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| 1 |
ID:
110915
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2012.
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| Summary/Abstract |
This article examines the politics of identity work in the private security industry. Drawing on memoirs authored by British private military contractors, and using a theoretical framework influenced by symbolic interactionist thought, the article highlights the relevance of intersubjectivity to identity constitution. In particular, British contractors are found to constitute their professional identity in relation to their US military and contractor counterparts, above all by framing them as 'less-competent others'. This article makes an original contribution to the private and military security companies literature through its sociological focus on the links between national and professional self-identities and security practices on the ground. The article also explores the importance of the memoir genre as a valid textual resource which throws light on the interplay of the international and security dimensions within multinational military and militarised contexts.
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| 2 |
ID:
110912
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2012.
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| Summary/Abstract |
In this article I will explore the paradoxical relationship between anarchism and realism in International Relations (IR) theory. I will do this in an oblique way by uncovering an uncomfortable complicity shared by that existentialist and heretical realist, Carl Schmitt, with his ideological arch-enemies the anarchists. In their diametrically opposed positions on the state, both Schmitt and the anarchists reveal the absolutism of the state in the sovereign moment of exception, and its reliance on a figure of anarchy which at the same time destabilises it, blurring the division between inside and outside and opening up a genuinely revolutionary moment. Here the notion of anarchy is used to deconstruct realism, while at the same time suggesting a move beyond anarchism itself towards a post-foundationalist anarchism or 'postanarchism'. Anarchy reveals the contingency and inconsistency of hegemonic identities in IR, as well as the autonomy of the political which is vital to understanding contemporary movements of resistance to statism and capitalism.
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| 3 |
ID:
110913
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| Publication |
2012.
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In recent years, the field of security studies has turned increasing attention to the processes through which security threats are constructed. Two approaches in particular have flourished, securitisation and framing, but scholars working within these frameworks generally do not draw on the other body of literature to inform theoretical development or to accumulate cases. This has resulted in the production of parallel literatures and the duplication of concepts and terminology, and has hindered the development of theory. This article demonstrates that securitisation and framing are substantively similar research programmes, that security operates as one of a number of distinct master frames, and that securitisation should be viewed as a subfield of framing. This would produce a division of labour whereby securitisation scholars could continue to focus on the distinct realm of security, while drawing on the broader framing literature to inform a number of areas that are under-theorised in present securitisation studies, such as audience acceptance, non-linguistic communicative forms, empowerment and marginalisation, and resistance and desecuritisation.
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| 4 |
ID:
110916
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| Publication |
2012.
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| Summary/Abstract |
The proliferation of armed security contractors in Iraq and Afghanistan has led to widespread criticism of their insufficient control through international laws and conventions. This article suggests that one reason for this omission has been the (re)construction of actors who provide armed force for profit in international legal discourses. During most of the 20th century, armed persons who participated in foreign conflicts for monetary gain were identified as 'mercenaries'. They were outlawed through international legal documents such as the United Nations (UN) Convention on Mercenarism and given restricted rights in the First Additional Protocol to the Geneva Conventions. Today, the same types of actors are increasingly defined as 'private security contractors', and new discourses and international agreements are emerging that attribute to them legality and legitimacy. The aim of this article is to examine the changing legal constructions of armed security providers since the 1970s and the consequences with respect to their control. The article argues that the (re)construction of actors who supply armed force for money in international legal discourses has been made possible by three main discursive strategies: the distinction between persons and corporations providing armed force for profit, the changing focus from the motivations of these actors to their relationship to a 'responsible command', and the shift from a concern about the actors to one about certain activities.
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| 5 |
ID:
110917
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| Publication |
2012.
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| Summary/Abstract |
Although private military and security companies (PMSCs) are gaining increasing importance, they still suffer from an image problem. In the media, they are frequently referred to as 'mercenaries' or 'dogs of war'. PMSCs are therefore interested in presenting themselves as legitimate and acceptable contract parties. Based on a discourse analysis of the homepages of select PMSCs and the industry association International Stability Operations Association (ISOA), and drawing on the framing literature, we examine one way in which companies respond to such negative labels. We show not only that PMSCs provide supplemental logistics or security for the staff of humanitarian organisations confronted with complex emergencies and ever-more dangerous missions, but also that these companies appropriate the humanitarian frame discursively, emphasising those elements that fit their interests and needs. To present themselves as 'new humanitarians', PMSCs employ primarily two kinds of strategies: naming and forging alliances with more traditional humanitarian actors. Their growing involvement in this field may not be without consequences and may contribute to the blurring of lines between military and civilian missions.
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| 6 |
ID:
110911
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2012.
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| Summary/Abstract |
Risk-security writers of various persuasions have suggested that risk is effectively the new security. They say risk works to widen securitisation whereby exceptional measures are made permanent and introduced to deal with merely potential, hypothetical and less-than-existential dangers. A transformation in the political logic of the security field of this kind is a potentially problematic and momentous change. However, this has so far not been much reflected in the primary theory of what security is, namely the Copenhagen School's theory of securitisation. This article tries to tackle this problem by identifying the distinct logic of speech acts that turn issues into questions of risk politics suggesting a model for what rules or grammars they follow and what the political implications of them are. A separate kind of speech act - 'riskification' - is identified based on a re-theorisation of what distinguishes 'risks' from 'threats'. It is argued that risk politics is not an instance of securitisation, but something distinct with its own advantages and dangers. Threat-based security deals with direct causes of harm, whereas risk-security is oriented towards the conditions of possibility or constitutive causes of harm a kind of 'second-order' security politics that promotes long-term precautionary governance. Separating securitisation and 'riskification' preserves the analytical precision of the Copenhagen School notion of securitisation, makes a new logic of security understandable to analysts of the security field, and helps to clarify what basic logic 'normal' non-securitised politics may follow. The new framework is demonstrated through a critical reading of literature that has suggested that climate change has been securitised.
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| 7 |
ID:
110914
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| Publication |
2012.
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| Summary/Abstract |
Private security companies (PSCs) do not merely provide protective services; they also sell specific understandings of the world and of security problems. Promoting their services, PSCs project images of professional security expertise. This article contributes to our knowledge of commercial security experts by analysing the ways in which images of expertise are constructed, focusing on the contracting of a PSC in 2008 by the Swedish Ministry for Foreign Affairs. Drawing on material from interviews, the company website and the contracting process, the article explores 'public' and 'professional' self-images, and shows how these images differ in important respects, underlining the need to see private security expertise as multifaceted and contradictory. The article also reveals problems of using categories such as 'public' and 'private' when analysing private security, thus feeding into the debate on definition, and provides important insights into the potential role of PSCs in shaping understandings of, and decisions on, security issues.
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