The USA: National Security, Terrorism

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The USA National Security, Terrorism
Globalization

• Dr. McKerchers 244E Guest Lecturer, April 2,
  2008

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National Security, Terrorism Globalization

• What and where is national security?
• Blurring lines between domestic foreign
• Permanent war and preemption
• Homeland security here and/or there
• Governing Through Risk
• foreign goes domestic and the domestic goes
  foreign
• Emerging model of governance

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National Security The role of critical theory

• Who?
• Actors overlapping authorities (e.g. DHS
  stakeholders) terrorists
• What?
• Interests public, private, bureaucratic,
  partisan, etc.
• How Possible?
• Framing the conditions of possibility governing
  through risk

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Themes

• Identity Foreign Policy
• Biopolitics and Geopolitcs
• Risk as an emerging form of governance

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Literature Background

• Identity - David Campbell Writing Security
• e.g. Biopolitics and the SUV
• Biopolitics - (M. Foucault) - management of
  life - biopolitical security (M. Dillon)
• Risk - logic of preemption - management of
  unease (D. Bigo)
• This story is NOT only about the state and
  terrorism

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National Security

• to create a more secure, democratic, and
  prosperous world for the benefit of the American
  people and the international community US State
  Department
• If we do not face the terrorists in Afghanistan,
  we will face them on our own soil G.W. Bush,
  NATO Conference, Bucharest, Romania, 1 April 2008

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National Security Geopolitics
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National Security Biopolitics
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Identity, Security Foreign Policy
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Biopolitics of Security The example of the SUV
Foreign Policy

• SUV as WMD
• environmental concerns geopolitics (foreign
  oil) highway arms race security and/as
  insecurity safety issues
• SUV and American identity (automobility)
• SUV symbolic of global military reach, and
  thus, a threat to national security
• Critical constructivism mutual constitution of
  norms, ideas, identities, and behaviors

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9/11 and Afterwards
Manage Uncertainty i.e. Terrorism
Risk Avoidance
Security (insecurity)
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Risk Management
Accept
Mitigate
Transfer
Avoid
PUBLIC Security
Assess the frequency and impact allocate scarce
resources accordingly
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Governing through Risk

• Risk is not a thing
• Risk is a mode of governing - actuarial/insurance
• Risk involves imagination
• 9/11 Commission report cited a failure of
  imagination as significant to the event
  themselves on 9/11, and the haphazard response

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Uniting and Strengthening America by Providing
Appropriate Tools Required to Intercept and
Obstruct Terrorism Act of 2001
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Liberty
rights over search, arrests and seizures
require probable cause or warrants
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Problems
Cannot quantify success or failure i.e.
waterboarding works G.W. Bush
Cannot know how many Dziekanskis (Taser death
at Vancouver airport)
Authority and Accountability?
Whose or what (in)security is being sold?
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What is Needed?
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Question the (in)appropriateness of risk
management as a policy model for the provision of
public security
Come to terms with (map?) Authority
authorization in contemporary national security
Question how the relationship Between Liberty
Security is framed