policies are elucidated. We go on to analyse the contents and practices of the war on terror, arguing that the offensive and pre-emptive strategies that it legitimates are wedded to a creeping shift in risk assessment from retrospective estimations of harm to an outlook based on futurity. It is posited that this shift ushers in a number of contradictions and dilemmas around the political deployment of discourses of risk. Keywords risk terrorism governance security
Introduction
ONSEQUENT TO THE EVENTS OF 9/11, issues of national security and transnational crime have risen up the political agenda (Fletcher, 2006; Furedi, 2007; Mythen & Walklate, 2006b). Since that time, a string of high-profile incidents, including the Bali bombings, the Madrid train explosions, attacks on the London Underground and the car bomb at Glasgow Airport, have fixed international terrorism as a critical social problem. In many Western nations, terrorism has assumed centre stage in political exchanges about risk and human security, driven by the belief that a new form of global terrorism has emerged (Furedi, 2005: 319; Gregory & Wilkinson, 2005; Lacquer, 2000). This new terrorism, typified by the actions
2008 PRIO, www.prio.no SAGE Publications, http://sdi.sagepub.com Vol. 39(23): 221242, DOI: 10.1177/0967010608088776
222
Security Dialogue vol. 39, no. 23, April 2008
of extreme Islamic fundamentalist groups, has been distinguished from preceding forms of violence practised by terrorist organizations such as ETA and the IRA (Morgan, 2004; 9/11 Commission, 2004). Instead of operating with unified ideological aims and delineated hierarchies, new terrorist groups are defined by their amorphous objectives, scattered following and ability to strike across different continents (Ould Mohamedou, 2007: 3). Rather than being locally self-financed, new terrorism is said to be funded by a wider net of sources around the globe, including donations by private financiers, charities and NGOs (9/11 Commission, 2004: 57). What is more, extreme terrorist groups such as Al-Qaeda are described as willing to launch spectacular assaults that specifically target the civilian population (Gregory & Wilkinson, 2005: 3). We will return to the conceptual and descriptive utility of the term new terrorism shortly, but it needs to be stated at the outset that terrorism is a historically embedded entity, regardless of whether it is prefixed with new. Insofar as the concept of new terrorism is contested and contestable, dominant media and political discourses post 9/11 have accepted and perpetuated its ideological existence. Accordingly, political discussions in the West have focused on a cluster of interlinked issues, including the increased magnitude of threat, novel modes of attack, the robustness of emergency management procedures and the efficacy of counter-terrorist measures. Of course, it is easy to see why terrorism has become a fundamental political concern in Western capitalist cultures. Terrorist attacks effectively undo the liberal myth that the state is able to secure order and maintain territorial control (Garland, 1997: 448). It is important to note also that current political discussions about the destructive consequences of terrorism have become embedded in a broader set of discursive formations that have encouraged the public to be vigilant and think security (de Lint & Virta, 2004: 466). This command to think security extends beyond the ideological and the symbolic. The prevailing discourse of (in)security acts as a linchpin for political decisions that have produced and are reproducing economic and material effects (Burkitt, 2005; McLaren & Martin, 2004; Neocleous, 2006).1 The key objective of the present article is to examine the utility of theories of risk in extending understanding about the nature, regulation and management of terrorism. To this end, through the lens of the risk society perspective, we illustrate how the conceptual framework provided by Ulrich Beck can illuminate the changing nature of terrorism in contemporary society. We subsequently draw on Frank Furedis work on the culture of fear, to argue that the discourse of terrorism constitutes part of a safety-conscious politics of risk that is acting as a lever for a wide range of social policies. Finally,
Government spending on counter-terrorism in the UK will top 2 billion in 2007/08, as compared to 1.5 billion in 2004/05 and less than 1 billion prior to 11 September 2001.
Gabe Mythen & Sandra Walklate Terrorism, Risk and International Security
223
borrowing from the governmentality perspective, we unspool the thread which joins the international war on terror to domestic law and order policies.2 Although the theories considered here historically predate both 9/11 and the formation of discourses of new terrorism, we will demonstrate that each perspective provides a different aperture through which the problem of contemporary terrorism can be surveyed. To be clear, the object of the article is not to evaluate the wider integrity of theories of risk nor to comment on which has the greatest social utility. Rather, we are seeking to discuss the potentialities of cross-disciplinary theories of risk in unravelling the construction, deployment and governance of terrorism. In addition to considering the possibilities of risk theories, we wish to problematize the creeping transfer among security agencies from retrospective estimations of harm to a futuredriven outlook and tie this to the political deployment of risk. Although we draw on examples from several countries, our lens is most firmly fixed on the UK. Not only has Britain been the site of two recent terrorist attacks, it also has developed comparatively extensive legal and security countermeasures post 9/11, factors that make it an important site of examination.3
Terrorism in the Risk Society: The Globalization of Insecurity?

The major political and security issues that have affected Western nations over the last two decades have been conceptualized in a number of ways within the social sciences. One of the most renowned attempts to grasp recent societal transformations can be found in Becks (1992) ubiquitously cited Risk Society. Developed there and in subsequent texts (Beck, 1995, 1996), the risk society thesis documents the deleterious effects of environmental risks on everyday life while paradoxically championing the emancipatory capacity of risk to generate productive dialogue in the political sphere. In prcis, Beck recounts an epochal shift from industrial society to the risk society, which is supported by three pillars (Mythen, 2004: 17). First, contemporary security risks are defined as unique in their degree of temporal and spatial mobility. In comparison to the restricted harms arising in pre-industrial cultures, the threats of the risk society cannot be temporally or geographically enclosed. In effect, the localized hazards common in industrial society have been supplanted by the de-bounded dangers of the risk society. As the international
For analytical purposes, we will use the more commonly used US term war on terror, rather than the war against terrorism that is widely used in the UK. It should further be added that the UK already has a relative glut of counter-terrorism laws, which were advanced in the years of struggle between the British government, Loyalist paramilitaries and the IRA.
224
reach of terrorist networks demonstrates, national security is, in the borderless age of risks, no longer national security (Beck, 2002b: 14). Second, it is argued that risks have come to possess greater potential for harm in the modern age. Not only do manufactured risks stretch the globe, they also generate irremediable effects. Beck (2002b: 9) believes that the acceleration of techno-scientific development has served to intensify, not alleviate, risk production: the risks of terrorism exponentially multiply with technological advancement. With the technologies of the future genetic engineering, nanotechnology and robotics, we are opening a new Pandoras box. Third, the destructive force of manufactured risks shatters extant methods of insurance, as typified by the Chernobyl incident. In industrial society, hazards are predicted and managed through insurance policies, welfare support systems and legal rules. By contrast, in the global risk society, the violent force of worst imaginable accidents (WIAs) overpowers methods of institutional regulation. Beck (2003) has it that these fluctuations in the composition and distribution of risk reshape notions of security and alter the content of politics and public policy. As the focus within Western capitalist societies tilts away from the positive problem of acquiring goods (e.g. income, health care, housing) toward the negative issue of avoiding bads (e.g. environmental despoliation, AIDS and terrorism), overriding political conflicts are no longer about possession, but avoidance. Given that the foremost threats of the world risk society remain constant across space and place, the globality of security threats effectively democratizes the distribution of risk. While the logic of the class society is sectoral some win and some lose the logic of the risk society is universal everyone loses. In a perverse twist of fate, the systemic risks produced as side-effects of capitalist expansion produce a boomerang effect, returning to haunt affluent Western nations. So, how can we draw on risk society theory to make sense of the changing nature of terrorism? In many respects, terrorism serves as a classic risk society problem, bearing the principal hallmarks of the manufactured risk (Mythen & Walklate, 2006a). It is worth solidifying this supposition by alluding to the three pillars of risk. In relation to the first pillar, which accents mobility, dominant political narratives in the USA and the UK have reinforced the idea that the terrorist threat is geographically universal. In the words of former British prime minister Tony Blair (2004), we have got to be totally vigilant in the face of the threat because all major countries around the world face the same threat. The topography of the terrorist threat thus invites parallels with Becks claims about the universality of manufactured risks. Insofar as the distribution of threats in industrial society tracks hierarchical class structures, it might be argued that the terrorist risk forms a circular arc that effectively encircles extant ladders of affluence and poverty. Ultimately, avoiding a terrorist attack is impossible, even for the affluent. As Beck (1996: 32) puts it, there are no bystanders anymore. For risk society
225
thinkers, the mobility and permanence of the threat of terrorism stretches the boundaries of time and space.4 Taking the second pillar of risk, the catastrophic nature of consequences, the modes of attack open to terrorist groups can be linked to the developmental dynamics of the risk society. Constructed as a dominant political rhetoric, the war on terror defines an existential threat that, owing to its magnitude, necessitates that exceptional security measures be taken (Gill, 2006: 42). Politicians and security experts have routinely warned the public about all manner of potential threats, including radiological dispersal devices, biological and chemical attack and airstrikes against nuclear facilities. For some, Al-Qaeda carries the most dangerous threat ever presented by a non-state group (Gregory & Wilkinson, 2005: 2). This kind of apocalyptic vision can be aligned with Becks (2002a: 46) dramatic cautioning: the theory of world risk society is not just another kind of end-of-history idea: this time world history does not end with the resolution of political and social tensions, as Marx and Fukuyama believed, but with the end of the world itself. There are doubtless elements of a boomerang effect in the way in which terrorist groups have been able to turn techno-scientific advances against their creators. For instance, the dubious fruits of neoliberal capitalism have been skilfully harnessed by terrorist groups through activities such as phishing, money-laundering, tax evasion and identity theft (Sassen, 2002: 235). Third, it could be postulated that terrorism cannot be effectively insured against. The creation of generalized anxiety is a strategic terrorist objective, directed through the targeting of quotidian areas of civilian use. Owing to uncertainty about the nature and location of forthcoming attacks, it is difficult to perform dependable risk assessments and to identify safe spaces. The unpredictable nature of terrorist attacks makes it impossible for security agencies and governments to guarantee public security. For Beck, the nowarning suicide-bomb method used in recent attacks in the UK wipes out the principles of social insurance and criminal justice: in a strict sense, the act and the suicide bomber are one. A suicide bomber can neither commit a suicide attack more than once, nor can State authorities convict him. This singularity is marked by the simultaneity of act, confession and selfextinguishment (Beck, 2002b: 8). Despite its apparent theoretical applicability, there are also limits to Becks thesis and problems associated with its appeal to the novelty of terrorism (see Aradau & van Munster, 2007; Mythen, 2005; Mythen & Walklate, 2006a). In contrast to the positive dovetails above, there are also incongruities. Although the new terrorist threat may be potentially universal, in practice certain countries largely those with histories of economic, cultural, political and religious imperialism are more endangered than others. We may not be
4
Individuals and groups inspired by the philosophy of Al-Qaeda, for example, are thought to reside in at least 60 countries across the globe (Barnaby, 2002: 131; ISP/NSC, 2005: 1).
226
completely surprised if the UK or the USA were subjected to future attacks by Islamic fundamentalist terrorist groups, but it may puzzle us if Slovenia were. Further, Becks meta-narrative of global bads needs to be rigorously probed and evidentially validated. Although the spectre of WIAs may induce anxiety, it is debatable whether catastrophic events are more or less likely to happen today than in bygone eras.5 Despite recent attacks in Spain and the UK, we need to remember that in Western nations at least terrorism remains a high-consequence, low-probability risk. Once we make the distinction between risk as hypothetical possibility and risk as actual harm, the universalizing language of the risk society narrative comes unstuck. Clearly, certain classes of people living in certain areas and regions are more at risk than others. As the recent miscommunication of Iraqs weapons of mass destruction capability in the UK and the USA demonstrates, a propensity to believe the worst-case scenario among political elites can lead to raw, slap-dash militarism, bringing ruinous consequences.6 Hypothetical risks may operate along a sliding scale, but there are no degrees of death. Despite well-documented and widely mediated fears about chemical, biological and radiological attacks, the methods recently used by individuals and groups assembled under the banner of new terrorism have been low-tech and relatively crude, as borne out by the 2005 attacks on the London Underground and the 2007 car bomb at Glasgow Airport. Consequently, it would be unwise to hastily concur with notions of a paradigm shift in the nature of terrorism and sagacious to deconstruct the claims forwarded by proponents of the new terrorism thesis (Mockaitis, 2007; Whyte & Burnett, 2005). Although Beck is right that traditional methods of calculating risk are theoretically confounded by the suicide bombing, such incidents are extremely rare in Western countries. Furthermore, as we will demonstrate, the political aftershock of such attacks can be used to extend as well as threaten the powers of dominant institutions.
Terrorism, Fear and the Politics of Risk

Having discussed the functionality of the risk society thesis as a tool for unpicking the changing nature of terrorism, we now turn to our second theory of risk, commonly associated with the work of Frank Furedi. Serving as a counterpoint to Becks predominantly realist perspective on risk,
5
Amid rumours about the perilous possibilities of hi-tech weaponry, we should remember that the blunt force of territorial warfare claimed over 100 million lives in the course of the 20th century (Eagleton, 2001: 15). Figures released by Iraq Body Count indicate that between 77,333 and 84,250 civilians have been killed since the ongoing military intervention in Iraq; see http://www.iraqbodycount.org/ (accessed 26 November 2007).
227
Furedis culture of fear approach is strongly constructionist. Furedi (2002, 2005, 2007) posits that the current preoccupation with security threats is indicative of a tendency to focus on the destructive aspects of everyday life. In Furedis opinion, a culture of fear has taken root, promoted by politicians, journalists and security professionals. The constant media fixation with future threats to human security is said to encourage individuals to become more inward-looking and fearful, obscuring the fact that contemporary Western societies remain comparatively safe places to live. Furedi reasons that the cultural fixation with risk detracts attention from more severe and deep-rooted global problems of poverty, malnutrition and disease. Despite its scattered method, Furedis approach reminds us that risks are not simply things out there. Although institutional methods of risk assessment may seek to objectively measure threats, the categories utilized are themselves the products of cultural values and choices. Ways of measuring risk are not objective, nor are they necessarily based on quantitative rationality (Sparks, 2001: 169). Security discourses are socially constructed by dominant institutions such as government, the police and the media. Whether intentionally or otherwise, Furedi (2005, 2007) believes that these agencies have been complicit in creating a climate of fear around terrorism. In both the UK and the USA, government officials have worked hard to keep terrorism high on the political and media agenda, particularly in times of relative calm. In the UK, there have been a number of alleged instances of threats to national security being leaked by the police and/or government to the media (Morris, 2004; Mythen & Walklate, 2006b). A series of foiled plots hatched by fundamentalist Islamic networks have been revealed, including the crashing of a plane into Canary Wharf Tower, the launching of surface-to-air missiles at Heathrow, explosive strikes on the Houses of Parliament and the detonation of a bomb at Old Trafford football stadium. Similarly, in the USA, President George W. Bush announced in February 2006 that Al-Qaeda had intended to fly a plane into the tallest building on the west coast, the 73storey Library Tower in Los Angeles. It later transpired that this planned attack, allegedly to be executed by members of Jemaah Islamiah, was uncovered by intelligence services back in 2002. President Bushs revelation four years later prompted the mayor of Los Angeles, Antonio Villaraigosa, to complain that this was the first he had heard about it (Webb, 2006). Such examples give credence to Furedis (2007: 4) claim that a culture of fear is being moulded around the terrorist threat, encouraged by institutions and agencies involved in security management:
The fact that more and more areas of life are seen as targets for terrorists buildings, power stations, the economy and so on has little to do with the increased capabilities of terrorists; rather it reflects the growth in competitive claims-making around fear and terror.
228
This is not to blithely state that raising public awareness about terrorism or encouraging the public to be vigilant in preventing terrorist attacks is a baseless enterprise. It is, however, to say that the calculated leaking of information about possible attacks for political gain is disingenuous and has socially malign consequences (see also Oborne, 2006; Mythen & Walklate, 2006b). It is probable that each exposure of a terrorist plot serves to ratchet up levels of public concern about terrorism. Indeed, the attempt to manipulate popular emotions has historically proven to be an integral component of the governance of terrorism (Burkitt, 2005). Following Furedi (2007: 2), we can both chart the discursive construction of terrorism while also grasping that public feelings of anxiety are not always proportional to the degree of threat. Further, Furedi is alert to the manner in which the creation of a politics of fear casts a shadow over informed debates about the causes of terrorism and the development of security policy. As Furedi (2007) recognizes, as well as radiating outwards into foreign policies, the politics of fear also circles inwards and impacts upon domestic law and order programmes. There have been several examples of transference of security practices deployed as special measures to combat terrorism to other areas of crime control. In 2007, environmental protestors at Heathrow Airport were charged with a string of offences under anti-terrorism legislation, while in 2005 an octogenarian sporting a T-shirt accusing Tony Blair of war crimes was cautioned under the Terrorism Act. Despite its being acknowledged by political elites as a global phenomenon, crucial penal decisions about terrorism are being made on an ad hoc basis within the boundaries of the sovereign nation-state, according to the political preferences of presiding parties. Amid the legitimate concern expressed about the terrorist risk, there is a need to ensure that legislative responses are commensurate with the level of threat. As we shall see through the eyes of the governmentality thesis, the shadow of fear shades into and obscures the rationale underpinning domestic anti-terrorism measures and international military interventions.
Governing Through Terrorism?

While Becks risk society theory enables us to track the global dimensions of contemporary terrorism and Furedi brings into view the political orchestration of fear, thinkers inspired by Michel Foucaults work have commented on the disciplinary effects of discourses of risk and security on human behaviour. Building on Foucaults (1978, 1980, 1991) writing, theorists such as Castel (1991), OMalley (2002) and Dean (1999) have highlighted the role of neoliberal social institutions in constructing understandings of human security that regiment human behaviour. Governmentality theorists argue
229
that, in contrast to preceding epochs, the operation of power in society is now decentred rather than direct and requires the active involvement of citizens (Dean, 1999: 19). In the contemporary context, the idea of governmentality alludes to the neoliberal project to govern health and security risks as a means of maintaining order through various modes of incitement and provocation (Denney, 2005: 35). Central to governmentality is the circulation of discourses generated by dominant institutions through which people come to recognize and understand risk. Discourses condition human behaviour by generating truths about society that are interiorized by individuals (Foucault, 1978, 1980). In this way, power relations are reproduced not by force but by activated individuals consenting to discourses that encourage patterns of self-regulation. Not only do institutional discourses of risk make individuals responsible for their own safety management; they also encourage the allocation of blame by attributing risk to marginalized groups. There is clearly much mileage in applying elements of the Foucauldian approach to the current regulation and management of terrorism. In particular, the material effects of the squeezing together of national and international crime and security policies can be glimpsed through the Foucauldian lens (Mythen & Walklate, 2006a). At the level of institutional discourse, what is being stitched together is much more than simply concern about the terrorist threat. Safety/security discourses around terrorism are merging with and subsuming existing problem groups. In this way, fears about terrorism become linked to contemporary folk devils: immigrants, bogus asylum-seekers, religious zealots and dole scroungers. Thus, the treatment of terrorism forms part of a broader sweep of classifying and identifying offenders by risk values, rather than addressing them as rational social actors (Hudson, 2003: 42). Yet, such risk values easily become attached to and draped over particular groups for instance, young male Asian Muslims who find themselves positioned as dangerous and ascribed risk identities. Whether intentionally or otherwise, the discourse of terrorism makes suspect populations out of particular ethnic groups. Police and security services in the UK have mounted so-called fishing expeditions among the Muslim community to signal the extent of their surveillance. Such panoptic operations form part of the wider criminalization and marginalization of the Muslim community, potentially alienating an already disadvantaged and underprivileged minority group. A Metropolitan Police Authority survey found that the number of Asians stopped and searched by police jumped by 41% between 2000/01 and 2001/02, and among black people by 30%, compared to 8% for whites in the same period. This categorization of safe and risky kinds of people under conditions of high anxiety can lead to suspicion and distrust, encouraging a constant scanning of all with whom we come into contact to see whether or not they pose a threat to our security (Hudson, 2003: 74). Once attributed a risky identity, othered groups can act as a
230
punch-bag, a repository for blame (Joffe, 1999: 22). As governmentality thinkers are aware, the process linking exclusion to blame is historically entrenched and culturally malleable. Naturally, such social labelling around who is risky and the punitive measures coupled to it cannot be easily disassociated from wider political goals and strategies (see Sparks, 2000: 8). Feeley (2003: 126) has previously described the embedding of crime as a master theme that has acted as a touchstone for political debate and policymaking. Within this master theme, the threat of terrorism appears not only to have risen to the surface within political discourses, but also to have had an impact on areas of social policy previously considered peripheral to crime control, such as immigration and welfare. Working beyond governance through crime, it would appear that there is a presently a movement toward governing through terrorism (Mythen & Walklate, 2006a). Widespread concerns have been raised in the UK by civil rights campaigners, academics and journalists about the effects of anti-terrorism legislation on fundamental democratic freedoms and liberties (Barnaby, 2002: 7; Biglino, 2002). The controversial use of control orders in the UK affords the home secretary personal power to tag and track suspects and to keep them under house arrest without formal charges being levied. Basic legal rights such as the right to a fair trial, privacy, asylum and free movement are being curtailed because of the fear of terrorism. Since 9/11, extraordinary rendition has been used by the US government to transport detainees to countries where torture is accepted. This practice effectively bypasses due process required for extradition and is tantamount to kidnapping by the state (Gill, 2006: 24). The threat of state violence is doubtless being deployed as a technology of control, through the geographically and ideologically expansive war on terror (see Jabri, 2006). As Oates (2005: 7) reasons, in such a climate it is easy to slip into prejudices and assumptions about the enemy rather than focussing on any erosion of citizens rights resulting from the war on terror. It is important to recognize that dominant notions of security are labile, socially situated and discursively defined (Bubandt, 2005). In the UK, the legal governance of terrorism has effectively been redrawn via a raft of counter-terrorist legislation, including the Anti-Terrorism, Crime and Security Act (2001), the Prevention of Terrorism Act (2005) and the Terrorism Act (2006). While these forms of legislation have been formally imposed to restrict the freedom of terrorists, widespread concerns have been raised both about possible infringements of civil liberties and about the impact of new laws on the surveillance and policing of ethnic minority groups. In other Western countries where anti-terrorism legislation has accelerated since 9/11, such as Italy and Germany, similar concerns are being expressed about the rebalancing of security and liberty within the criminal justice system (Patane, 2006; Safferling, 2006). The UKs 2005 Prevention of Terrorism Act
231
includes offences such as incitement to terrorism, acts preparatory to terrorism, and giving and receiving terrorist training. Not only are these offences difficult to define, they augment the spectre of surveillance that hangs over the Muslim community. The incitement to self-surveillance is further typified by the establishment of Muslim Contact Units designed to proactively seek out intelligence about suspicious activity. The UK government has also proposed that a database be constructed of individuals who have demonstrated unacceptable behaviour, and it has vowed to increase surveillance of foreign students studying at UK universities (Oliver, 2005). Insofar as there may appear to be little wrong with these proposed offences in principle, as previous examples illustrate, it is the vagueness of definition and the ways in which such powers may be enacted that give rise to concern. Though politically expedient, it may not be ethically appropriate to be pushing through draconian law and order measures in the present climate of high anxiety. By following the arc of the governmentality thesis, we are able to discern the impact of the deployment of risk technologies for citizens. Government campaigns to increase awareness about terrorism launched in Australia and the UK provide two apposite examples of responsibilization in practice. As part of its be alert, but not alarmed campaign mobilized after 9/11, the Australian government sent all citizens an information kit, which included a fridge magnet bearing the details of the 24-Hour National Security Hotline through which the general public were encouraged to report suspicious behaviour (Lee, 2007: 161). In a parallel initiative, the UK government launched an 8.3 million campaign to inform the public about how to respond to emergency situations, disseminating an advice booklet to 25 million households. The specified objective of the campaign was to relay information about what members of the public should do to prepare for major emergencies, such as a terrorist attack. The information in the emergency advice booklet is appreciably weighted toward the individual what you can do to protect yourself against risk and away from the state what we are doing to protect you. As such, the advice offered tends to individualize emergency situations and to responsibilize people for their own risk management, rather than laying out institutional security strategies (see Kearon, Mythen & Walklate, 2007).
Theorizing the Terrorist Risk: The Power of What If?

Thus far, we have demonstrated some of the ways in which crossdisciplinary risk theory can be put to work to read processes around the construction, deployment and regulation of the terrorist threat. Before we move on to look at the political impacts of shifting forms of security assess-
232
ment, it is worth providing a capsule account of the modes and means by which different theories enable us to get a handle on the diverse political effects of risk and its role in the management and governance of terrorism. The risk society perspective and, in particular, the notion of manufactured risk can be used as a heuristic to map out the changing nature of terrorism in broad brush strokes. Risk society theory is able to grapple with the global parameters of terrorism and casts a projective line forward to speculate about future threats. This said, in application, Becks theory serves to accentuate the novel features of contemporary terrorism and muddies the waters between the possible and the probable degree of threat. In his recent work on cosmopolitanism, Beck (2006) has moved beyond conceptualizing terrorism as a manufactured risk and grappled more fruitfully with the underlying causes of terrorism. In particular, Beck promotes greater tolerance of religious difference and deeper awareness of some of the politically unspoken drivers of terrorism, such as poverty, economic inequalities and cultural imperialism. While the risk society framework permits us to tap into the changing nature of terrorism and the globalization of political violence, the governmentality approach can be used to deconstruct the discourse of new terrorism and to highlight its role in maintaining social order. In particular, governmentality theory steers us towards the ways in which coercive counter-terrorism measures extend the control of the neoliberal state. Following Foucault, the legislation assembled in the UK to protect against the terrorist risk has reinforced state governance and intensified the classification and control of citizens. As discussed earlier, the dissemination of dominant discourses can function as a tactic of disciplinary control through which right-thinking citizens are encouraged to come to order. We can identify governmental policies that are designed to actively securitize individuals, recruiting them as attentive foot soldiers in the war on terror. Dominant political discourses of terrorism are disseminated by a matrix of institutional agencies that make the terrorist threat thinkable. The discourse of the war on terror is an attempt to unify a disparate set of problems that places distinct limits on what can be said and done about terrorism. As inferred in the examples discussed, the war on terror ideologically renders discrete populations dangerous and functions to endorse a myriad of extraordinary security measures. Moving a step beyond the descriptive capacity of the risk society perspective, the governmentality approach thus brings into the spotlight both the discursive construction of the terrorist threat and the efforts of the state to (re)establish a mandate for social control. So far as Furedis work is concerned, it is possible both to discern the fabrication of a culture of fear around terrorism and to consider the role of the terrorist threat in the broader formation of a politics of fear. It is feasible that a culture of fear around terrorism has thrived, promoted by media sensationalism and the rhetoric and hyperbole of political leaders. In Western
233
countries threatened by terrorism, neoliberal politicians have become practised in nurturing and harnessing fear as a tool to sanction domestic and foreign policies (Burkitt, 2005). As we shall argue, institutional fixation with the catastrophic possibilities of future terrorist attacks is just one dimension of a politics of fear in which worst-case scenarios drive the introduction of tighter law and order measures. Such overzealous counter-terrorist measures which are themselves a product of the politics of fear loop back into and reinforce a more expansive culture of fear. Not only has fearfulness about terrorism become part and parcel of the modern condition, the perception of society being at risk is pervasive and self-conditioning (Tudor, 2003: 238; Furedi, 2002: 20). To varying degrees, each of the theories of risk discussed recognizes that the contemporary governance of security involves various methods of measuring, evaluating and estimating risk. Historically speaking, government through risk has been a common and ingrained practice in Western cultures (Dean, 1999; OMalley, 2001: 85). Yet, in the late 20th century, we can identify a caesura in relation to the political management of risk. As Lupton (1999: 98) reasons, a shift occurred from the immediate language of need and welfare toward the future-leaning language of risk. Having offered up theoretical avenues into the problem of terrorism, it is now necessary to ask what the drive toward future-oriented risk-based approaches means for the regulation of terrorism and how the political desire to manage terrorism propels the neoliberal quest to discipline the future. Quite understandably, it is the duty of government to protect citizens, ensure free movement in public spaces and guard against terrorist attacks. A central plank of counter-terrorist strategy involves gathering intelligence and data that can inform threat assessments and predictions. But, as Beck (2002a,b) warns, contemporary terrorism presents conspicuous problems for regulatory institutions, both nationally and internationally. There are perceptible and definite limits to the knowability of terrorism (Whyte & Burnett, 2005: 6). Just three weeks before the 2005 bomb attacks in London, the Joint Terrorist Analysis Centre (JTAC) which includes representatives from MI5, MI6, GCHQ and the police force issued a report that stated: at present, there is not a group with both the current intent and the capability to attack the UK (Sturcke, 2005). Following on from the discovery of unexploded car bombs in London in June 2007, police stepped up security at the Wimbledon International Tennis Tournament and the Gay Pride event in the capital (Dodd, 2007). A day later, a jeep full of explosives was driven into the entrance of Glasgow International Airport. None of the suspects charged with the car-bomb attack at Glasgow Airport were on MI5s database of 1,600 individuals classified as presenting a terrorist risk at home or abroad (Norton-Taylor & Cobain, 2007: 7). This institutional failure to accurately predict the future is partly a consequence of the changing shape of terrorist
234
groups alluded to earlier. Rather than a hierarchical organization, Al-Qaeda is best described as a movement or idea that motivates a series of looser networks and individuals (Gregory & Wilkinson, 2005: 2). In such indeterminate circumstances, political decisions about security regulation take place under conditions of pervasive uncertainty and incomplete knowledge:
The ultimate deadlock of risk society . . . resides in the gap between knowledge and decision: there is no one who really knows the global outcome at the level of positive knowledge, the situation is radically undecideable but we none the less have to decide . . . risk society is provoking an obscene gamble, a kind of ironic reversal of predestination: I am accountable for decisions which I was forced to make without proper knowledge of the situation (Beck, 1999: 78).
This climate of not knowing enough and, moreover, knowing about not knowing enough has had a visible impact on the authority of security institutions. So far as regulating terrorism is concerned, there has been a palpable shift toward futurity in practices of risk analysis and the language of governance. A precautionary approach that suggests that security professionals must act in advance of possessing conclusive evidence has become prevalent in policing and military operations (Durodie, 2006: 2). The very impossibility of estimating the terrorist risk can provide a mandate for the hasty implementation of legislation that threatens civil liberties. The net result of the creeping presence of the future is that perceived forthcoming events come to direct contemporary policies (Rasmussen, 2001). As Rigakos & Hadden (2001: 77) surmise, once institutions become consumed by the future, they are duty bound to assume responsibility for control. Speculating about and trying to anticipate terrorist attacks has been an ongoing theme in contemporary political discourses. The battle against emergent forms of terrorism is cast as a conflict of the present and the future (Rasmussen, 2007). Whereas risk assessments have traditionally predicted future outcomes based on past performance, the calculus of risk used by politicians and security experts was reprogrammed after 9/11. The new calculus does not assess the future by focusing on the past What was? nor indeed the present What is?. Instead, security assessments are directed by the question: What if?. This transformation dictates that the basis of evidence changes under the risk of terrorism. Once one assumes a projective What if? position, presumption of innocence metamorphoses into presumption of guilt. As the indefinite detention of non-UK subjects at Belmarsh Prison and the confinement of enemy combatants at Guantnamo Bay illustrate, What if? questions produce solutions that are extremely problematic at the level of both law enforcement and criminal justice. If citizens are detained because they might be planning terrorist attacks in the future, what charges can reasonably be brought? Even in the event of a hypothetical charge being levelled, what legal defence can the accused have?
235
Augmenting and cementing its use in judicial, intelligence and security communities, the What if? question has been prevalent in the realm of politics, with figurehead politicians such as George Bush and Tony Blair frequently using hypothetical attack scenarios to concretize the idea that it is inaction (nonviolence) rather than military action (state violence) that is impractical. Implicit in such ideological manoeuvres, which form the building blocks of Furedis politics of fear, is the assumption that pre-emption is the only reasonable way of resolving terrorism. If political vistas are driven by the hypothetical appearance of future dangers, the end point is invariably worst-case-scenario thinking, as the Iraq WMD affair points up. A fixation with projective horizon-scanning also supports and legitimates the misguided militarization of domestic policing. Following on from the 7/7 bombings in London, an innocent Brazilian electrician, Jean Charles de Menezes, was killed by eight close-range shots to the head as part of the Metropolitan Polices shoot to kill policy, operationalized in response to the terrorist threat. It later transpired that the police had mistaken him for a suspected suicide bomber (Hinsliff, 2005). In a further example of overzealous action, 250 police officers stormed a house in Forest Gate, London, in search of a chemical weapon. In the arrest, Mohammed Kahar was shot in the chest as he was detained with his brother Abul. After being held under the Terrorism Act and questioned for eight days, both men were later released without charge (Dodd, 2006: 2). Following the London and Glasgow bombings, serious concerns have been expressed by the Asian community about a backlash against British-born Muslims. To cite one stark example, the Metropolitan Police reported an alarming 600% rise in religious hate crimes in the month directly following the 7/7 bombings.7 It is important to point out that there is nothing natural or inevitable about the elements that constitute the war on terror. Rather, the war on terror is a heterogeneous and orchestrated set of security processes and practices (Aradau & van Munster, 2007; Kellner, 2002; Rasmussen, 2004). What is most striking about the war on terror is its emphatic and absolute approach. Instead of seeking to limit and reduce the risk, the alleged objective of the war on terror is simply to wipe terrorism out. The obliteration of terrorism can only be achieved by the adoption of an aggressive set of policies that actively seek out terrorist cells and punish states that fail to quash or challenge terrorist activities. Such power-plays are put into motion through aggressive activities that take the fight to the terrorists, such as the invasions of Afghanistan and Iraq. The Foucauldian echoes of such attempts to discipline and/or punish nations that give voice to or promote subaltern discourses about terrorism are axiomatic. Yet, it remains questionable as to whether these geopolitical excursions are legitimate, practical or just:
7
There were 273 recorded incidents in London the month of July 2005, as compared with just 41 incidents the preceding month.
236
It is extraordinarily dangerous to declare, as the Bush administration has done, that the whole world is a battlefield in the war on terror, and that the laws of war apply to every element of the struggle against terrorism. If the whole world is a battlefield and every suspected terrorist is a combatant, then it would be entirely permissible for the United States to do on the streets of Paris or Hamburg or Cairo what it did . . . in Yemen in other words, if its intelligence picked up the presence of a suspected terrorist in a house in a European or Middle Eastern city it could fire a Predator missile at that house so long as it took appropriate care to minimise civilian casualties (Malinowski, 2003: 85).
After the 2005 attacks in London by British-born Muslims, one might add that adhering to the presiding logic of the war on terror this makes the UK both the subject and the object of its own aggression. The current formation of security policy in the USA and the UK appears to be driven by a desire to reproduce order in an uncertain world. Yet, this drive toward the certainties of bygone ages generates a clutch of thorny issues. First, if new terrorism is treated as a protean enemy, conflicts with vastly different roots and causes for example, in Chechnya, Spain and Palestine are diagnosed as a common disease to be treated with a universal dose of medicine (Sontag, 2004: 3). Second, activist UK and US foreign policy has caused rifts within the United Nations, being criticized and resisted by many other member countries (Goh, 2004). This neo-isolationist reflex has led to the formation of a counter-modern security strategy that tramples over existing complexities and ambiguities in an attempt to provide order and certainty (OTuathail, 1999: 9; Steinert, 2004).8 This is akin to managing the flux and uncertainty of globalization through blanket either/or strategies, rather than acknowledging the and of the risk society (Beck, 1996). Such an absolutist approach defines terrorism as a uniform object and frames the current situation as a for us or against us battle between good and evil. Democratically elected governments have a duty to maintain basic civil liberties and uphold fundamental freedoms. The tendency of the governments of the UK and the USA to ignore international law, ride roughshod over human rights and restrict public liberties does not seem to be a particularly effective or ethically sound way of regulating international terrorism. True security cannot and should not depend on inflicting insecurity on another. As Rehn (2003: 58) warns, if particular states flout consensually agreed security regulations, rules on human rights and fundamental freedoms, poco a poco the basis underpinning them disappears and the rules lose meaning. The issue that needs to be foregrounded in the present debate about the management of the terrorist risk is what degree of liberty is worth paying for what degree of security. If the pursuit of security comes at the expense of human rights, then not only is the quality of that security compromised, but the very principles of democracy are threatened. As Hudson (2003: 225) warns:
8
The Pentagon is said to have constructed contingency plans to use nuclear weapons pre-emptively against at least seven countries (Barnaby, 2002: 3).
237
The fearfulness of risk society is leading western societies to respond to dangers in ways that undermine the basic values of liberal societies, values honed to guard against the dangers of repression and inhumanity as well as to express commitment to democratic governance.
It is evident that the language of neoliberal politics has become saturated with risk and stunted in its discussions of the enduring burdens of poverty, disease and famine (Culpitt, 1999: 148).9 Against such a backdrop, Sachs (2007: 2) links together issues of safety and poverty, arguing that the former cannot be achieved without the eradication of the latter:
How can it be that we think we are safe? We think we can be safe when we leave a billion people to struggle literally for their daily survival; the poorest billion for whom every day is a fight to secure enough nutrients . . . how can this be safe?
Not only do basic survival problems require solutions, they should not be readily distanced from the issue of terrorism. In many respects, terrorism is acting as the ideational glue that sticks the politics of risk together. We would argue that the resultant projective risk-based security paradigm is as problematic as it is perilous. In addition to being expediently mobilized to validate pre-emptive military attacks on international targets, the What if? proposition can also serve as a rationale for domestic law and order policies. In identifying the presence of the future in current war on terror discourses, we can begin to grasp the ways in which governments deploy technologies of risk to both frighten and motivate citizens. Alongside the drive to securitize individuals, it is imperative that elected politicians orchestrate a public debate about terrorism that directs attention away from fear and instead seeks to discuss policy alternatives to regulating terrorism. In the affluent West, the penumbra of the politics of risk is shading out pressing global issues. While Western nation-states strive to shore up their territories against terrorist attacks, 50% of the global population still do not have access to clean drinking water and over 18 million refugees remain displaced. By 2010, 10 million children in Africa will be orphaned as a result of AIDS (Cohen, 2001). Amid the fraught habitat of the risk society, we need to be bold enough to ask what the real dangers actually are and to insist that the political ordering of risk is inspected rather than passively accepted.
Conclusion
In this article, we have considered the usefulness of theories of risk in unpacking different elements of the problem of terrorism. Our analysis has brought to the surface but some of the possible applications of risk theory to
9
The annual US military budget is $623 billion, while its aid to Africa totals $4.5 billion (see Sachs, 2007: 2).
238
the governance of security in a dynamic, threat-conscious world. We have also discussed the wider implications of changing modes of risk analysis for political strategies, forms of governance and security management. This remains an area ripe for cross-cultural empirical investigation and more exhaustive theoretical exploration. At present, it would appear that the balance between liberty and security has become skewed, with the war on terror overriding the political drive to meet the most basic of human needs (Shearing & Wood, 2007: 90). As Sassen (2002: 233) points out, in the global south, the growth of poverty and inequality and the overwhelming indebtedness of governments that reduces resources for development, all are part of the broader landscape within which rage and hopelessness thrive. In the light of this view, greater attention needs to be directed toward the origins and the causes of terrorism (Behnke, 2004). Disregarding whether one agrees with them, there are a cluster of broadly political reasons why extremist groups such as Al-Qaeda encourage attacks on Western countries, including tacit support for Israels occupation of Palestinian territories, economic assistance to authoritarian Arab regimes, and an expanded military presence in the Middle East (McLaren & Martin, 2004). History suggests that reliance on brute force is not an effectual way of eradicating terrorism. A political logic that reasons my security depends on the insecurity that I can inflict on you is both warped and counterproductive (Ould Mohamedou, 2007: 20). All of this indicates that powerful nations that demand to be heard but refuse to listen must become democratically reoriented. As the governance of security continues to be reconfigured, a broad-based dialogue is required between human rights groups, security bodies and global governmental bodies (Kellner, 2002). With debates on cosmopolitanism increasingly infusing political analysis, it is worthwhile pursuing the possibilities of establishing these kinds of exchanges and dialogues. Beck has compellingly argued that cosmopolitanization is multidimensional, demands multiple loyalties and requires non-judgemental recognition of difference. It is a view of the contemporary social world that regards the either/or-ism of sameness/difference debates as constituting false alternatives. Rather, Beck (2006: 57) promotes the both/and principle, which rejects essentialist principles of universalism and the accenting of ethnic difference. Somewhat in contrast, Benhabibs (2002) work on cosmopolitanism focuses on the we question: who are we and how do we exist in a reflective relationship with the other? In other words, how do we learn from each other through deliberative processes and through that learning accommodate difference? Understanding both the politics of risk and the risks of politics is a prerequisite for practically resolving these critical questions.
* Gabe Mythen is Senior Lecturer in Sociology at the University of Liverpool. He is author of Ulrich Beck: A Critical Introduction to the Risk Society (Pluto, 2004) and, with Sandra
239
Walklate, co-editor of Beyond the Risk Society: Critical Reflections on Risk and Human Security (Open University Press, 2006). He is presently writing a third book, to be published by Palgrave Macmillan, entitled Understanding the Risk Society: Crime, Security and Welfare. Sandra Walklate is Eleanor Rathbone Chair of Sociology at the University of Liverpool. She is widely recognized for her work on criminal victimization, most recently Imagining the Victim of Crime (Open University Press, 2007) and (as editor) The Handbook of Victims and Victimology (Willan, 2007). She is presently writing her third book on gender and crime: Gendering Crime and Criminal Justice, to be published by Willan. The authors would like to thank the two anonymous reviewers who commented on an earlier draft of this article for their constructive feedback. The faults that remain are our own.
References
9/11 Commission, 2004. Final Report of the National Commission on Terrorist Attacks upon the United States. Washington, DC: National Commission on Terrorist Attacks. Aradau, Claudia & Rens van Munster, 2007. Governing Terrorism Through Risk: Taking Precautions, (Un)Knowing the Future, European Journal of International Relations 13(1): 89115. Barnaby, Frank, 2002. How To Build a Nuclear Bomb and Other Weapons of Mass Destruction. London: Granta. Beck, Ulrich, 1992. Risk Society: Towards a New Modernity. London: Sage. Beck, Ulrich, 1995. Ecological Politics in an Age of Risk. London: Sage. Beck, Ulrich, 1996. The Reinvention of Politics: Rethinking Modernity in the Global Social Order. Cambridge: Polity. Beck, Ulrich, 1999. World Risk Society. Cambridge: Polity. Beck, Ulrich, 2002a. The Terrorist Threat: World Risk Society Revisited, Theory, Culture and Society 19(4): 3955. Beck, Ulrich, 2002b. The Silence of Words and Political Dynamics in the World Risk Society, Logos 1(4): 118. Beck, Ulrich, 2003. The Silence of Words: On Terror and War, Security Dialogue 34(3): 255267. Beck, Ulrich, 2006. Cosmopolitan Vision. Cambridge: Polity. Behnke, Andreas, 2004. Terrorising the Political: 9/11 Within the Context of the Globalisation of Violence, Millennium: Journal of International Studies 33(2): 279312. Benhabib, Seyla, 2002. The Claims of Culture. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press. Biglino, Irene, 2002. Anti-Terrorism Legislation in Britain. London: Liberty. Blair, Tony, 2004. Speech to the Annual Conference of the Labour Party, Brighton, 28 September; available at http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/3697434.stm. Bubandt, Nils, 2005. Vernacular Security: The Politics of Feeling Safe in Global, National and Local Worlds, Security Dialogue 36(3): 275296. Burkitt, Ian, 2005. Powerful Emotions: Power, Government and Opposition in the War on Terror, Sociology 39(4): 679695. Castel, Robert, 1991. From Dangerousness to Risk, in Graham Burchell, Colin Gordon & Peter Miller, eds, The Foucault Effect: Studies in Governmentality. London: Harvester Wheatsheaf (281298). Cohen, Stanley, 2001. States of Denial: Knowing About Atrocities and Suffering. Cambridge: Polity. Culpitt, Iain, 1999. Social Policy and Risk. London: Sage.
240
de Lint, Willem & Sirpa Virta, 2004. Security and Ambiguity: Towards a Radical Security Politics, Theoretical Criminology 8(4): 465489. Dean, Mitchell, 1999. Governmentality: Power and Rule in Modern Society. London, Sage. Denney, David, 2005. Risk and Society. London: Sage. Dodd, Vikram, 2006. Police May Let Muslims See Terrorism Intelligence, The Guardian, 17 June. Dodd, Vikram, 2007. Car Bombs Come to London, The Guardian, 30 June. Durodie, Bill, 2006. Repeating the Anti-Terror Soap Opera, Spiked Online, 7 June. Eagleton, Terry, 2001. The Gatekeeper. London: Vintage. Feeley, Malcolm, 2003. Crime, Social Order and the Rise of Neo-Conservative Politics, Theoretical Criminology 7(1): 111130. Fletcher, George, 2006. The Indefinable Concept of Terrorism, Journal of International Criminal Justice 4: 894911. Foucault, Michel, 1978. The History of Sexuality. Harmondsworth: Penguin. Foucault, Michel, 1980. Power/Knowledge. Brighton: Harvester. Foucault, Michel, 1991. Governmentality, in Graham Burchell, Colin Gordon & Peter Miller, eds, The Foucault Effect: Studies in Governmentality. London: Harvester Wheatsheaf (87104). Furedi, Frank, 2002. Culture of Fear: Risk Taking and the Morality of Low Expectation. London: Continuum. Furedi, Frank, 2005. Terrorism and the Politics of Fear, in Chris Hale, Keith Hayward, Ali Wahidin & Emma Wincup, eds, Criminology. Oxford: Oxford University Press (307322). Furedi, Frank, 2007. The Only Thing We Have To Fear is the Culture of Fear Itself, Spiked Online, 4 April; available at http://www.spiked-online.com/index.php?/site/ article/3053 (accessed 26 November 2007). Garland, David, 1997. Governmentality and the Problem of Crime, Theoretical Criminology 1(2): 173214. Gill, Peter, 2006. Not Just Joining the Dots But Crossing the Borders and Bridging the Voids: Constructing Security Networks After 11 September 2001, Policing and Society 16(1): 2749. Goh, Irving, 2004. Dangerous Philosophy: Threat, Risk and Security, CTheory: Theory, Technology and Culture 27(1): 143. Gregory, Frank & Paul Wilkinson, 2005. Riding Pillion for Tackling Terrorism is a HighRisk Policy, in Security, Terrorism and the UK, ISP/NSC Briefing Paper 05/01. London: Chatham House (24). Hinsliff, Gaby, 2005. Anger Over Shoot To Kill Policy Grows, The Guardian, 31 July. Hudson, Barbara, 2003. Justice in the Risk Society. London: Sage. ISP/NSC, 2005. Security, Terrorism and the UK, ISP/NSC Briefing Paper 05/01. London: Chatham House. Jabri, Vivienne, 2006. War, Security and the Liberal State, Security Dialogue 37(1): 4764. Joffe, Helene, 1999. Risk and the Other. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Kearon, Tony; Gabe Mythen & Sandra Walklate, 2007. Making Sense of the Terrorist Risk: Public Perceptions of Emergency Advice, Security Journal 20(2): 7795. Kellner, Douglas, 2002. September 11 and Terror War: The Bush Legacy and the Risks of Unilateralism, Logos 1(4): 1941. Laqueur, Walter, 2000. The New Terrorism: Fanaticism and the Arms of Mass Destruction. London: Oxford University Press. Lee, Murray, 2007. Inventing Fear of Crime. Cullompton: Willan. Lupton, Deborah, 1999. Risk. London: Routledge. McLaren, Peter & Martin, Gus, 2004. The Legend of the Bush Gang: Imperialism, War and
241
Propaganda, Cultural Studies, Critical Methodologies 4(3): 281303. Malinowski, Tom, 2003. By Infringing Basic Liberties the US Undermines Its Own Terrorism Prevention Strategy, in Tammo Hoeksema & Jan ter Laak, eds, Human Rights and Terrorism. Holland: NHC/OSCE. Mockaitis, Thomas, 2007. The New Terrorism: Myths and Realities. Holland: Praeger Security International. Morgan, Matthew, 2004. The Origins of Terrorism, Parameters, Spring Edition: 2943. Morris, Nigel, 2004. The Politics of Fear, The Independent, 23 November. Mythen, Gabe, 2004. Ulrich Beck: A Critical Introduction to the Risk Society. London: Pluto. Mythen, Gabe, 2005. From Goods to Bads? Revisiting the Political Economy of Risk, Sociological Research Online 10(3); available at http://www.socresonline.org.uk/10/3/ mythen.html (accessed 26 November 2007). Mythen, Gabe & Sandra Walklate, 2006a. Criminology and Terrorism: Which Thesis? Risk Society or Governmentality?, The British Journal of Criminology 46(3): 379398. Mythen, Gabe & Sandra Walklate, 2006b. Communicating the Terrorist Risk: Harnessing a Culture of Fear?, Crime, Media, Culture: An International Journal 2(2): 123142. Neocleous, Mark, 2006. From Social to National Security: On the Fabrication of Economic Order, Security Dialogue 37(3): 363384. Norton-Taylor, Richard & Ian Cobain, 2007. Threat Level Lowered as Inquiry Examines Foreign Connection, The Guardian, 5 July. Oates, Sarah, 2005. Selling Fear? The Framing of Terrorist Threat in Elections, in Security, Terrorism and the UK, ISP/NSC Briefing Paper 05/01. London: Chatham House (78). Oborne, Peter, 2006. The Use and Abuse of Terror: The Construction of a False Narrative of the Domestic Terror Threat. London: Centre for Policy Studies. Oliver, Mark, 2005. Government To Compile List of Extremists, The Guardian, 20 July. OMalley, Pat, 2001. Discontinuity, Government and Risk: A Response to Rigakos and Hadden, Theoretical Criminology 5(1): 8592. OMalley, Pat, 2002. Risk and Uncertainty. London: Glasshouse. OTuathail, Gerard, 1999. Understanding Critical Geopolitics: Geopolitics and Risk Society, Journal of Strategic Studies 22(3): 107124. Ould Mohamedou, Mohammad-Mahmoud, 2007. Understanding Al Qaeda: The Transformation of War. London: Pluto. Patane, Varia, 2006. Recent Italian Efforts To Respond to Terrorism at the Legislative Level, Journal of International Criminal Justice 4: 11661180. Rasmussen, Mikkel Vedby, 2001. Reflexive Security: NATO and International Risk Society, Millennium: Journal of International Studies 30(2): 285309. Rasmussen, Mikkel Vedby, 2004. It Sounds Like a Riddle: Security Studies, the War on Terror and Risk, Millennium: Journal of International Studies 30(2): 381395. Rasmussen, Mikkel Vedby, 2007. The Risk Society at War: Terror, Technology and Strategy in the Twenty-First Century. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Rehn, Elisabeth, 2003. Excessive Reliance on the Use of Force Does Not Stop Terrorism, in Tammo Hoeksema & Jan ter Laak, eds, Human Rights and Terrorism. Holland: NHC/OSCE. Rigakos, George & Richard Hadden, 2001. Crime, Capitalism and the Risk Society: Towards the Same Olde Modernity?, Theoretical Criminology 5(1): 6184. Sachs, Jeremy, 2007. Bursting at the Seams, Reith Lecture 1. London: BBC. Safferling, Christoph, 2006. Terror and Law: German Responses to 9/11, Journal of International Criminal Justice 4: 11521165. Sassen, Saskia, 2002. Governance Hotspots: Challenges We Must Confront in the PostSeptember 11 World, Theory, Culture and Society 19(4): 233244. Shearing, Clifford & Jennifer Wood, 2007. Imagining Security. Cullompton: Willan.
242
Sontag, Susan, 2004. What Have We Done?, The Guardian, 24 May. Sparks, Richard, 2000. Perspectives on Risk and Penal Politics, in Tim Hope & Richard Sparks, eds, Crime, Risk and Insecurity. London: Routledge (129145). Sparks, Richard, 2001. Degrees of Estrangement: The Cultural Theory of Risk and Comparative Penology, Theoretical Criminology 5(2): 159176. Steinert, Heinz, 2004. The Indispensable Metaphor of War: On Populist Politics and the Contradictions of the States Monopoly of Force, Theoretical Criminology 7(3): 265291. Sturcke, James, 2005. Intelligence Warned of Iraq Terror Link, The Guardian, 19 July. Tudor, Andrew, 2003. A (Macro) Sociology of Fear?, Sociological Review 51(2): 238256. Webb, Justin, 2006. Bush Spells Out LA Terror Plot, BBC News Online; available at http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/4697896.stm (accessed 26 November 2007). Whyte, Dave & Jonny Burnett, 2005. Embedded Expertise and the New Terrorism, Journal for Crime, Conflict and the Media 1(4): 118.

Terrorism, Risk and International Security

Uploaded by

Document Information

Original Description:

Copyright

Available Formats

Share this document

Share or Embed Document

Sharing Options

Did you find this document useful?

Is this content inappropriate?

Copyright:

Available Formats

Terrorism, Risk and International Security

Uploaded by

Copyright:

Available Formats

Security Dialogue

International Peace Research Institute, Oslo

>> Version of Record - Mar 20, 2008 What is This?

Special Issue on Security, Technologies of Risk, and the Political

School of Sociology and Social Policy, University of Liverpool, UK

Security Dialogue vol. 39, no. 23, April 2008

Terrorism in the Risk Society: The Globalization of Insecurity?

Security Dialogue vol. 39, no. 23, April 2008

Security Dialogue vol. 39, no. 23, April 2008

Terrorism, Fear and the Politics of Risk

Security Dialogue vol. 39, no. 23, April 2008

Governing Through Terrorism?

Security Dialogue vol. 39, no. 23, April 2008

Theorizing the Terrorist Risk: The Power of What If?

Security Dialogue vol. 39, no. 23, April 2008

Security Dialogue vol. 39, no. 23, April 2008

Security Dialogue vol. 39, no. 23, April 2008

Security Dialogue vol. 39, no. 23, April 2008

Security Dialogue vol. 39, no. 23, April 2008

Security Dialogue vol. 39, no. 23, April 2008

You might also like