| ID | 168880 |
| Title Proper | World is a garden |
| Other Title Information | nomos, sovereignty, and the (contested) ordering of life |
| Language | ENG |
| Author | Mabon, Simon |
| Summary / Abstract (Note) | Traditional approaches to questions about nomos in IR typically focus upon either its establishment and the formal structures that emerge through interaction within a clearly delineated spatial area, or an exploration of US hegemony in the post-2003 world. In this article I posit a different approach, building on the ideas of Giorgio Agamben, which grounds nomos as a spatialisation of the exception within conditions of neoliberal modernity. I suggest that within the global nomos are more localised nomoi. These localised nomoi are a consequence of the spatialisation of the exception and a fundamental tension between localisation and ordering. I argue that while sovereign power has been a source of contemporary scholarship, such explorations have paid scant attention to the regulatory power of normative values and their capacity to create order within space. Such norms allow for a greater awareness of how sovereign power can be mobilised in and of itself as a form of contestation. Locating such debates in the Middle East, I explore the concept of nomos to understand how struggle over the localisation and ordering of space helps us to better understand contemporary political life. |
| `In' analytical Note | Review of International Studies Vol. 45, No.5; Dec-2019: p.870-890 |
| Key Words | Sovereignty ; Middle East ; Space ; Nomos ; Agamben |