| Publication |
2011.
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| Summary/Abstract |
This exploratory article argues that the mobilisation process for the war in Iraq has revealed and exacerbated the fault lines across American society and brought on a crisis in army-society relationships in the US to which the state has ultimately responded by announcing it would withdraw troops from Iraq. To explore these tensions, I present the analytical framework of "American imperial society" as an alternative problematisation of 'empire' and hope to show its utility to highlight how the repercussions of the US's political ambitions abroad are felt far beyond the battlefield. In doing so, it also provides the first account of empire which builds on the sociology of Pierre Bourdieu. I finally explore these questions by looking at the debate taking place over the meaning and legitimacy of American military sacrifice in three major American newspapers and two magazines.
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