1AC
Myth 1AC -Critical Introduction of US Armed
Forces Aff
United States military forces have been occupying Afghanistan for 12 years.
RAWA, the Revolutionary Association of the Women of Afghanistan has provided recent
accounts of the violence and oppression that continue and have worsened.
[The next two quotes are from Revolutionary Association of the Women of Afghanistan (RAWA),
July 3rd, 2013 (Organization established in Kabul, Afghanistan, in 1977 as an independent
political/social organization of Afghan women fighting for human rights and for social justice in
Afghanistan “Afghan women burn in the fire of the oppression of the occupiers and
fundamentalists” http://www.rawa.org/rawa/2013/03/07/rawa-statement-on-iwd-2013english.html)
“The persistence of the current instability and the West's support of the ‘Northern Alliance’ terrorists in
Afghanistan proves that the US and her [its] allies pay no attention to human rights and women rights,
but seek only their political and economical interests. Today, even the most optimistic people in our
country, confess that Afghan women have not been liberated, and have become a commodity for the
Western propaganda. Thanks to the presence of the US, women are gang-raped by warlords, are
flogged in many Taliban-controlled areas, are preys of acid attacks, or are mercilessly stoned to death”
Even though our occupation has been justified under the illusion of saving
women, the legal situation has not provided assistance to women.
“In this country, laws are just pieces of paper that aid only in deceiving people, and are never practically
applied … When criminal husbands, fathers, or brothers kill women under different contexts, they are
never punished. In many cases, women are convicted by the judicial bodies and thrown into jails for the
crime of ‘running away from home’, where they are further raped by the jail keepers. In such a hostile
situation, most women find self-immolation the only solution to free them from a slow torturous death.
The suicide rates among our women has risen in an unprecedented manner”
The prevailing western representations of Afghanistan justify a flawed ideology
that American Forces are here to save the brown Other from chaos. This practice
of otherization ensures epistemic violence.
Crowe 2007 (Lori, Grad Student in Pol. Sci. – York U., “The “Fuzzy Dream”: Discourse,
Historical myths, and Militarized (in)Security Interrogating dangerous myths of Afghanistan and
the ‘West’”, http://archive.sgir.eu/uploads/Crowe-loricrowe.pdf)
In his re-theorization of foreign policy, Campbell exposes the essential role binaries play in the processes implicated in state identity
formation: It emphasizes the exclusionary practices, the discourses of danger, the representations of fear, and the enumeration of
threats, and downplays the role of affirmative discourses such as claims to shared ethnicity, nationality, political ideals, religious
beliefs, or other commonalities.76 Looking specifically at the relationship between the US and Afghanistan,
the US has
defined its own identity (as good, modern, normal, etc.) in relation to its difference from the
Afghan ‘Other’, cultivating its demonization on the basis of perceived danger and moral
valuations (superior/inferior) that are spatially constructed. Claims that the West is constructing a
peaceful, democratic, and liberal nation (values claimed to be at the core of “our civilization, freedom, democracy and ways of life”)
are motivated by the need to transform “their barbarism, inhumanity, low morality and style of life”.77 Eisenstein explains that
“Creating the savage, or slave, or
woman, or Arab allows made-up certainty rather than honest complex variability and
unknowability.”78 Unfortunately, this is not a novel phenomenon unique to the
contemporary situation in Afghanistan: articulations of security that rely on definitions of
‘otherness’ as threats to security, argues Campbell, replicates the logic of Christendom’s
‘evangelism of fear’. Obstructions to security/order/God become defined as irrational, abnormal, mad, etc. in need of rationalization, normalizations,
‘Others’ are constructed or fabricated in order to deal with the fear of not-knowing:
punishment, moralization, etc.: “The state project of security replicates the church project of salvation”.79 As is commonly known, under Christendom it was such ‘discourses of
danger’ that were instrumental in establishing its own authority and disciplining its followers. Similarly, by relying on discourses of danger to define who “we” are, who “we” are
not, and who “they” are that we must fear, the state constructs enemies who’s elimination/domination is necessary to preserve the states own identity (and security): “All
the “war on terror”, or
Afghanistan, or Iraq, becomes, in the words of Baudrillard, an endless war of prevention to
“exorcise” “evil”; an ablation of a non-existent enemy masquerading as the leitmotiv for
universal safety.81 These elements of oppositional binaries is closely related to the second element: contemporary discourse has developed from and further
powers are geared against a single “alien.” And all the rationalizations are raging against the advent of “Evil.”80 Thus,
perpetuates a particular ideology that emanates from a neo-liberal capitalist and imperial agenda that is founded upon neo-colonialist attitudes and assumptions. “The US
campaign to ‘fight terrorism’, initiated after September 11th” explains Nahla Abdo “has crystallized all the ideological underpinnings of colonial and imperial policies towards the
constructed ‘other’.”82 This emerges in the “heroism” myth mentioned above; for example, Debrix explains how narratives around humanitarianism serve an ideological
purpose in that it “contributes to the reinforcement of neoliberal policies in ‘pathological’ regions of the international landscape.83 It also emerges in the militarization myth,
insofar as neoliberal globalisation relies on the institutionalization of neo-colonialism and the commodification and (re)colonization of labor via militarized strategies of imperial
politics. That is, as Agathangelou and Ling point out, “Neoliberal economics enables globalized militarization”.84 Embedded in this normalization of neo-colonial frames are the
elements of linearity and thus assumed rationality of reasoning in the West. As Canada stepped up its role in direct combat operations (which included an increase of combat
troops, fighter jets, and tanks with long-range firing capacities85), Stephen Harper appealed to troop morale on the ground in Afghanistan, stating: “Canada and the
international community are determined to take a failed state and create a "democratic, prosperous and modern country."86 (my italics) Proposed solutions to the conflict(s) in
Afghanistan have been framed and justified not only as ‘saving backwards Afghanistan’ but also as generously bringing it into the modern, capitalist, neoliberal age. Moreover,
this element represents an continuity of colonial power, presenting the one correct truth or resolution, emanating from the ‘objective gaze’ of the ‘problem-solving’ Western
Representations of Afghanistan present Western voices as the authority and the potential
progress such authority can bring to the ‘East’ as naturally desirable. This ‘rationality’ also
presumes an inherent value of Western methodology (including statistical analysis,
quantification of data, etc) and devalues alternative epistemologies including those of the
Afghan people. This is problematic for several reasons: 1) It forecloses and discourages thinking
“outside the box” and instead relies upon the “master’s tools” which include violent military
force, the installation of a democratic regime, peacekeeping, and reconstruction and foreign
aid – alternative strategies are deemed “radical”, “unworkable”, and “anti-American”; 2) it
prioritizes numbers and statistics over lived experiences. By relying on tallies of deaths, percentages of voters,
and numbers of insurgents for example, the experiences of those living in the region are obfuscated and devalued, and; 3)it
reproduces a colonial hierarchy of knowledge production. Old colonial narratives of have resurfaced with renewed vigor in the case of Afghanistan is contingent on and mutually
reinforced by opposing narratives of a ‘civilized’ and ‘developed’ ‘West’. For example: “Consider the
world.
language which is being used…Calling the perpetrators evildoers, irrational, calling them the forces of darkness, uncivilized, intent on
They hate freedom, we are told. Every person of
colour, and I would want to say also every Aboriginal person, will recognize that language. The
language of us versus them, of civilization versus the forces of darkness, this language is
rooted in the colonial legacy.”87 This colonizer/colonized dichotomy is key to the civilisational
justification the US administration pursues (“We wage war to save civilization itself”88) which,
as Agathangelou and Ling explain, is motivated by a constructed medieval evil that threatens
American freedom and democracy, the apotheosis of modern civilization, and therefore must be disciplined/civilized.
destroying civilization, intent on destroying democracy.
In his Speech to Congress on September 21, 2001, Bush portrays the irrational Other as Evil and retributive seeking to destroy the
‘developed, ‘secure’ ‘prosperous’ and ‘civilized’ free world: These terrorists kill not merely to end lives, but to disrupt and end a way
of life…Al Qaeda is to terror what the mafia is to crime. But its goal is not making money; its goal is remaking the world, and
This production of othering and re-institutionalization
of colonial discourse has been enabled by and facilitated ‘culture clash’ explanations.90 The danger of
imposing its radical beliefs on people everywhere.”89
such theories, warns Razack, lies not only in their decontextualization and dehistoricization, but also on its reliance on the Enlightenment narrative and notions of European
moral superiority that justify the use of force. This is evident in the unproblematic way in which outside forces have assumed a right of interference in the region spanning from
the 18th century when imperial powers demarcated the Durrand Line (which created a border between British India and Afghanistan with the goal of making Afghanistan an
effective ‘buffer state’for British Imperial interests91) to the American intervention that began in the Cold War, followed by the Soviets in the 1980’s and the Americans,
Canadians and British today. In fact, The West’s practical engagement in Afghanistan reveals how it has served to reporoduce this neo-colonial myth as well as the complexities
and paradoxes which simultaneously de-stabilize that myth.
Epistemological violence justifies a larger crusade on otherness. This division
places us on a path towards genocide.
Mignolo & Tlostanova 06 [Walter & Madina, Prof of Literature & Prof of the History of
Culture, “Theorizing from the Borders,” European Journal of Social Theory, p.205-6, 208]
The modern foundation of knowledge is territorial and imperial. By modern we mean the sociohistorical organization and classification of the world founded on a macro-narrative and on a specific concept and
principles of knowledge. The point of reference of modernity is the European Renaissance founded,
as an idea and interpretation of a historical present, on two complementary moves: the colonization of time
and the invention of the Middle Ages, and the colonization of space and the invention of America that became integrated
into a Christian tripartite geo-political order: Asia, Africa and Europe. It was from and in Europe that the classification of the world
emerged and not in and from Asia, Africa or America – borders were created therein but of different kinds. The Middle Ages were
integrated into the history of Europe, while the histories in Asia, Africa and America were denied as history. The world map drawn by
Gerardus Mercator and Johannes Ortelius worked together with theology to create a zero point of observation and of knowledge: a
perspective that denied all other perspectives (Castro-Gómez, 2002).
Epistemological frontiers were set in place in
that double move: frontiers that expelled to the outside the epistemic colonial differences (Arabic,
Aymara, Hindi, Bengali, etc.). Epistemic frontiers were re-articulated in the eighteenth century with the
displacement of theology and the theo-politics of knowledge by secular ego-logy and the egopolitics of knowledge. Epistemic frontiers were traced also by the creation of the imperial difference (with the Ottoman,
the Chinese and the Russian empires) and the colonial difference (with Indians and Blacks in America). Both epistemic
differences, colonial and imperial, were based on a racial classification of the population of
the planet, a classificatory order in which those who made the classification put themselves at
the top of Humanity. The Renaissance idea of Man was conceptualized based on the paradigmatic examples of Western
Christianity, Europe, and white and male subjectivity (Kant, 1798; Las Casas, 1552). Thus, from the Renaissance all the way down, the
rhetoric of modernity could not have been sustained without its darker and constitutive side: the logic of coloniality. Border thinking
or theorizing emerged from and as a response to the violence (frontiers) of imperial/territorial epistemology and the
rhetoric
of modernity (and globalization) of salvation that continues to be implemented on the
assumption of the inferiority or devilish intentions of the Other and, therefore, continues to
justify oppression and exploitation as well as eradication of the difference. Border thinking is the
epistemology of the exteriority; that is, of the outside created from the inside; and as such, it is always a decolonial project. Recent
immigration to the imperial sites of Europe and the USA – crossing the imperial and colonial differences – contributes to maintaining
the conditions for border thinking that emerged from the very inception of modern imperial expansion. In this regard, critical border
thinking displaces and subsumes Max Horkheimer’s ‘critical theory’ which was and still is grounded in the experience of European
internal history (Horkheimer, 1937). ‘Critical border thinking’ instead is grounded in the experiences of the colonies and subaltern
empires. Consequently, it provides the epistemology that was denied by imperial expansion. ‘Critical border thinking’ also denies the
epistemic privilege of the humanities and the social sciences – the privilege of an observer that makes the rest of the world an object
of observation (from Orientalism to Area Studies). It also moves away from the post-colonial toward the de-colonial, shifting to the
geoand body-politics of knowledge.
They Continue…
Accordingly, our first thesis is the following .
‘Borders’ are not only geographic but also political, subjective (e.g.
epistemic and, contrary to frontiers, the very concept of ‘border’ implies the existence of
people, languages, religions and knowledge on both sides linked through relations established
by the coloniality of power (e.g. structured by the imperial and colonial differences). Borders in this precise sense, are not a
natural outcome of a natural or divine historical processes in human history, but were created in the very constitution of the
modern/colonial world (i.e. in the imaginary of Western and Atlantic capitalist empires formed in the past five hundred years). If we limit
cultural) and
our observations to the geographic, epistemic and subjective types of borders in the modern/colonial world (from the European Renaissance till today),
we will see that they
all have been created from the perspective of European imperial/ colonial
expansion: massive appropriation of land accompanied by the constitution of international
law that justified the massive appropriation of land (Grovogui, 1996; Schmitt, 1952); control of knowledge
(the epistemology of the zero point as representation of the real) by disqualifying non-European languages and
epistemologies and control of subjectivities (by conversation, civilization, democratization) or, in today’s language – by
the globalization of culture.
The epistemological constructions of the Afghanistan other are apart of a larger
discourse of militarism. Presidential war powers have no limit on them by congress, which
places Obama at the head of a global military network.
Dr. Paul Craig Roberts 13 is former Assistant Secretary of the US Treasury and Associate Editor
of the Wall Street Journal, has held numerous university appointments. He is a frequent
contributor to Global Research, "America Shamed Again: Are US Lawmakers 'Owned' by the
Israel Lobby?" 2-19-13, www.globalresearch.ca/america-shamed-again-are-us-lawmakersowned-by-the-israel-lobby/5323415, DOA: 7-31-13, y2k
Americans are a colonized people. Their government represents the colonizing powers : Wall Street,
the Israel Lobby, the Military/Security Complex , Agribusiness, Pharmaceuticals, Energy, Mining, and Timber interests.
Two elected representatives who tried to represent the American people–Ron Paul and Dennis Kucinich–found representative
government to be an inhospitable place for those few who attempt to represent the interests of the American people. Like Ron Paul,
Dennis Kucinich, and Gerald Celente,
I stand with our Founding Fathers who opposed America’s
entanglement in foreign wars. In an effort to prevent entanglements, the Founding Fathers
gave the power to declare war to Congress. Over the years Congress has gradually ceded this
power to the President to the extent that it no longer exists as a power of Congress. The
President can start a war anywhere at any time simply by declaring that the war is not a war
but a “time-limited, scope-limited, kinetic military action.” Or he can use some other
nonsensical collection of words. In the first few years of the 21st century, the executive
branch has invaded two countries, violated the sovereignty of five others with military
operations, and has established military bases in Africa in order to counteract China’s economic
penetration of the continent and to secure the resources for US and European corporations,
thus enlarging the prospects for future wars . If the Republicans succeed in blocking Hagel’s
confirmation, the prospect of war with Iran will be boosted. By abdicating its war power,
Congress lost its control of the purse. As the executive branch withholds more and more
information from Congressional oversight committees, Congress is becoming increasingly
powerless . As Washington’s war debts mount, Washington’s attack on the social safety net will become more intense.
Governmental institutions that provide services to Americans will wither as more tax revenues are directed to the coffers of special
The tenuous connection between the US government and the interests of
citizens is on its way to being severed entirely.
interests and foreign entanglements.
The occupation of Afghanistan plays a central part of preserving American
militarism in the region. Harvesting rare Earth minerals and deployment to regional
conflicts ensures our power. Unfortunately, our intervention brought war criminals and
rapists back into power.
Ian Sinclair and Mariam Rawi 2009 ( Ian is a journalist with Znet and Rawi is a member of
RAWA’s foreign relations committee, “Interview with the Revolutionary Association of the
Women of Afghanistan” April 29, 2009 http://www.zcommunications.org/interview-with-therevolutionary-association-of-the-women-of-afghanistan-by-ian-sinclair)
The US invaded Afghanistan to fulfil its geo-political, economic and regional strategic interests
and to change Afghanistan into a strong military base in the region. Since Afghanistan is the
heart of Asia, it would serve as a strong base for controlling surrounding countries like
Pakistan, China, Iran and above all the Central. Additionally, as a superpower, it continues to
occupy Afghanistan to combat rising powers like Russia and China, who are becoming greater
rivals for the US in the economic, military and political fields. Asian Republics. Many argue today that the
2001 invasion was planned before 9/11, but it gave the war-mongers in the White House and Pentagon a golden opportunity to
advance its agenda in the region. In the words of Tony Blair "to be truthful about it, there was no way we could have got the public
consent to have suddenly launched a campaign on Afghanistan but for what happened on September 11..."Getting hold of the multibillions drug business was another reason for invading Afghanistan and in the past few years we clearly see that the US and its allies
changed Afghanistan into the opium capital of the world. Opium production increased more than 4400%, with 93% of world illegal
opium produced in Afghanistan. Narcotics is said to be the third greatest trade commodity in cash terms after oil and weapons.
There are large financial institutions behind this business and the control of the routes of narcotics was important for the US
Afghanistan holds a rich source of gas, copper,
iron and other minerals and precious stones and the big powers are of course interested in
looting it the way they are doing in poor African countries. In the past few years there have
been exploration efforts of our natural resources. The United States Geological Survey (USGS) estimates there
government and now they have reached their goal. Furthermore,
are about 700 billion cubic meters of gas and 300 million tonnes of oil across several Northern provinces of Afghanistan. Also the
world's second-biggest unexploited copper deposit is located in our country with an estimated 11 million tonnes of copper. So
besides routing the oil and gas from the Central Asian Republics through Afghanistan, the US is interested in exploiting Afghanistan's
The "war on terror" and "liberation of Afghan women" were mere lies to cover the
above and many other hidden agendas of the US in Afghanistan. Our peoples' dreams for
liberation were shattered in the very first days after the invasion when they witnessed that
the war criminals and Northern Alliance murderers and rapists who destroyed Afghanistan,
were backed and brought back to power by the US and its allies after the fall of the Taliban
regime. When infamous criminals like Burhanuddin Rabbani, Abdul Rasul Sayyaf, Karim Khalili,
Mohammad Mohaqiq, Yunus Qanooni, Mullah Rakiti, Atta Muhammad, Rashid Dostum, Ismail
Khan, Haji Almas, Hazrat Ali and many more were decorated by the US as champions of
freedom and were installed in power, everyone knew that Afghanistan had once again
become the centre of a chess game of the US and its allies who made the slogans of
"democracy" and "human rights" into painful jokes for our nation.
resources too.
An empowered military complex ensures global instability by propping up
authoritarian governments and creating resentment amongst civilians. This is
slowly spiraling into extinction.
Ismael Hossezin-Zadeh 10 teaches economics @ Drake University, “The Biggest Parasite,”
12-17-10, http://www.counterpunch.org/2010/12/17/the-globalization-of-militarism/ DOA: 731-13, y2k
Many Americans still believe that US foreign policies are designed to maintain peace , to
safeguard human rights and to spread democracy
around the world. Regardless
of their officially stated
objectives, however, those policies often lead to opposite outcomes : war, militarism and dictatorship .
Evidence of the fact that US policy makers no longer uphold the ideals they state publicly is
overwhelming . Those who continue to harbor illusions about the thrust of US policies around the world
must be oblivious to the fact that the U nited S tates has been overtaken by a military-industrialsecurity-financial cabal whose representatives are firmly ensconced in both the White House and
the
US
Congress . The ultimate goal of the cabal, according to their own military guidelines, is “full spectrum
dominance” of the world; and they are willing to wage as many wars , to destroy as many
countries and to kill as many people as necessary to achieve that goal. The liberal hawks and
petty intellectual pundits who tend to defend US foreign policies on the grounds of “human
rights” or “moral obligations” are well served to pay attention (among other evidence) to the US
foreign policy documents that are currently being disclosed by the Wikileaks. The documents “show all too clearly that,”
as Paul Craig Roberts puts it, “ the US government is a duplicitous entity whose raison d’etre is to control
every other country .” In essence, the documents show that while the US government, like a global mafia
godfather , rewards the pliant ruling elites of the client states with arms, financial aid and
military protections, it punishes the nations whose leaders refuse to surrender to the wishes
of the bully and relinquish their national sovereignty. US foreign policies , like its domestic policies, are
revealed as catering not to the broader public or national interests of the people but to the powerful special
interests that are vested primarily in the military capital and the finance capital. US foreign policy
architects are clearly incapable of recognizing or acknowledging the fact that different peoples and
nations may have different needs and interests . Nor are they capable of respecting other
peoples’ aspirations to national sovereignty. Instead, they
tend to
view other peoples , just as they do the
through the narrow prism of their own nefarious interests . By selfishly dividing the world
into “friends” and “foe,” or “vassal states,” as Zbigniew Brzezinski put it, powerful beneficiaries of war and
militarism compel both groups to embark on a path of militarization, which leads inevitably to
American people,
militarism and authoritarian rule.
Although militarism grows out of the military, the two are different in character. While the
military is a means to meet certain ends such as maintaining national security,
militarism represents a bureaucratized
permanent military establishment as an end in itself . It is “a phenomenon,” as the late Chalmers Johnson
which a nation’s armed services come to put their institutional preservation ahead of
achieving national security or even a commitment to the integrity of the governmental
structure of which they are a part” (The Sorrows of Empire, Metropolitan Books, 2004, pp. 423-24). This explains the
cancerous growth and parasitic nature of US militarism? cancerous because it is steadily expanding
throughout many parts of the world, and parasitic because not only does it drain other nations resources, it also
sucks US national resources out of the public purse into the coffers of the wicked interests
that are vested in the military-industrial-security complex. By creating fear and instability and
embarking on unilateral military adventures, corporate militarism of the United States also fosters
put it, “by
militarism elsewhere . A major US strategy of expanding its imperial influence and promoting
militarism around the globe has been the formation of international military alliances in
various parts of the world . These include not only the notorious North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO), which is
essentially an integral part of the Pentagon’s world command structure, and which was recently expanded to police the world, but also 10 other joint
military commands called Unified Combatant Commands. They include Africa Command ( AFRICOM), Central Command (CENTCOM),
European Command (EUCOM), Northern Command (NORTHCOM), Pacific Command (PACOM), and Southern Command
(SOUTHCOM). The geographic area under the “protection” of each of these Unified Combatant Commands is called Area of Responsibility (AOR).
AFRICOM’s area of responsibility includes US “military operations and military relations with 53 African nations – an area of responsibility covering all of
Africa except Egypt.” CENTCOM’s area of responsibility spans many countries in the Middle East/Near East/Persian Gulf and Central Asia. It includes
Iraq, Afghanistan, Pakistan, Kuwait, Bahrain, Qatar, United Arab Emirates, Oman, Jordan, Saudi Arabia, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan,
Turkmenistan, and Uzbekistan. EUCOM’s area of responsibility “covers 51 countries and territories, including Europe, Iceland, Greenland, and Israel.”
NORTHCOM’s area of responsibility “includes air, land and sea approaches and encompasses the contiguous United States, Alaska, Canada, Mexico and
the surrounding water out to approximately 500 nautical miles (930 km). It also includes the Gulf of Mexico, the Straits of Florida, portions of the
Caribbean region to include The Bahamas, Puerto Rico, and the US Virgin Islands.” PACOM’s area of responsibility “covers over fifty percent of the
world’s surface area ? approximately 105 million square miles (nearly 272 million square kilometers) ? nearly sixty percent of the world’s population,
thirty-six countries, twenty territories, and ten territories and possessions of the United States.” SOUTHCOM’s area of responsibility “encompasses 32
nations (19 in Central and South America and 13 in the Caribbean)?and 14 US and European territories. . . . It is responsible for providing contingency
planning and operations in Central and South America, the Caribbean (except US commonwealths, territories, and possessions), Cuba, their territorial
waters.”
Together with over 800 military bases scattered over many parts of the world, this
military colossus represents an ominous presence of the US armed forces all across our
planet.
Instead of dismantling NATO as redundant in the post-Cold War era, it has been expanded (as a proxy for the US military juggernaut) to
include many new countries in Eastern Europe all the way to the borders of Russia. Not only has it inserted itself into a number of new international
relations and recruited many new members and partners, it has also arrogated to itself many new tasks and responsibilities in social, political,
economic, environmental, transportation and communications arenas of the world. NATO’s new areas of “responsibility,” as reflected in its latest
Strategic Concept, include “human rights”; “key environmental and resource constraints, including health risks, climate change, water scarcity and
increasing energy needs. . .”; “important means of communication, such as the internet, and scientific and technological research. . .”; “proliferation of
ballistic missiles, of nuclear weapons and other weapons of mass destruction”; “threat of extremism, terrorism and trans-national illegal activities such
as trafficking in arms, narcotics and people”; “vital communication, transport and transit routes on which international trade, energy security and
prosperity depend”; the “ability to prevent, detect, defend against and recover from cyber-attacks”; and the need to “ensure that the Alliance is at the
front edge in assessing the security impact of emerging technologies.” Significant global issues thus claimed to be part of NATO’s expanded mission fall
logically within the purview of civilian international institutions such as the United Nations. So why is the US ruling plutocracy, using NATO, now trying
to supplant the United Nations and other international agencies ? The
reason is that due to the rise of the influence of a
number of new international players such as Brazil, South Africa, Turkey, Iran, and Venezuela
the UN is no longer as subservient to the global ambitions of the United States as it once was.
Planning to employ the imperial military machine of NATO instead of the civilian multilateral
institutions such as the UN clearly belies, once again, the self-righteous US claims of trying to spread democracy worldwide.
Furthermore, NATO’s expanded “global responsibilities” would easily provide the imperial US military machine new excuses for unilateral military
interventions. By the same token, such military adventures would also provide the US military-industrial-security complex additional rationale for
continued escalation of the Pentagon budget. The expansion of NATO to include most of the Eastern Europe has led Russia, which had curtailed its
military spending during the 1990s in the hope that, following the collapse of the Berlin Wall, the US would also do the same, to once again increase its
military spending. In response to the escalation of US military spending, which has nearly tripled during the last 10 years (from $295 billion when
George W. Bush went to the White House in January 2001 to the current figure of nearly one trillion dollars), Russia too has drastically increased its
military spending during the same time period (from about $22 billion in 2000 to $61 billion today). In a similar fashion, US military encirclement of
China (through a number of military alliances and partnerships that range from Pakistan, Afghanistan and India to South China Sea/Southeast Asia,
Taiwan, South Korea, Japan, Cambodia, Malaysia, New Zealand and most recently Vietnam) has led that country to also further strengthen its military
capabilities. Just as the US military and geopolitical ambitions have led Russia and China to reinforce their military capabilities, so have they compelled
other countries such as Iran, Venezuela and North Korea to likewise strengthen their armed forces and buttress their military preparedness. Not
only does aggressive US militarism compel its “adversaries” to allocate a disproportionately
large share of their precious resources to military spending, but it also coerces its “allies” to
likewise embark on a path of militarization . Thus, countries like Japan and Germany, whose military capabilities were
reduced to purely defensive postures following the atrocities of World War II, have once again been re-militarizing in recent years under the impetus of
what US military strategists call “the need to share the burden of global security.” Thus, while Germany and Japan still operate under a “peace
constitution,” their military expenditures on a global scale now rank sixth and seventh, respectively (behind the US, China, France, UK and Russia). US
militarization of the world (both directly through the spread of its own military apparatus across the globe and indirectly by compelling
both “friends” and “foe” to militarize) has a number of ominous consequences for the overwhelming majority or the
population the world. For one thing, it is the source of a largely redundant and disproportionately
large allocation of the world’s precious resources to war, militarism and wasteful production
of the means of death and destruction . Obviously, as this inefficient, class-biased disbursement of
resources drains public finance and accumulates national debt, it also brings tremendous
riches and treasures to war profiteers , that is, the beneficiaries of the military capital and the
finance capital.
Secondly,
to justify this lopsided allocation of the lion’s share of national
resources to military spending, beneficiaries of war dividends tend to create fear , suspicion
and hostility among peoples and nations of the world, thereby sowing the seeds of war,
international conflicts and global instability. Thirdly, by the same token that powerful beneficiaries of war
and military-security capital tend to promote suspicion, to create fear and invent enemies, both
at home and abroad, they also undermine democratic values and nurture authoritarian rule . As the
predatory military-industrial-security-financial interests find democratic norms of openness
and transparency detrimental to their nefarious objectives of limitless self-enrichment, they
cleverly
create pretexts for secrecy, “security,” military rule and police state. Concealment of the robbery of public
treasury in the name of national security requires restriction of information, obstruction of transparency, and curtailment of democracy. It
follows
that under the kleptocratic influence of the powerful interests that are vested in the militarysecurity-financial industries the US government has turned into an ominous global force of
destabilization, obstruction, retrogression and authoritarianism .
RAWA says “The exit of foreign troops and our country’s independence, can be
the first step in the path of the realization of values such as freedom and
democracy, which are vital conditions for the emancipation of women”
(Partner) and I demand that The United States Congress should amend the
Authorization for the Use of Military Force and related statutes to prohibit the
President from re-introducing United States armed forces into hostilities in
Afghanistan after 2014.
Now is a key time in US occupation of Afghanistan. The Bilateral Security Agreement
does not force US forces out until 2014, but members in Washington are pressuring Karzai to
extend the deadline.
Ioannis Koskinas August 1, 2013 (Ioannis Koskinas was a military officer for over twenty
years and now focuses on economic development projects in Afghanistan and Pakistan “The
U.S.-Afghan game of "Chicken’”
http://afpak.foreignpolicy.com/posts/2013/08/01/us_afghan_game_of_chicken
In an Afghan context, the U.S. and Afghan governments are on a collision course in a number of areas and unless cooler heads can
prevail, the eventual crash will be devastating, yet totally uneven. For the United States, its international credibility will be
undoubtedly damaged; but for the Afghan government, the fallout will be disastrous, and signal the beginning of the end for this
the Bilateral Security Agreement
(BSA), which will determine the size and shape of the U.S. mission post 2014, and the tussle over
period of relative progress and prosperity. Two prime examples of the stakes are
taxing U.S. government contractors supporting military operations in Afghanistan. Following the ill-choreographed opening of the
Taliban political office in Qatar, Afghan President Hamid Karzai put the BSA on pause. Even though U.S. officials were quick to admit
that the Doha event was embarrassing and not what they had intended, they also made it clear that they had acted with Karzai's
Karzai's decision to halt
the BSA talks was yet another attempt to challenge the United States when Afghan
sovereignty was on the line. But with the negotiations still stalled, his move may prove to be a
pyrrhic victory. One of the unintended consequences of his decision is that a "zero option"
(keeping no U.S. forces in Afghanistan after 2014), which had little support in Washington and
in NATO-member capitals, is now being considered in earnest. As far as the U.S. government is
concerned, the BSA is the sine qua non for a continued U.S. military presence past 2014. In
fact, the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff recently set an October 2013 deadline for
completing the BSA in an effort to force the issue with an Afghan government that is
struggling to define its own vision of a post-2014 security environment. Without the BSA, however,
blessing. That really should have been the end of it and the negotiations should have resumed.
even those who warn against the "zero option" have been adamant that total withdrawal is not only likely, but also inevitable. In
other words, unless the BSA is finalized quickly, the idea of leaving no U.S. troops in Afghanistan after 2014 will continue to gain
momentum, and what started out as a dangerous possibility may become the most likely course of action.
The 1AC’s incorporation of alternative perspectives dismantles the colonial
epistemology that has erased other’s perspectives. Understanding that history
is always a constructed truth is necessary to rethink the problem at hand.
Crowe 2007 (Lori, Grad Student in Pol. Sci. – York U., “The “Fuzzy Dream”: Discourse,
Historical myths, and Militarized (in)Security Interrogating dangerous myths of Afghanistan and
the ‘West’”, http://archive.sgir.eu/uploads/Crowe-loricrowe.pdf)
Conclusion: The Dangers of Myth-making We need to navigate critically and cautiously through
the multiple stories, silences, and complex and contradictory narratives that lie beneath the
surface of imperial myths. Kaufman, for example, explains that in order to study incidences of ethnic conflict, we must
begin by trying to hear the myriad narratives and different assumptions and combine insights from multiple methodological and
We need to understand that “some people are just written out of
history”106, and the stories of history are so partial and there is so much those of us in the
West don’t see that we can never believe that we have arrived at a ‘truth’ or ‘reality’: History
is never just simply the ‘past’. Nor is history simply its official rendering…History is made while
old histories are simultaneously reproduced, without most of us ever owning the story
told…Once I see interpretation is already embedded in the very process of thought I recognize that there is a before that I cannot
theoretical approaches.105
completely ever know or recover. The very idea of history itself is destabilized as a process of storytelling with different
storytellers…I therefore need to know whose story I am reading, who is telling the story, and from what timebound lens it is being
told.107 Perhaps the best response is, as Peter Hulme suggests:
“to read speculatively, recognizing that the
story can never be fully recovered, and that which has been recovered is often distorted and
manufactured.”108 There are emancipatory possibilities in a critical project of discourse
deconstruction: it lies in the recognition of the detrimental effects of imperial, neo-colonial,
orientalist ‘myths’ and the policy agendas that are made possible through them. By beginning to
delve into the complex and interrelated factors of Afghanistan’s history in the previous section, the dangers of historical narratives
“By myth man has lived, died and – all too often –
killed.”109 While pressure must be put on the messengers of violent and deliberately myths,
we must also take responsibility and listen critically to the multiple narratives around us in
order to realize a more “panoptic”110 vision; understanding, nonetheless, that we can never
achieve a whole or complete understanding or “truth”. “As we listen to the antithetical
mythologies that tear our world apart,” argues Armstrong “we need to be receptive to the
counter-narrative that opposes our point of view and expresses the ‘other’ perspective.”111
that conceal these elements start to become visible:
One way to ‘see’ without an imperial or colonial gaze is to connect heterogeneity into a form of “collective assemblage” in a
Deleuzian and Guattarian sense; that is, accept concrete multiplicities in order to see variation without conquest.112 What are the
historical myths being produced as we speak? Will history books teach young children stories about ‘uncivilized’ and ‘barbaric’
Afghanistan, harborer of evil and Muslim terrorists, saved by the heroic and technologically vanguard strategies of Western
All myths are political and embody a very particular and power infused representation
about how the world works. We must historicize particular forms of knowledge and
acknowledge their partiality by unpacking the theories that underpin the “facts” produced by
situated knowledge’s; “A thicker and more complex vision of humanity is urgently
needed.”113 If, as Taylor pronounces, history and its myths are not indeed about the past, but
rather the future, than the question we must continually ask ourselves (and of other myth
producers, as we are all implicated in this process) is what kind of world is being produced
through what myths and who is benefiting and who is being disappeared?
militaries?
For the purposes of our discussion, we accept that the affirmative defends a
topical action carried out by the USFG, but also defends the discursive context
within which such an action could take place. We reject the magic wand theory of fiat
that imagines action separate from the conditions that make that action possible. Imagining a
world where military policy is changed requires also imagining a radical change in social
discursive structures. Negative political process DAs are irrelevant to this question because
they assume a world that simply cannot coexist with the affirmative.
Bleiker 2000 [Roland, Prof of International Relations, Popular Dissent, Human Agency, and
Global Politics, p. 134-6]
Since a systematic theory cannot capture the intricate functioning of power, one must explore different ways of understanding the frameworks within
which domination, resistance and social change take place. One must search for more subtle foundations that could, maybe, provide momentary
ground for understanding how human agency functions in a transversal context. But how is one to embark upon this intricate task? Foucault continues
to provide useful guidance, at least up to a certain point. He approaches power by adding an extra step to understanding it. Power, he argues, is
not simply the relationship between individuals or groups, a type of force that one person
exerts on another. It works in a more intricate, more indirect way: [W]hat defines a
relationship of power is that it is a mode of action which does not act directly and
immediately on others. Instead it acts upon their actions: an action upon an action, on existing
actions or on those which may arise in the present or the future. . .[T]he exercise of power. . .is a total structure of actions brought to bear upon
possible actions.29 Power
is a complex strategic situation, something that shapes and frames the
boundaries within which actions can be carried out. Such a definition inevitably raises a number of questions. What
mediates the exercise of power? What is the space that lies between actions, this mesh of social forces through which actions frame the actions of
others? One mediating factor is the relationship between power and knowledge. Foucault, drawing once more on Nietzsche, argues that knowledge
and power are intrinsically linked. There are no power relations which do not constitute corresponding fields of knowledge. And there are no forms of
knowledge that do not presuppose and at the same time constitute relations of power.30 Power is not a stable and steady force, something that exists
on its own. There is no essence to power, for its exercise is dependent upon forms of knowledge that imbue certain actions with power. This is to say
that the manner in which we view and frame power also influences how it functions in practice. ‘It is within discourse,’ Foucault claims, ‘that power and
knowledge articulate each other.’31 Discourses
are subtle mechanisms that frame our thinking process.
They determine the limits of what can be thought, talked and written in a normal and rational
way. In every society the production of discourses is controlled, selected, organised and diffused by certain procedures. This process
creates systems of exclusion in which one group of discourses is elevated to a hegemonic
status while others are condemned to exile. Discourses give rise to social rules that decide
which statements most people recognise as valid, as debatable or as undoubtedly false. They
guide the selection process that ascertains which propositions from previous periods or foreign cultures are retained, imported, valued, and which are
forgotten or neglected.32 Although these boundaries change, at times gradually, at times abruptly, they maintain a certain unity across time, a unity
that dominates and transgresses individual authors, texts or social practices. Not
everything is discourse, but everything is
in discourse. Things exist independently of discourses, but we can only assess them through
the lenses of discourse, through the practices of knowing, perceiving and sensing which we
have acquired over time. Nietzsche: That mountain there! That cloud there! What is ‘real’ in that? Subtract the phantasm and every
human contribution from it, my sober friends! If you can! If you can forget your descent, your past, your training – all of your humanity and animality.
There is no ‘reality’ for us – not for you either, my sober friends. . .33 Nietzsche’s point, of course, is not that mountains and clouds do not exist as such.
To claim such would be absurd. Mountains and clouds exist no matter what we think about them. And so do more tangible social practices. But they are
not ‘real’ by some objective standard. Their appearance, meaning and significance is part of human experiences, part of a specific way of life. A
Nietzschean position emphasises that discourses
render social practices intelligible and rational – and by
doing so mask the ways in which they have been constituted and framed. Systems of
domination gradually become accepted as normal and silently penetrate every aspect of
society. They cling to the most remote corners of our mind, for ‘all things that live long are gradually so saturated with reason that their
emergence out of unreason thereby becomes improbable’.34 Discourses are more than just masking agents. They provide us with
frameworks to view the world, and by doing so influence its course. Discourses express ways of life that
actively shape social practices. But more is needed to demonstrate how the concept of discourse can be of use to illuminate transversal dissident
practices. More is needed to outline a positive notion of human agency that is not based on stable foundations. This section has merely located the
terrains that are to be explored. It is now up to the following chapters to introduce, step by step, the arguments and evidence necessary to develop and
sustain a discursive understanding of transversal dissent and its ability to exert human agency.
Militarism
Prez  Militarism
Presidential abuse of armed forces causes militarization
Maj. Charles G. Kels 12 “The militarization of the presidency: The danger of conflating military
and civilian values,” http://www.armedforcesjournal.com/2012/06/9381480/ DOA: 7-31-13, y2
THE MILITARISM OF THE UNMILITARIZED But a funny thing happened on our way to a civilian
utopia of peace-loving leaders : The fewer military bona fides our politicians possess, the more
militaristic
their
bearing
and vocabulary
have
seemingly
become . This is particularly true of the presidency , which
increasingly appears enveloped in a military aura that bears little relation to our founding documents or principles. True, Alexander
Hamilton wrote in Federalist No. 69 that the president’s war powers “amount to nothing more than the supreme
command and direction of the military and naval forces, as first general and admiral of the confederacy,” but his
emphasis was on the “nothing more,” in order to differentiate the president from the British king, whose authority extended to both making and
declaring war. There was no implication that the president was anything other than a civilian, albeit one with the profound and sacred duty of exercising ultimate command
authority over the nation’s military forces. Of note, the Constitution only uses the term “commander in chief” once, but presidents constantly refer to themselves as such. A
foreign observer of our political system, with no prior knowledge of American constitutional traditions, could be forgiven for mistaking the modern presidency for an exalted
military rank. The Defense Department quadrennial election-year public affairs guidance — which states that candidates cannot “engage in any political campaign or election
activity” on military installations, then explicitly exempts the president, vice president and House speaker from such prohibition — no doubt adds to this impression. It also
Whether it’s landing on an aircraft carrier in a flight suit or
tipping off a televised basketball game in the same venue, presidents want to be seen with
the military — and to be seen as one of the military. Presidential flight jackets with embroidered
names ensure that the military motif persists during periods of transportation and relaxation.
probably increases the incumbents’ re-election prospects.
Do our chief executives really have trouble getting recognized without a name tag? Evidently, we’ve come a long way since 1862, when President Abraham Lincoln wore a formal
suit and top hat while dressing down Gen. George McClellan at Antietam for his failure to aggressively pursue the enemy. Meeting with top Union officers, Lincoln quite literally
stood out and above — nearly a foot taller and in civilian garb. This significant moment (and famed picture) would have somehow been less poignant had the president been
flaunting a quasi-military coat embroidered with, “Abe Lincoln, Commander-in-Chief.” As it was, the president’s authority spoke for itself. In some respects, the current
environment may simply reflect the old adage that those who have seen war are the ones who hate it the most. A decade before becoming defense secretary, Robert Gates
wrote, “
The biggest doves in Washington wear uniforms .” In “From the Shadows,” he noted the ambivalence of the Pentagon brass
about invading Grenada in 1983: “Our military leaders have seen too many half-baked ideas for the use of military force advanced in the Situation Room by hairy-chested
civilians who have never seen combat or fired a gun in anger.” Indeed, arguably our most dovish president since World War II was the five-star supreme commander
Eisenhower, who ended one war (Korea), avoided another (Vietnam), opposed military action in the Suez, and then warned us about the dangers of the “military-industrial
complex” on his way out of office. The eminent political scientist Jean Edward Smith’s new biography, “Eisenhower in War and Peace,” is an instructive reminder that President
Eisenhower’s war aversion — whatever its merits or defects — was at the very least a matter of principle rather than passivity. In keeping with this theme, it is noteworthy that
the uniform Eisenhower chose to be buried in omitted most of his medals. One of the most decorated soldiers in American history, he apparently declined to thump his own
chest even at the close of his life.
Yet perhaps it should come as no surprise that presidents are enamored by
the armed forces . The military’s performance, especially when it comes to special operations forces, has the power to
make presidents look very good or very bad — even though the outcome of specific missions, let alone larger campaigns, are generally
much more attributable to training, intelligence, the vagaries of warfare, and just plain luck than any guidance emanating from 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue. The death knell of
President Jimmy Carter’s re-election prospects may very well have been a haboob over eastern Iran, whereas Lincoln’s political future (and maybe the nation’s) in 1864 had
Over the past three-plus decades in particular, the military
has been a reliable and spectacular asset for incumbents seeking to project power and control .
Whether killing terrorists, rescuing hostages, toppling dictators or stopping genocide, it has, by
more to do with the fall of Atlanta than a stirring stump speech.
any measure,
been an incredible run
— accruing largely to the benefit of the world, the nation, the military itself, and yes, to that exclusive club of (so far)
guys sporting the good hair and wearing the embroidered flight jackets.
Militarism Blurs Peace/War
Militarism blurs civilian and military life – the erasure and indistinction
between war and peace means we live in a state of constant war.
Sjoberg and Via 10 [Laura: professor at University of Florida, feminist scholar of international
relations and international security, PhD from USC, JD from Boston College and Sandra:
professor of Political Science at Ferrum College. Gender, War, and Militarism: Feminist
Perspectives Praeger security international, Santa Barbara p. 7]
Though war is an essential condition of militarism—the apex, the climax, the peak experience,
the point of all the investments, training, and preparation—militarism is much, much broader
than war, comprising an underlying system of institutions, practices, values, and cultures.
Militarism is the extension of war-related, war-preparatory, and war-based meanings and
activities outside of “war proper” and into social and political life more generally. Peterson and
Runyan (1999, 258) explain that “militarization refers to processes by which characteristically
military practices are extended into the civilian arena—as when businesses become
dependent on military contracts, clothing fashions celebrate military styles, or toys and games
embody military activities.” Peterson and Runyan’s definition captures an important part of
militarism, but a conceptual extension helps us see its pervasiveness. Instead of envisioning
militarism as the extension of military practices into civilian life, it is possible to see it as the
blurring or erasure of distinctions between war and peace, military and civilian. Scholars
cognizant of the impacts of war and militarism on women, like Betty Reardon who is cited
earlier, have always argued that the artificial construction of boundaries between “war” (one
day) and “not war” (the next day) do not represent the political realities or the humanitarian
situations in conflict zones. Instead, as Chris Cuomo (1996, 31) has explained, war is best seen
as a process or continuum rather than a discrete event. Where an event has a starting point
and an ending point, militarism pervades societies (sometimes with more intensity and
sometimes with less) before, during, and after the discrete event that the word “war” is
usually used to describe. Because of this, “the spatial metaphors used to refer to war as a
separate, bounded sphere indicate assumptions that war is a realm of human activity vastly
removed from normal human life” (Cuomo 1996, 30).
Prez Control/Military  Violence
The damage to democracy makes violence and all their impacts are inevitablechecking military elite control of policy is key
Boggs, National University (Los Angeles) social sciences professor, December 1997
[Carl, Theory and Society, vol26 no6, "The Great Retreat: Decline of the Public Sphere in Late
Twentieth-Century America, JSTOR]
The false sense of empowerment that comes with such mesmerizing impulses is accompanied by a loss of public engagement, an erosion of citizenship
and a depleted capacity of individuals in large groups to work for social change. As this ideological quagmire worsens, urgent problems that are
destroying the fabric of American society will go unsolved perhaps even unrecognized only to fester more ominously into the future. And such
problems (ecological
crisis, poverty, urban decay, spread of infectious diseases, technological displacement of
workers) cannot be understood outside the larger social and global context of internationalized markets, finance, and
communications. Paradoxically, the widespread retreat from politics, often inspired by localist sentiment, comes at a time when agendas that ignore or
sidestep these global realities will, more than ever, be reduced to impotence. In his commentary on the state of citizenship today, Wolin refers to the
increasing sublimation and dilution of politics, as larger numbers of people turn away from public concerns toward private ones. By
diluting the
common involvements, we negate the very idea of politics as a source of public ideals and
visions.74 In the meantime, the fate of the world hangs in the balance. The unyielding truth is that, even as the ethos of
anti-politics becomes more compelling and even fashionable in the United States, it is the vagaries of
political power that will continue to decide the fate of human societies. This last point demands further elaboration.
The shrinkage of politics hardly means that corporate colonization will be less of a reality , that
social hierarchies will somehow disappear, or that gigantic state and military structures will lose their hold over
people's lives. Far from it: the space abdicated by a broad citizenry, well-informed and ready to
participate at many levels, can in fact be filled by authoritarian and reactionary elites an already familiar dynamic in
many lesserdeveloped countries. The fragmentation and chaos of a Hobbesian world, not very far removed from the rampant
individualism, social Darwinism, and civic violence that have been so much a part of the American
landscape, could be the prelude to a powerful Leviathan designed to impose order in the face of disunity and
atomized retreat. In this way the eclipse of politics might set the stage for a reassertion of politics in more
virulent guise or it might help further rationalize the existing power structure. In either case, the state would likely become
what Hobbes anticipated: the embodiment of those universal, collective interests that had vanished from civil society.75
life of
US = Imperialist
There’s no such thing as benevolent hegemon---it’s an ideological cover to
promote pro-interventionist policies---you should reject utilitarian logic which
justifies US control
Robin Farwell 12 "Post 9/11 US Foreign Policy: Continuation of 'New Imperialist' Ambitions?"
8-14-12, www.e-ir.info/2012/08/14/post-911-us-foreign-policy-continuation-of-new-imperialistambitions/ DOA: 7-31-13, Y2K
After the Second World, ‘responding’ to the Cold War exigencies allowed the U.S. to act relatively freely in establishing a new world order.
Indeed, this period allowed the U.S. to realise its imperialist ambitions and establish a fundamental
ideological base (Glassman, 2004). The end of the Cold War witnessed a slight break in western unity. Indeed, realist power balance theory
dictates that the absence of the Soviet threat meant that the western states, particularly within the E.U.,
were becoming increasingly autonomous. However, the extent to which the relationships within the
institutions were maintained is a notable element of the U.S.’s imperialist ambitions . By
establishing U.S. centric institutions that served a purpose for the U nited S tates in the Cold War, the U.S.
experienced a shift in their role in the 1990s. The global distribution of troops remained long after the end of the Cold War, providing an apparent
indication of the U.S.’s continued imperial ambition (Todd, 2002). It is argued that a shift in the aforementioned ‘function’ of troops overseas occurred after the Cold War.
focus had shifted to ‘imperial policing’ to ensure that no states are able to ‘slip
the leash’ and was a means of ‘attempting to control as many sources of petroleum as possible, both to serve
America’s insatiable demand for fossil fuels and to use that control as a bargaining chip for even more oil dependent regions’ (2004, pp.
154 – 155). Combining this with the developing benevolent and exceptionalist conception of ‘global police ,’ the
U.S. appeared set to cement its imperial ambitions at the end of the Cold War. The three key elements of analysis in the post Cold
Johnson asserts that the
War era are the U.S.’s role within the international community, the military’s distribution and utilisation, and the notable ideological shifts amongst the presidential
administrations. Academics (Johnson, 2002; Boggs, 2005; Negri & Hardt, 2000) have asserted that
capable of managing ‘international justice’
when the U.S. became the only power
in the post Cold War era,
the concept of ‘global security’ was
established to enable the U.S. to act internationally for its own imperialist interests . The Gulf War was
the first time when the U.S. was able to utilise its established role as ‘international police’ and
exert military dominance (Negri & Hardt, 2000). The conflict allowed the U.S. to fully and ‘legitimately’
establish their focus on protecting their interests in the Gulf region. Perceiving the ‘rogue
states’
threat to U.S. interests, maintaining a focus on the military focus became a
priority in the Middle East (Little, 2008). The motivations behind the Gulf War has been described as the U.S. solely acting
in ‘imperial interest,’ instead of the U.S. acting in ‘imperialist interest’ but with a genuine belief that they are acting within the ‘global right’ (Negri & Hardt,
2000). Although not an entirely erroneous assertion, the extent to which the Gulf War exemplifies the U.S.’s evident
imperialist ambitions is notable. The region was selected because , as the realist argument asserts, it had
of Iraq and Iran
as the
next
favourable results from a cost–benefit analysis point of view . There was clearly a motivational element of securing the
regions in possession of the oil revenues, while deterring opposition. The conflict allowed for massive military expenditure to
become a norm in post Cold War budgets. With the Gulf War setting the tone and, indeed, further cementing
the pro-interventionist ideological stance maintained by neoconservatives , the U.S. military
spending increases of the 90s were supported by both Republicans and Democrats (Bacevich, 2002).
Noting the previous successes of the British Empire to maintain militarily dominant, the U.S. developed the realist concept of ‘N + 1.’ In this equation, ‘N’ equals the military
capabilities of all the states that have an antagonistic relationship with the U.S. combined. The comparative military strength of the U.S., in the post Cold War era, was a focal
point for much of the decade’s political discourse. The U.S. appeared to settle for nothing less than military ‘supremacy’ (Bacevich, 2002). The most fundamental shift that
occurred in the post-Cold War era, with regards to the military, was in the desire to utilise the military more freely. Indeed, General Salikashvili, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of
Staff, observed in 1997: ‘for more than 50 years we were constrained by a bipolar rivalry with a superpower adversary’. This acknowledgement is a clear indication of the U.S.’s
The
ability to project ‘hard power’ became one of the fundamental elements of U.S. foreign policy
in the post-Cold War era. Despite the assertion by some academics (Cox, 1995; Todd, 2002) that the post Cold War period saw a decline in imperialist
imperialist ambitions in the post-Cold War era. With the ‘constraints’ of the bipolar removed, the U.S. enjoyed relative freedom in establishing its imperial objectives.
ambitions, overall, the opposite shows to be true. Arguably, the 1992 election demonstrated that the U.S.’s missionary zeal was waning. Indeed, the more foreign policy
orientated and Jeffersonian President, George Bush, conceded defeat against a more domestically focused and Wilsonian President, Bill Clinton. Clinton believed that the U.S.
There was a rigorous debate within the U.S. over
protectionism and the possibility of opting for a national – democratic tactic when it came to
the country’s socio–economic orientation (Todd, 2002). However, this desire not to entertain the role of ‘international police’ and to
maintain a domestic focus exemplified the wavering commitment and respect that the Clinton administration gave to international institutions. It has been a
disregard for international bodies, and use when needed, that has become key for U.S.
imperialist ambitions (Ikenberry, 2006). Madelaine Albright, Clinton’s Secretary of State, famously stated, with regards to the use of force against Iraq: ‘if we
have to use force, it is because we are America; we are the indispensable nation’ (Dobbs & Goshko, 1996). This belief perpetuated the notion ,
should not be, nor could it afford to be, the ‘international police’.
within the Clinton administration,
that the U.S. was entitled to act above the fray of general politics.
Clinton did,
however, acknowledge the importance of engaging with international institutions and how soft power can be exercised through them.
American Exceptionalism
American exceptionalism guides US militaristic foreign policy
Andrew J. Bacevich 13 Jr. (born 1947) is an American political scientist specializing in
international relations, security studies, American foreign policy, and American diplomatic and
military history. He is currently Professor of International Relations and History at Boston
University.[1] He is also a retired career officer in the United States Army. He is a former director
of Boston University's Center for International Relations (from 1998 to 2005) and author of
several books, including American Empire: The Realities and Consequences of US Diplomacy
(2002), The New American Militarism: How Americans are Seduced by War (2005) and The
Limits of Power: The End of American Exceptionalism (2008). He has also appeared on television
shows such as The Colbert Report and the Bill Moyers Report and has written op-eds which have
appeared in papers such as The New York Times, Washington Post, Wall Street Journal, Boston
Globe, Los Angeles Times, and Financial Times. He is also a member of the Council on Foreign
Relations. “The new American militarism: how Americans are seduced by war,” 2013, Oxford
University Press, DOA: 8-1-13, y2k
Dissent, confined to the Far Left and the Old Right, has been sporadic, marginal, and ineffective . Given the
impoverished state of national political discourse and the exceedingly narrow range of views
deemed permissible, efforts to call attention to the potentially adverse consequences of
becoming smitten with military power , whether offered by the venerable Nation, by Patrick Buchananfreshly minted American
have made little headway . The same can be said regarding
efforts to propose a plausible alternative to Wilsonianism under arms. Thus, if only by default, the nation’s status
as the greatest military power the world has ever seen has come to signify for the great majority of
citizens a cosmic verdict of sorts, a compelling affirmation of American Exceptionalism . At
Conservative, or by websites like the feisty Antiwar.com,
least as measured by our capacity to employ violence, we are indeed Number One . The
providential judgment seems indisputable : the nation charged with the responsibility for guiding
history to its predetermined destination has been endowed with the raw power needed to do
just that. In fact, our present-day military supremacy represents something quite different. All of
this seeing armed force as the preeminent expression of state power and military institutions
as the chief repositories of civic virtue, the expectation that revolutionary advances in military
technology might offer a tidy solution to complex problems, the outsourcing of defense to a
professional military elite, the erosion of civilian control distorts if it does not altogether
nullify important elements of the American birthright .
Security Reps
Militarization is perpetuated by a securitization discourse that devalues other’s
perspectives. This narrative must be ruptured through recognition of the
perspectives erased in pursuit of power.
Crowe 2007 (Lori, Grad Student in Pol. Sci. – York U., “The “Fuzzy Dream”: Discourse,
Historical myths, and Militarized (in)Security Interrogating dangerous myths of Afghanistan and
the ‘West’”, http://archive.sgir.eu/uploads/Crowe-loricrowe.pdf)
The militarization narrative, in contrast to the ‘objective benevolence’ of the heroism myth,
utilizes constructed and one-dimensional conceptions of militaries, security, and defense. This
narrative relies on the myth that militarization is always a useful tool in securitization. For
example: Following the NATO air strikes in October of this year that killed at least 50 civilians
and an augmentation of Taliban suicide attacks, Afghanistan’s President Hamid Karzai called on
the need for more military operations, an international air force, and an increase in Afghan
soldiers and police as mechanisms necessary to “tackle the root causes of terrorism”.62 Words
such as ‘freedom’, ‘democracy’, ‘justice’, and ‘women’s rights’ have become permanent
variables in the mantra that has been used liberally and repeatedly as part of the common and
often un-stated, assumptions that intervention by NATO, American, Canadian, and British forces
will improve the lives of Afghanistan people over ‘there’ and increase security for us over ‘here’.
Thus, as the military continues to occupy the region, we in the West are continually told that
Afghan women and men have now been “liberated” from an oppressive regime by the West.
This is bolstered by the assumption that the Afghan people support the US-backed
government and want the military there for security (That is, that they are better off now than
before). There is a dominant assumption that the West can “win” the “war on terror” and that
military measures in the Middle East are necessary to prevent future terrorist attacks. If
prospects look dim in the region, this narrative implies the appropriate response is to increase
combat troops and artillery. Finally, embedded in these images is the assumption that
reconstruction, delivery of humanitarian aid and development can coesist alongside military
efforts to fight off insurgents/terrorists and “pacify” the opposition. Thus, reports on the
increasing numbers of casualties of the war does not appear incongruous with claims of ‘peacemaking’ and ‘development’ therefore we must protect it the puppet government and fight the
insurgents.63 This type of narrative serves several purposes, including the reinforcement in
the public of the legitimacy of military response to crises and the re-construction of power
and dominance through the image of military superiority, fighting capacity, and mechanisms
of control. The result of such myths is the reaffirmation of the importance of state-led military
missions (which contribute to the maintenance of armed forces by attracting future recruits)
and their necessity for resolving multiple types of international crises. Enloe defines
militarization as a sociopolitical process by which militarism as an ideology is “driven deep down
into the soil of a society”.64 Militarism, in turn, encompasses beliefs, values, and assumptions
including the use of armed force to resolve tensions, the effectiveness and naturalness of
hierarchy, the need for a state to have a military in order to be perceived as legitimate, and that
the feminine require armed protection while the masculine is only a “manly man” if he
participates in the culture of armed conflict.65 The process of militarization involves cultural,
institutional, ideological, and economic transformations through which militaristic needs,
presumptions, and ideas gradually come to control or determine a person or thing.66 In her
work on the study of gender and militarization, Enloe has revealed how gendered notions of
masculinity and femininity are fundamental to the very establishment and maintenance of
military structures: “None of these institutions – multilateral alliances, bilateral alliances, foreign
military assistance programs – can achieve their militarizing objectives without controlling
women for the sake of militarizing men.”67 Additionally then, governmental policies and actions
in the international arena (an arena deemed untouchable and irrelevant to women in orthodox
studies of international relations) “directly produce changes in women’s lives”.(My italics)68
Enloe’s work is particularly relevant in this project which seeks to complicate, interrogate, and
historicize particular mythic representations and narratives because it denaturalizes militarizing,
war, and soldiering (so often presented as conventional and innate responses to conflict) and
reveals them as deliberate actions of intentional policies and warmaking strategies
(“Militarization and the privileging of masculinity are both products not only of amorphous
cultural beliefs but also of deliberate decisions”)69. It also helps demonstrate that by ‘erasing’
history the structures that enabled it are legitimized and thus perpetuated; that is,
militarization, hegemonic masculinity, and the absence of women is represented as natural,
normal and thus are potentially destructive mechanisms. Discourses of Danger Several
problematic elements repeatedly appear in Western narratives that are embedded within both
of these categorizations of discourse. These elemants have become normalized and banal in the
media resulting in the audience (‘myth readers’70) becoming de-sensitized to the dangerous
ideological and imperial agendas they empower. In recognizing how these elements which are
intricately connected to each other become mobilized and identifying the assumptions,
distortions, and social hierarchies that are their foundation, the discursive power of myths
that legitimize violence and imperial politics in the name of security begins to be revealed; the
myths themselves unravelled.
! – Killing Civilians
American intervention is based on a false crusade to save women’s rights. Our
military occupation has resulted in the death of numerous civilians.
Cloud 2004 (Dana L., Associate Prof. And Dir. Graduate Studies – Dept. Comm – UT Austin,
Quarterly Journal of Speech, “”To Veil the Threat of Terror”: Afghan Women and the Clash of
Civilizations”, 90(3), August, Ebsco P 297-298)
There are other contradictions between the rationale for war of “saving the brown women
from the brown men” and the reality of women’s lives there. Since the U.S. bombing of
Afghanistan, the Northern Alliance has forcibly stopped the fast-growing Union of the Women of
Afghanistan from marching in Kabul. The leading women’s rights organization, the
Revolutionary Association of the Women of Afghanistan (RAWA), opposed U.S. military action
there as well as the war in Iraq, arguing that their feminist movement does not need U.S.
“help” in the form of bombs and military occupation. 62 Their continuing opposition belies the
U.S. justifications for war based on the humanitarian rescue of oppressed women. RAWA’s
statement on the U.S. war in Afghanistan reads, in part: America, by forming an international
coalition against Osama and his Taliban-collaborators and in retaliation for the 11th September
terrorist attacks, has launched a vast aggression on our country. Despite the claim of the U.S.
that only military and terrorist bases of the Taliban and Al Qaeda will be struck and that its
actions would be accurately targeted and proportionate, what we have witnessed for the past
seven days leaves no doubt that this invasion will shed the blood of numerous women, men,
children, young and old of our country. 63 Their predictions were accurate; after the killing of
thousands of innocent civilians in Afghanistan, Afghan women are hardly better off than they
were before; they regard the U.S. war as akin to the Taliban regime. 64 The full political case for
my belief that U.S. withdrawal would be better than occupation for Afghan people, including
women, is beyond the scope of this article. However, accepting the argument that the people of
a nation cannot determine the shape of their own society is an example of having been
persuaded by the “clash of civilizations” hypothesis and accepting its racialized logic. Further, in
the Afghanistan case, it is difficult to dispute that even the women’s movement in Afghanistan
has no use for the United States or the occupation. Thus, the appeals to the liberation of
women, even profoundly oppressed women, must be understood not as legitimate
justification but rather as a pretext for the war and occupation. As McGee noted in his discussion of the ideograph,
tightly condensed symbols of a people’s commitments can be quite forceful inducements to public consent to their rulers’ policies. These images as condensed incantations of
the ideograph ! clash of civilizations " are no exception. Political discourse has accompanied and invoked the image of Afghan women in the appeal to the ! clash of civilizations "
. President George W. Bush encapsulated the ! clash of civilizations " motive in his 2002 State of the Union Address: “The last time we met in this chamber, the mothers and
daughters of Afghanistan were captives in their own homes, forbidden from working or going to school. Today women are free, and are part of Afghanistan’s new government.”
65 Likewise, in his 2004 State of the Union Address, President George W. Bush summarized the effects of the U.S. intervention in Afghanistan: As of this month, that country has
a new constitution, guaranteeing free elections and full participation by women. Businesses are opening, health care centers are being established, and the boys and girls of
Afghanistan are back in school. With help from the new Afghan Army, our coalition is leading aggressive raids against surviving members of the Taliban and al-Qaida [ sic ]. The
men and women of Afghanistan are building a nation that is free, and proud, and fighting terror—and America is honored to be their friend. 66 Here Bush shares the narrative
strategy of the Time photographs and constructs a new image of the Afghan people, not as pre-modern Others but as “friends” in his claim that U.S. forces led to freedom. The
phrasing suggests that the women before intervention were Others, but that they now have been folded into U.S. identity as friends. Based on his argument, however, only a
, the Afghan people are claimed by the
United States without reciprocal power to define the relationship. Bush’s remarks imply that saving the people, and
subdued or compliant population has the prerogative of becoming a friend. Even in friendship
specifically the women, of Afghanistan was the primary motive and outcome of the U.S. intervention. A closer look at the history of U.S. relations in the region reveals more
salient reasons for the U.S. war. Well before the terrorist attacks on September 11, 2001, the balance of power in Afghanistan had shifted, away from “moderates” in the
Taliban, who favored open relations with the United States and the United Nations, toward more nationalist and fundamentalist forces. 67 In this new configuration, the regime
was much less open to the idea of allowing the United States to run an oil pipeline through Afghanistan from the Caspian Sea, which was a major component of U.S. plans to
control the world oil supply. Before this point, the condition of women in Afghanistan and the injustices of Islamic dictatorship had not been of concern to the United States. 68
, there is a contradiction between the rhetoric of moral inferiority and the mercenary
motives of the war. 69 Conquest of another nation for economic gain and geopolitical control
is the textbook definition of imperialism. 70 Conservative intellectuals in foreign policy circles
expressed the imperialist motives of the intervention explicitly, even as U.S. mass culture
Thus
offered the humanitarian justifications better designed to win public support. In the influential journal
Foreign Affairs , Sebastian Mallaby states outright the need for a new U.S. Empire: “A new imperial moment has arrived, and by virtue of its power America is bound to play the
leading role.” 71 Huntington also admits to this claim: “Culture, as we have argued, follows power. If non-Western societies are once again to be shaped by Western culture, it
will happen only as a result of the expansion, deployment, and impact of Western power. Imperialism is the necessary logical consequence of universalism.” 72 As in the time of
Rudyard Kipling’s description of the “white man’s burden,” the clashing images of ! the clash of civilizations " are the surface of U.S. imperialism
.
! – Error Replication
US promote value-based approach to propping up militarism that clouds
accurate judgments about our power which causes error-replication.
Andrew J. Bacevich 13 Jr. (born 1947) is an American political scientist specializing in
international relations, security studies, American foreign policy, and American diplomatic and
military history. He is currently Professor of International Relations and History at Boston
University.[1] He is also a retired career officer in the United States Army. He is a former director
of Boston University's Center for International Relations (from 1998 to 2005) and author of
several books, including American Empire: The Realities and Consequences of US Diplomacy
(2002), The New American Militarism: How Americans are Seduced by War (2005) and The
Limits of Power: The End of American Exceptionalism (2008). He has also appeared on television
shows such as The Colbert Report and the Bill Moyers Report and has written op-eds which have
appeared in papers such as The New York Times, Washington Post, Wall Street Journal, Boston
Globe, Los Angeles Times, and Financial Times. He is also a member of the Council on Foreign
Relations. “The new American militarism: how Americans are seduced by war,” 2013, Oxford
University Press, DOA: 8-1-13, y2k
When it comes to war, Americans have persuaded themselves that the U nited S tates
possesses a peculiar genius . Writing in the spring of 2003 , the journalist Gregg Easterbrook
observed that the extent of American military superiority has become almost impossible to
overstate. During Operation Iraqi Freedom, U.S. forces had shown beyond the shadow of a
doubt that they were the strongest the world has ever known, . . . stronger than the Wehrmacht
in 1940 , stronger than the legions at the height of Roman power; Other nations trailed so far
behind they have no chance of catching up1 The commentator Max Boot scoffed at
comparisons with the German army of World War II, hitherto the gold standard of operational
excellence In Iraq, American military performance had been such as to make fabled generals
such as Erwin Rommel and Heinz Guderian seem positively incompetent by comparison.
Easterbrook and Boot concurred on the central point: on the modern battlefield Americans had
located an arena of human endeavor in which their flair for organizing and deploying
technology offered an apparently decisive edge. As a consequence, the U nited S tates had (as
many Americans have come to believe) become masters of all things military. Further,
American political leaders have demonstrated their intention of tapping that mastery to
reshape the world in accordance with American interests and American values . That the two
are so closely intertwined as to be indistinguishable is, of course, a proposition to which the
vast majority of Americans subscribe. Uniquely among the great powers in all of world history,
ours (we insist) is an inherently values-based approach to policy. Furthermore, we have it on
good authority that the ideals we espouse represent universal truths, valid for all times .
American statesmen past and present have regularly affirmed that judgment. In doing so, they
validate it and render it all but impervious to doubt. Whatever momentary setbacks the United
States might encounter, whether a generation ago in Vietnam or more recently in Iraq, this
certainty that American values are destined to prevail imbues U.S. policy with a distinctive
grandeur . The preferred language of American statecraft is bold, ambitious, and confident.
Reflecting such convictions, policymakers in Washington nurse (and the majority of citizens
tacitly endorse) ever more grandiose expectations for how armed might can facilitate the
inevitable triumph of those values. In that regard, George W. Bush’s vow that the U nited
S tates will rid the world of evil both echoes and amplifies the large claims of his predecessors
going at least as far back as Woodrow Wilson. 3 Coming from Bush the warrior-president, the
promise to make an end to evil is a promise to destroy, to demolish, and to obliterate it .
One result of this belief that the fulfillment of America’s historic mission begins with
America’s destruction of the old order has been to revive a phenomenon that C. Wright Mills in
the early days of the Cold War described as a military metaphysics, a tendency to see
international problems as military problems and to discount the likelihood of finding a
solution except through military means . 4 To state the matter bluntly, Americans in our own
time have fallen prey to militarism , manifesting itself in a romanticized view of soldiers , a
tendency to see military power as the truest measure of national greatness, and outsized
expectations regarding the efficacy of force . To a degree without precedent in U.S. history,
Americans have come to define the nation’s strength and well-being in terms of military
preparedness, military action, and the fostering of (or nostalgia for) military ideals. Already in
the 1990 s America’s marriage of a militaristic cast of mind with utopian ends had established
itself as the distinguishing element of contemporary U.S. policy. The Bush administration’s
response to the horrors of 9 / 11 served to reaffirm that marriage, as it committed the
U nited S tates to waging an open-ended war on a global scale . Events since, notably the
alarms, excursions, and full-fledged campaigns comprising the Global War on Terror , have
fortified and perhaps even sanctified this marriage. Regrettably, those events , in particular the
successive invasions of Afghanistan and Iraq, advertised as important milestones along the road to
ultimate victory, have further dulled the average American’s ability to grasp the significance of this
union, which does not serve our interests and may yet prove our undoing.
Causes error-replication---results in bloodshed
Andrew J. Bacevich 13 Jr. (born 1947) is an American political scientist specializing in
international relations, security studies, American foreign policy, and American diplomatic and
military history. He is currently Professor of International Relations and History at Boston
University.[1] He is also a retired career officer in the United States Army. He is a former director
of Boston University's Center for International Relations (from 1998 to 2005) and author of
several books, including American Empire: The Realities and Consequences of US Diplomacy
(2002), The New American Militarism: How Americans are Seduced by War (2005) and The
Limits of Power: The End of American Exceptionalism (2008). He has also appeared on television
shows such as The Colbert Report and the Bill Moyers Report and has written op-eds which have
appeared in papers such as The New York Times, Washington Post, Wall Street Journal, Boston
Globe, Los Angeles Times, and Financial Times. He is also a member of the Council on Foreign
Relations. “The new American militarism: how Americans are seduced by war,” 2013, Oxford
University Press, DOA: 8-1-13, y2k
The twentieth century was an age of massive conceits, devised by ideologues who entertained
heady dreams of bending history to suit their will. In the end, colossal fascist and Marxist
ambitions produced not utopia but Auschwitz and the Gulag . Modern man’s effort to replace
the one true God in whom he had lost faith with a god of his own devising produced only
carnage and suffering . The consort of hubris was catastrophe . If there is one lesson that
deserves to be drawn from the bloodstained decades stretching from 1914 to 1989 , surely
that is it . Americans contributed mightily to the destruction of these false gods. In the course of
doing so, various architects of U.S. policy, beginning with President Woodrow Wilson,
nourished their own heady dreams, hardly less ambitious than those of the Marxist and fascist
true believers whom they resembled in spirit.
! – Democracy
Militarism destroys democracy and deliberation.
Wright and Rogers 6 Erik Olin Wright AND Joel Rogers, Professor Erik Olin Wright Profs @
Department of Sociology University of Wisconsin, Madison, 2006.
http://www.ssc.wisc.edu/~wright/ContemporaryAmericanSociety/Chapter%2020%20-%20Militarism%20and%20empire%20--%20Norton%20August.pdf
Reduction in democracy at home. Militarism and imperialism erode democracy in many ways.
Militarism brings with it an increasing concentration of power in the presidency, creating what
has come to be called the “Imperial Presidency.” The Imperial President can act with minimal
accountability to Congress or the Courts in the name of national security, elevating the powers
of the president as the “commander-in-chief” of the armed forces to the status of a general
principle of autonomous power over anything connected to foreign affairs. This concentration of
power in the presidency has characterized both Democratic and Republic presidents in the era
of militarism, but was greatly intensified during the Bush Administration where a wide range of
constitutional safeguards were violated on the grounds of autonomous Presidential power.
Militarism also pre-empts other forms of state spending, and this curtails the scope of
democratic deliberation about the public good. As we argued in chapter 16, a society is
democratic to the extent that decisions which are matters of collective importance are
subjected to collective deliberation and democratic choice. Militarism threatens this principle
both because decisions over the use of the military are likely to be made in relatively
undemocratic ways by elites operating behind closed doors, and because militarism squeezes
out other priorities. More broadly, militarism undermines democratic political culture. Military
priorities are bolstered by intensified fear, and people are more willing to give up civil liberties
and democratic rights when they are afraid. In debates over domestic priorities people can see
their opponents as legitimate. Some people want a public health care system, others want to
maintain a private system; both are legitimate views within a political spectrum of debate. In a
militarized context of debates over war and security, opponents to militarism are treated as
unpatriotic by putting the security of the nation at risk. The polarized good and evil view of
the world that is linked to militarism and the politics of fear corrodes the civility and mutual
respect needed for democratic deliberation.
! – Normalizes War
American militarism increases propensity to use unrestrained forces--normalizes war
Andrew J. Bacevich 13 Jr. (born 1947) is an American political scientist specializing in
international relations, security studies, American foreign policy, and American diplomatic and
military history. He is currently Professor of International Relations and History at Boston
University.[1] He is also a retired career officer in the United States Army. He is a former director
of Boston University's Center for International Relations (from 1998 to 2005) and author of
several books, including American Empire: The Realities and Consequences of US Diplomacy
(2002), The New American Militarism: How Americans are Seduced by War (2005) and The
Limits of Power: The End of American Exceptionalism (2008). He has also appeared on television
shows such as The Colbert Report and the Bill Moyers Report and has written op-eds which have
appeared in papers such as The New York Times, Washington Post, Wall Street Journal, Boston
Globe, Los Angeles Times, and Financial Times. He is also a member of the Council on Foreign
Relations. “The new American militarism: how Americans are seduced by war,” 2013, Oxford
University Press, DOA: 8-1-13, y2k
Thus, according to one typical study of the U.S. Navy’s future, sea supremacy beginning at our
shore lines and extending outward to distant theaters is a necessary condition for the
defense of the U.S. Of course, the U.S. Navy already possesses unquestioned global preeminence ;
the real point of the study is to argue for the urgency of radical enhancements to that
preeminence. The officer-authors of this study express confidence that given sufficient money
the Navy can achieve ever greater supremacy, enabling the Navy of the future to enjoy
overwhelming precision firepower, pervasive surveillance, and dominant control of a
maneuvering area, whether sea, undersea, land, air, space or cyberspace. In this study and in
virtually all others, political and strategic questions implicit in the proposition that supremacy
in distant theaters forms a prerequisite of defense are left begging, indeed, are probably
unrecognized . 21 At times, this quest for military dominion takes on galactic proportions .
Acknowledging that the U nited S tates enjoys superiority in many aspects of space capability ,
a senior defense official nonetheless complains that we don’t have space dominance and we
don't have space supremacy. Since outer space is the ultimate high ground, which the United
States must control, he urges immediate action to correct this deficiency. When it comes to
military power, mere superiority will not suffice. The new American militarism also manifests
itself through an increased propensity to use force , leading , in effect, to the normalization of
war . There was a time in recent memory, most notably while the so-called Vietnam
Syndrome infected the American body politic, when Republican and Democratic
administrations alike viewed with real trepidation the prospect of sending U.S. troops into
action abroad . Since the advent of the new Wilsonianism , however, self-restraint regarding
the use of force has all but disappeared . During the entire Cold War era, from 1945 through
1988 , large-scale U.S. military actions abroad totaled a scant six. Since the fall of the Berlin Wall,
however, they have become almost annual events. 23 The brief period extending from 1989
Operation Just Cause (the overthrow of Manuel Noriega) to 2003 Operation Iraqi Freedom (the
overthrow of Saddam Hussein) featured nine major military interventions. 24 And that count
does not include innumerable lesser actions such as Bill Clintonsignature cruise missile attacks
against obscure targets in obscure places, the almost daily bombing of Iraq throughout the late
1990 s, or the quasi-combat missions that have seen GIs dispatched to Rwanda, Colombia, East
Timor, and the Philippines. Altogether, the tempo of U.S. military interventionism has become
nothing short of frenetic.
! War
Militarism causes endless conflicts and hollows out democratic ideals
Andrew J. Bacevich 13 Jr. (born 1947) is an American political scientist specializing in
international relations, security studies, American foreign policy, and American diplomatic and
military history. He is currently Professor of International Relations and History at Boston
University.[1] He is also a retired career officer in the United States Army. He is a former director
of Boston University's Center for International Relations (from 1998 to 2005) and author of
several books, including American Empire: The Realities and Consequences of US Diplomacy
(2002), The New American Militarism: How Americans are Seduced by War (2005) and The
Limits of Power: The End of American Exceptionalism (2008). He has also appeared on television
shows such as The Colbert Report and the Bill Moyers Report and has written op-eds which have
appeared in papers such as The New York Times, Washington Post, Wall Street Journal, Boston
Globe, Los Angeles Times, and Financial Times. He is also a member of the Council on Foreign
Relations. “The new American militarism: how Americans are seduced by war,” 2013, Oxford
University Press, DOA: 8-1-13, y2k
The marriage of military metaphysics with eschatological ambition is a misbegotten one,
contrary to the long-term interests of either the American people or the world beyond our
borders. It invites endless war and the ever-deepening militarization of U.S. policy. As it
subordinates concern for the common good to the paramount value of military effectiveness,
it promises not to perfect but to distort American ideals. As it concentrates ever more
authority in the hands of a few more concerned with order abroad rather than with justice at
home, it will accelerate the hollowing out of American democracy. As it alienates peoples and
nations around the world, it will leave the United States increasingly isolated. If history is any
guide, it will end in bankruptcy, moral as well as economic, and in abject failure. Of all the
enemies of public liberty wrote James Madison in 1795 , war is perhaps the most to be dreaded,
because it comprises and develops the germ of every other. War is the parent of armies. From
these proceed debts and taxes. And armies, debts and taxes are the known instruments for
bringing the many under the domination of the few. . . . No nation could preserve its freedom
in the midst of continual warfare. The purpose of this book is to invite Americans to consider
the continued relevance of Madison’s warning to our own time and circumstances.
Military’s seizure of academic knowledge leads to never-ending war
Turse 4 Nicholas, Doctoral Candidate @ Columbia University, “The Military-Academic
Complex," http://www.countercurrents.org/us-turse290404.htm
The military-academic complex is merely one of many readily perceptible, but largely ignored,
examples of the increasing militarization of American society. While the Pentagon has long
sought to exploit and exert influence over civilian cultural institutions, from academia to the
entertainment industry, today's massive budgets make its power increasingly irresistible. The
Pentagon now has both the money and the muscle to alter the landscape of higher education,
to manipulate research agendas, to change the course of curricula and to force schools to play
by its rules. Moreover, the military research underway on college campuses across America
has very real and dangerous implications for the future. It will enable or enhance imperial
adventures in decades to come; it will lead to new lethal technologies to be wielded against
peoples across the globe; it will feed a superpower arms race of one, only increasing the
already vast military asymmetry between the United States and everyone else; it will make
ever-more heavily armed, technologically-equipped, and "up-armored" U.S. war-fighters ever
less attractive adversaries and American and allied civilians much more appealing soft targets
for America's enemies. None of this, however, enters the realm of debate. Instead, the
Pentagon rolls along, doling out money to colleges large and small, expanding and
strengthening the military-academic complex, and remaking civilian institutions to suit
military desires as if this were but the natural way of the world.
! – Economics
Unchecked military spending will continue in the future
Andrew J. Bacevich 13 Jr. (born 1947) is an American political scientist specializing in
international relations, security studies, American foreign policy, and American diplomatic and
military history. He is currently Professor of International Relations and History at Boston
University.[1] He is also a retired career officer in the United States Army. He is a former director
of Boston University's Center for International Relations (from 1998 to 2005) and author of
several books, including American Empire: The Realities and Consequences of US Diplomacy
(2002), The New American Militarism: How Americans are Seduced by War (2005) and The
Limits of Power: The End of American Exceptionalism (2008). He has also appeared on television
shows such as The Colbert Report and the Bill Moyers Report and has written op-eds which have
appeared in papers such as The New York Times, Washington Post, Wall Street Journal, Boston
Globe, Los Angeles Times, and Financial Times. He is also a member of the Council on Foreign
Relations. “The new American militarism: how Americans are seduced by war,” 2013, Oxford
University Press, DOA: 8-1-13, y2k
This new American militarism manifests itself in several different ways. It does so, first of all,
in the scope, cost, and configuration of America's present-day military establishment. Through
the first two centuries of U.S. history, political leaders in Washington gauged the size and capabilities of America's armed services
according to the security tasks immediately at hand. A grave and proximate threat to the nation's well-being might require a large
and powerful military establishment. In the absence of such a threat, policymakers scaled down that establishment accordingly.
With the passing of crisis, the army raised up for the crisis went immediately out of existence. This had been the case in 1865, in
1918, and in 1945. The general principle was to maintain the minimum force required and no more. Thus, for example, the millionman Union Army of 1865 shrank within a year to a mere fifty-seven thousand and within another five years was reduced to fewer
than thirty thousand. Even in the aftermath of World War II, when the United States had shouldered the responsibilities of global
power, this pattern pertained. On V-J Day in 1945, the U.S. Army consisted of over eight million officers and men. Within a year, 1.8
million remained on active duty, a number halved again within the following year. By 1947, the army was little more than an
occupation force, its combat capabilities virtually nonexistent. 14 Since the end of the Cold War, having come to value military
power for its own sake, the United States has abandoned this principle and is committed as a matter of policy to maintaining military
capabilities far in excess of those of any would-be adversary or combination of adversaries. This commitment finds both a qualitative
and quantitative expression, with the U.S. military establishment dwarfing that of even America's closest ally. Thus, whereas the U.S.
Navy maintains and operates a total of twelve large attack aircraft carriers, the once-vaunted Royal Navy has none. Indeed, in all the
battle fleets of the world there is no ship even remotely comparable to a Nimitz-class carrier, weighing in at some ninety-seven
thousand tons fully loaded, longer than three football fields, cruising at a speed above thirty knots, and powered by nuclear reactors
that give it an essentially infinite radius of action. Today, the U.S. Marine Corps possesses more attack aircraft than does the entire
Royal Air Force, and the United States has two other even larger air forces, one an integral part of the Navy and the other officially
designated as the U.S. Air Force. Indeed, in terms of numbers of men and women in uniform, the U.S. Marine Corps is half again as
large as the entire British Army, and the Pentagon has a second, even larger army actually called the U.S. Army, which in turn also
operates its own air force of some five thousand aircraft. All
of these massive and redundant capabilities cost
money. Notably, the present-day Pentagon budget, adjusted for inflation, is 12 percent larger
than the average defense budget of the Cold War era. In 2002, American defense spending exceeded by a
factor of twenty-five the combined defense budgets of the seven rogue states then comprising the roster of U.S. enemies. 16
Indeed, by some calculations, the United States spends more on defense than all other nations in the world together. 17 This is a
circumstance without historical precedent. Furthermore,
in all likelihood, the gap in military spending
between the United States and all other nations will expand further still in the years to come.
18 Projected increases in the defense budget will boost Pentagon spending in real terms to a level higher than it was during the
Reagan era. According to the Pentagon's announced long-range plans, by 2009 its budget will exceed the Cold War average by 23
percent, despite the absence of anything remotely resembling a so-called peer competitor. 19 However astonishing this fact might
seem, it elicits little comment, either from political leaders or the press. It is simply taken for granted. The truth is that there no
longer exists any meaningful context within which Americans might consider the question: How much is enough? On a day-to-day
basis, what do these expensive forces exist to do? Simply put, for the Department of Defense and all of its constituent parts, defense
per se figures as little more than an afterthought. The primary mission of America's far-flung military establishment is global power
projection, a reality tacitly understood in all quarters of American society. To suggest that the U.S. military has become the world
police force may slightly overstate the case, but only slightly. That well over a decade after the collapse of the Soviet Union the
United States continues to maintain bases and military forces in several dozens of countries.by some counts well over a hundred in
all, rouses minimal controversy, despite the fact that many of these countries are perfectly capable of providing for their own
security needs.20 That even apart from fighting wars and pursuing terrorists, U.S. forces are constantly prowling around the globe,
training, exercising, planning, and posturing, elicits no more notice (and in some cases less) from the average American than the
presence of a cop on a city street corner. Even before the Pentagon officially assigned itself the mission of shaping the international
environment, members of the political elite, liberals and conservatives alike, had reached a common understanding that scattering
U.S. troops around the globe to restrain, inspire, influence, persuade, or cajole paid dividends. Whether any correlation exists
between this vast panoply of forward-deployed forces on the one hand and antipathy to the United States abroad on the other has
remained for the most part a taboo subject.
! – Environment
Militarism destroys environment---causes pollution and ozone depletion---also
causes structural violence
Kristen Ostling 92 “The Impact of Militarism on the Environment: First of three excerpts from
the Science for Peace document by Kristen Ostling,”
http://peacemagazine.org/archive/v08n3p08.htm, DOA: 7-31-13, y2k
The world's armed forces have even more access to airspace than to land. Military activities have greatly
contributed to problems such as air pollution and ozone depletion. In former West Germany, almost the entire airspace
was open to military jets and two-thirds of it to low level flights. Most recent reports state that there were between 700,0000 and one million sorties per year. West German
As much as 70% of all airspace is used for
military purposes in the United States. The majority of the military flights take place over the
Western U.S.A. There are approximately 90,000 training sorties per year. Onefifth of these are at very low levels. Canada has one of the world's most extensive
armed forces jets accounted for 58% of air pollutants generated by all air traffic over its territory.
airspaces for military purposes. Over 100,000 square kilometres are assigned to the Goose Bay Air Base in Labrador. By 1992, the number of low-level sorties flown by Canadian
and other NATO jets is projected to increase from 6,656 to 8,400. In Alberta and Saskatchewan, the Cold Lake Air Weapons Range stretches over 450,000 square kilometres of
One of the most serious effects of military use of airspace results from low-level flights,
which disrupt wildlife migrations and behavioural patterns. Human health is also affected :
Supersonic "booms" occurring in low-level flights can lead to hearing loss, high blood
pressure, disturbance of the intestinal tract and other organs as well as psychological trauma.
flying area.
In North America, native communities are the most severely affected . In Canada, the Ilnnu of Nitassinan (Labrador)
have repeatedly complained to the Canadian government, but the number of flights is increasing over the land. In the U.S. flight training takes place over 14 Native American
nations. Lack of data on atmospheric pollution means that estimates are rough. However, German environmentalist Gunar Seitz estimates that 6 to 10% of global air pollution
can be linked to armed forces operations.
According to the Worldwatch Institute's research, the total release of
carbon dioxide as a result or military activity could be as high as 10 per-cent or total global
emissions . One military contractor, General Dynamics (makers of the F-16) uses 500,000 pounds of CFC-113 yearly. The U.S. military is responsible for half of the
worldwide use of CFC-113. the Department of Defense is a major user of Halon 1211 and CVC-113, which account for 13 percent of overall ozone depletion. According
to John O'Connor of the National Toxics Campaign, the world's military forces are responsible
for the release of more than two-thirds of CFC-113 into the ozone layer. The military also
uses ozone-depleting substances that have no civilian counterpart . The B-2 Stealth bomber, for example, uses a fuel
additive that is a known ozone depleter but of unknown potency. Ozone depletion is increasingly being linked to serious
health problems such as skin cancer, cataracts, and a number of diseases affected by
immunosuppression, such as the AIDS virus.
! – Extinction
Financial-military complex causes extinction---creates self-fulfilling prophecy
that causes global instability and blow-back---props-up authoritarian war
machine.
Ismael Hossezin-Zadeh 10 teaches economics @ Drake University, “The Biggest Parasite,”
12-17-10, http://www.counterpunch.org/2010/12/17/the-globalization-of-militarism/ DOA: 731-13, y2k
Many Americans still believe that US foreign policies are designed to maintain peace , to
safeguard human rights and to spread democracy
around the world. Regardless
of their officially stated
objectives, however, those policies often lead to opposite outcomes : war, militarism and dictatorship .
Evidence of the fact that US policy makers no longer uphold the ideals they state publicly is
overwhelming . Those who continue to harbor illusions about the thrust of US policies around the world
must be oblivious to the fact that the U nited S tates has been overtaken by a military-industrialsecurity-financial cabal whose representatives are firmly ensconced in both the White House and
the
US
Congress . The ultimate goal of the cabal, according to their own military guidelines, is “full spectrum
dominance” of the world; and they are willing to wage as many wars , to destroy as many
countries and to kill as many people as necessary to achieve that goal. The liberal hawks and
petty intellectual pundits who tend to defend US foreign policies on the grounds of “human
rights” or “moral obligations” are well served to pay attention (among other evidence) to the US
foreign policy documents that are currently being disclosed by the Wikileaks. The documents “show all too clearly that,”
as Paul Craig Roberts puts it, “ the US government is a duplicitous entity whose raison d’etre is to control
every other country .” In essence, the documents show that while the US government, like a global mafia
godfather , rewards the pliant ruling elites of the client states with arms, financial aid and
military protections, it punishes the nations whose leaders refuse to surrender to the wishes
of the bully and relinquish their national sovereignty. US foreign policies , like its domestic policies, are
revealed as catering not to the broader public or national interests of the people but to the powerful special
interests that are vested primarily in the military capital and the finance capital. US foreign policy
architects are clearly incapable of recognizing or acknowledging the fact that different peoples and
nations may have different needs and interests . Nor are they capable of respecting other
peoples’ aspirations to national sovereignty. Instead, they
tend to
view other peoples , just as they do the
through the narrow prism of their own nefarious interests . By selfishly dividing the world
into “friends” and “foe,” or “vassal states,” as Zbigniew Brzezinski put it, powerful beneficiaries of war and
militarism compel both groups to embark on a path of militarization, which leads inevitably to
American people,
militarism and authoritarian rule.
Although militarism grows out of the military, the two are different in character. While the
military is a means to meet certain ends such as maintaining national security,
militarism represents a bureaucratized
permanent military establishment as an end in itself . It is “a phenomenon,” as the late Chalmers Johnson
put it, “by which a nation’s armed services come to put their institutional preservation ahead of
achieving national security or even a commitment to the integrity of the governmental
structure of which they are a part” (The Sorrows of Empire, Metropolitan Books, 2004, pp. 423-24). This explains the
cancerous growth and parasitic nature of US militarism? cancerous because it is steadily expanding
throughout many parts of the world, and parasitic because not only does it drain other nations resources, it also
sucks US national resources out of the public purse into the coffers of the wicked interests
that are vested in the military-industrial-security complex. By creating fear and instability and
embarking on unilateral military adventures, corporate militarism of the United States also fosters
militarism elsewhere . A major US strategy of expanding its imperial influence and promoting
militarism around the globe has been the formation of international military alliances in
various parts of the world . These include not only the notorious North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO), which is
essentially an integral part of the Pentagon’s world command structure, and which was recently expanded to police the world, but also 10 other joint
military commands called Unified Combatant Commands. They include Africa Command ( AFRICOM), Central Command (CENTCOM),
European Command (EUCOM), Northern Command (NORTHCOM), Pacific Command (PACOM), and Southern Command
(SOUTHCOM). The geographic area under the “protection” of each of these Unified Combatant Commands is called Area of Responsibility (AOR).
AFRICOM’s area of responsibility includes US “military operations and military relations with 53 African nations – an area of responsibility covering all of
Africa except Egypt.” CENTCOM’s area of responsibility spans many countries in the Middle East/Near East/Persian Gulf and Central Asia. It includes
Iraq, Afghanistan, Pakistan, Kuwait, Bahrain, Qatar, United Arab Emirates, Oman, Jordan, Saudi Arabia, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan,
Turkmenistan, and Uzbekistan. EUCOM’s area of responsibility “covers 51 countries and territories, including Europe, Iceland, Greenland, and Israel.”
NORTHCOM’s area of responsibility “includes air, land and sea approaches and encompasses the contiguous United States, Alaska, Canada, Mexico and
the surrounding water out to approximately 500 nautical miles (930 km). It also includes the Gulf of Mexico, the Straits of Florida, portions of the
Caribbean region to include The Bahamas, Puerto Rico, and the US Virgin Islands.” PACOM’s area of responsibility “covers over fifty percent of the
world’s surface area ? approximately 105 million square miles (nearly 272 million square kilometers) ? nearly sixty percent of the world’s population,
thirty-six countries, twenty territories, and ten territories and possessions of the United States.” SOUTHCOM’s area of responsibility “encompasses 32
nations (19 in Central and South America and 13 in the Caribbean) ?and 14 US and European territories. . . . It is responsible for providing contingency
planning and operations in Central and South America, the Caribbean (except US commonwealths, territories, and possessions), Cuba, their territorial
waters.”
Together with over 800 military bases scattered over many parts of the world, this
military colossus represents an ominous presence of the US armed forces all across our
planet.
Instead of dismantling NATO as redundant in the post-Cold War era, it has been expanded (as a proxy for the US military juggernaut) to
include many new countries in Eastern Europe all the way to the borders of Russia. Not only has it inserted itself into a number of new international
relations and recruited many new members and partners, it has also arrogated to itself many new tasks and responsibilities in social, political,
economic, environmental, transportation and communications arenas of the world. NATO’s new areas of “responsibility,” as reflected in its latest
Strategic Concept, include “human rights”; “key environmental and resource constraints, including health risks, climate change, water scarcity and
increasing energy needs. . .”; “important means of communication, such as the internet, and scientific and technological research. . .”; “proliferation of
ballistic missiles, of nuclear weapons and other weapons of mass destruction”; “threat of extremism, terrorism and trans-national illegal activities such
as trafficking in arms, narcotics and people”; “vital communication, transport and transit routes on which international trade, energy security and
prosperity depend”; the “ability to prevent, detect, defend against and recover from cyber-attacks”; and the need to “ensure that the Alliance is at the
front edge in assessing the security impact of emerging technologies.” Significant global issues thus claimed to be part of NATO’s expanded mission fall
logically within the purview of civilian international institutions such as the United Nations. So why is the US ruling plutocracy, using NATO, now trying
to supplant the United Nations and other international agencies ? The
reason is that due to the rise of the influence of a
number of new international players such as Brazil, South Africa, Turkey, Iran, and Venezuela
the UN is no longer as subservient to the global ambitions of the United States as it once was.
Planning to employ the imperial military machine of NATO instead of the civilian multilateral
institutions such as the UN clearly belies, once again, the self-righteous US claims of trying to spread democracy worldwide.
Furthermore, NATO’s expanded “global responsibilities” would easily provide the imperial US military machine new excuses for unilateral military
interventions. By the same token, such military adventures would also provide the US military-industrial-security complex additional rationale for
continued escalation of the Pentagon budget. The expansion of NATO to include most of the Eastern Europe has led Russia, which had curtailed its
military spending during the 1990s in the hope that, following the collapse of the Berlin Wall, the US would also do the same, to once again increase its
military spending. In response to the escalation of US military spending, which has nearly tripled during the last 10 years (from $295 billion when
George W. Bush went to the White House in January 2001 to the current figure of nearly one trillion dollars), Russia too has drastically increased its
military spending during the same time period (from about $22 billion in 2000 to $61 billion today). In a similar fashion, US military encirclement of
China (through a number of military alliances and partnerships that range from Pakistan, Afghanistan and India to South China Sea/Southeast Asia,
Taiwan, South Korea, Japan, Cambodia, Malaysia, New Zealand and most recently Vietnam) has led that country to also further strengthen its military
capabilities. Just as the US military and geopolitical ambitions have led Russia and China to reinforce their military capabilities, so have they compelled
other countries such as Iran, Venezuela and North Korea to likewise strengthen their armed forces and buttress their military preparedness. Not
only does aggressive US militarism compel its “adversaries” to allocate a disproportionately
large share of their precious resources to military spending, but it also coerces its “allies” to
likewise embark on a path of militarization . Thus, countries like Japan and Germany, whose military capabilities were
reduced to purely defensive postures following the atrocities of World War II, have once again been re-militarizing in recent years under the impetus of
what US military strategists call “the need to share the burden of global security.” Thus, while Germany and Japan still operate under a “peace
constitution,” their military expenditures on a global scale now rank sixth and seventh, respectively (behind the US, China, France, UK and Russia). US
militarization of the world (both directly through the spread of its own military apparatus across the globe and indirectly by compelling
both “friends” and “foe” to militarize) has a number of ominous consequences for the overwhelming majority or the
population the world. For one thing, it is the source of a largely redundant and disproportionately
large allocation of the world’s precious resources to war, militarism and wasteful production
of the means of death and destruction . Obviously, as this inefficient, class-biased disbursement of
resources drains public finance and accumulates national debt, it also brings tremendous
riches and treasures to war profiteers , that is, the beneficiaries of the military capital and the
finance capital.
Secondly,
to justify this lopsided allocation of the lion’s share of national
resources to military spending, beneficiaries of war dividends tend to create fear , suspicion
and hostility among peoples and nations of the world, thereby sowing the seeds of war,
international conflicts and global instability. Thirdly, by the same token that powerful beneficiaries of war
and military-security capital tend to promote suspicion, to create fear and invent enemies, both
at home and abroad, they also undermine democratic values and nurture authoritarian rule . As the
predatory military-industrial-security-financial interests find democratic norms of openness
and transparency detrimental to their nefarious objectives of limitless self-enrichment, they
cleverly
create pretexts for secrecy, “security,” military rule and police state. Concealment of the robbery of public
treasury in the name of national security requires restriction of information, obstruction of transparency, and curtailment of democracy. It
follows
that under the kleptocratic influence of the powerful interests that are vested in the militarysecurity-financial industries the US government has turned into an ominous global force of
destabilization, obstruction, retrogression and authoritarianism .
IMilitarism Hurts Domestic Lives
Militaristic attitudes and the notion of expanded presidential war powers has
spillover effects on the rest of American society – from militaristic approaches
on social issues like “the war on drugs” and “the war on poverty” to expanded
presidential control over domestic policy and our everyday lives
Healy 9 (The Cult of the Presidency: America's Dangerous Devotion to Executive Power, By
Gene Healy, vice president at the Cato Institute)
“It is of the nature of war to increase the executive at the expense of the legislative authority,"
the Federalist tells us." And modern commanders in chief tend to reflexively invoke the war
metaphor when the public demands that they take action to solve the emergency of the
month, real or imagined. “War is the health of the state," Randolph Bourne’s famous aphorism
has it, but Bourne could just as easily have written that “war is the health of the presidency."
Throughout American history, virtually every major advance in executive power has come
during a war or a warlike crisis. Convince the public that we are at war, and constitutional
barriers to action fall, as power flows to the commander in chief. Little wonder, then, that,
confronted with impossible expectations, the modern president tends to recast social and
economic problems in military terms: war on crime, war on drugs, war on poverty. Martial
rhetoric often ushers in domestic militarism, as presidents push to employ standing armies at
home, to fight drug trafficking, terrorism, or natural disasters. And when the president raises
the battle cry, he can usually count on substantial numbers of American opinion leaders to
cheer him on. Like intellectuals the world over, many American pundits and scholars, right and
left, view bourgeois contentment with disdain. Normal people appear to like “normalcy,”
Warren Harding's term for peace and prosperity, just fine. But all too many professional
thinkers look out upon 300 million people living their lives by their own design and see
something impermissibly hollow in the spectacle. From William ]ames's search for a “Moral
Equivalent of War" that could unite Americans behind a common cause to the modern nostalgia
for the “Greatest Generation," large swaths of our intelligentsia believe that war is the force
that can give American life meaning.” Our chief executives capitalize on that belief, declaring
metaphorical wars on all manner of social harms or real wars on foreign adversaries. Again
and again throughout American history, presidents have used the power of the bully pulpit—
and their power to command the army—to redefine their role, transforming themselves from
humble chief magistrates to domineering commanders in chief.
Foreign Policy = Militarism
Militarism dominates US foreign policy---continual threat inflation guides
expansion of security politics that destroys alternative approaches to solving
international problems---resisting military involvement is key
Melvin Goodman 13 is an adjunct professor at Johns Hopkins University. He was division chief
and senior analyst at the Office of Soviet Affairs, Central Intelligence Agency from 1976 to 1986.
He was a senior analyst at the Bureau of Intelligence and Research, State Department from 1974
to 1976. He was an intelligence adviser to the Strategic Arms Limitations Talks in Vienna and
Washington. He is co-author of The Wars of Edvard Shevardnadze (2nd edition, 2001), The
Phantom Defense, America's Pursuit of the Star Wars Illusion (2001); Bush League Diplomacy;
How the Neoconservatives are Putting the World at Risk (2004); Failure of Intelligence: the
Decline and Fall of the CIA (2008). (From Center for International Policy) “American Militarism:
Costs and Consequences,” 3-5-13, http://www.truth-out.org/progressive-picks/item/14926american-militarism-costs-and-consequences, doa: 7-31-13, y2k
We in the United States have created a land of illusion . We have the world's best medical facilities,
but also its highest medical costs, and we still lack genuine universal health care coverage. Our
costs for entitlements such as Medicare and Social Security are out of control, but we are
unwilling to discuss reform. Our corporations and the wealthy classes pay the lowest taxes in
the industrial world, but we adamantly oppose raising tax rates that could alleviate one-quarter
to one-third of our deficit problem. We have the most expensive and lethal military force in
the world, but we face no existential threat ; nonetheless, liberals and conservatives alike
declare the defense budget sacrosanct. A reasonable reduction in the amount of money we
spend on defense would enable us to reduce our debt and invest in the peaceful progress and
development of a civilian economy. The United States has the most secure geopolitical
environment of any major nation, but sustains a defense budget that equals the combined
budgets of the rest of the world. Cuts in the defense budget over the next five years, announced
in January 2012, were extremely modest, amounting to a minuscule 1 percent real cut when
factoring in inflation. The cuts in Army and Marine personnel over a five-year period ending in
2017 will leave these services larger than they were in 2005. The mere lowering of recruitment
quotas and the retirement of officers and noncommissioned officers will cover the modest
reduction of the 92,000 troops. Those who criticize even these modest reductions fail to
recognize that, over the past two decades, the Cold War has ended and the greatest strategic
threat to the United States—the Soviet Union—has dissolved. Nevertheless, we barricade
ourselves behind a national missile defense, fight wars in which no vital national security
interests are at stake, and post hundreds of thousands of troops overseas . U.S. nuclear forces,
which have no utilitarian value, remain the same, although President Obama persistently claims
to support arms control and disarmament. The United States has become that militarized
nation that President Dwight D. Eisenhower presciently warned against in his farewell
address more than fifty years ago. The United States lacks a strategic vision for a world
without an enemy , and it continues to spend far more on defense, homeland security, and
intelligence than the rest of the world combined. We are the only nation in the world that
deploys its military primarily to support foreign policy rather than to defend our borders and
people. U.S. corporations dominate the sales of military equipment , selling extremely
sophisticated weapons to countries such as Saudi Arabia that have the hard currency to pay for
them but lack the skill to use them. We have more than 700 military bases and facilities around
the world; few other countries have any. We can deploy eleven aircraft carriers; among our
rivals only China even plans to deploy one—and that is a revamped Ukrainian aircraft carrier, a
carryover from the ancient Soviet inventory. U.S. militarization, reliance on the military to
pursue foreign policy objectives better achieved by other means, has continued to expand
since the end of the Cold War, when we might have expected and experienced a peace
dividend. Military expansion during the Cold War, especially during peaks in the U.S. arms
buildup against the Soviets and during the Vietnam War, at least had as its rationale the spectre
of an aggressive Soviet Union. The administrations of Bill Clinton, George W. Bush, and Barack
Obama, facing no existential threat , have given the Pentagon an unprecedented position of
power and influence , including huge increases in defense spending and a dominant voice in
the making of national security and foreign policies . The key contributions to the Pentagon's
enhanced role have been President Bush's doctrine of preemptive attack and the permanent
War on Terror , or the Long War; the misuse of power in Iraq; and President Obama's initial
expansion of the war in Afghanistan. The Bush and Obama administrations have made sure
that military figures dominate national security positions, and both administrations have failed
to use the tools of diplomacy to deal effectively with foreign policy conflicts in the Middle East or
with Iran or North Korea. The roots of the militarization of U.S. foreign policy lie in the year
1947, with the beginning of the Cold War. Passage of the National Security Act in 1947 made
the U.S. armed forces an inherent part of national security policy in peacetime . Previously, the
Pentagon had rarely asserted itself in the policy process , even in wartime. Military influence
grew over the next four decades, leading to the Defense Reorganization Act of 1986, commonly
referred to as the Goldwater-Nichols Act, which made the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff
the "principal military adviser to the President, the National Security Council, and the Secretary
of Defense." One of the consequences of U.S. militarization and unilateralism has been an
unwillingness to join international agreements and conventions designed to foster moderate
actions in the global community . The United States, for example, joined the so-called "rogue states" (Algeria, China, Libya, Iran, Iraq, and Sudan) in opposing creation of the
International Criminal Court (ICC), which extended the scope of international law and provided a means of bringing the world's worst human rights violators, such as Yugoslav President Slobodan Milosevic, to
justice. Every member state of the European Union, including all of America's NATO allies, favored the ICC, as did President Clinton initially. Clinton ultimately deferred to the Pentagon and Senator Jesse Helms (RNC), who argued that the Court would expose U.S. soldiers to international justice. This was a red herring, as the member states of the ICC have the right to try any of their own citizens charged with international
crimes in their own courts, which is exactly what the United States has done in the past. Thus, as with the creation of the League of Nations in 1919, a major step forward in international law was taken without the
endorsement and participation of the United States, which had prided itself on its support of international justice since the Nuremberg trials after World War II. The United States has also been out of step with the
global effort to ban the use of landmines, an effort that political conservatives and the Pentagon have opposed because of U.S. deployment of landmines near the border between North and South Korea. Although
anti-personnel mines have killed and maimed thousands of civilians, including children, all over the world—Afghanistan, Angola, Bosnia, Cambodia, El Salvador, Mozambique, and elsewhere—the marginal
advantage of their deployment in South Korea has been used to justify U.S. refusal to adhere to the convention. Not even the possibility of warmer relations between the two Koreas has led the United States to
. Since the 9/11 attacks of 2001, the United States, using the pretense of a
global war on terror, has gone to war in Iraq and Afghanistan and has used military force in
take a new position on the issue
Pakistan, Libya, Somalia, and Yemen . It is no surprise that we now find ourselves
overcommitted in the Middle East, North Africa, and Southwest Asia , which has become an "arc of
crisis"
for the United States. President George W. Bush helped to create this arc with his wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. Although President Obama has undertaken military disengagement in both
countries, he has widened covert action throughout the area as the Pentagon and the CIA conduct assassination programs against insurgents and terrorists. The United States may be closing down the arrogantly
named "Camp Victory" in Iraq, but it is building secret facilities in Ethiopia, Djibouti, the Seychelles, and the Arabia Peninsula (presumably in Yemen or the United Arab Emirates) as bases for Predator and Reaper
drone aircraft. These drones have been used against targets in Afghanistan, Iraq, Libya, Pakistan, Yemen, and Somalia, according to State Department cables obtained by WikiLeaks, an anti-secrecy group. In
addition to drone bases, U.S. secret facilities support special operations against dozens of countries from South America to Central Asia. Army Rangers, Navy Seals, and CIA personnel operate out of them. Military
personnel are deployed throughout the Middle East and North Africa, and the Pentagon and the Department of State are training special forces from dozens of countries in the art of counterinsurgency. The New
Yorker's Seymour Hersh has been reporting for several years that the United States is conducting special operations in Iran, and the Wall Street Journal has reported that Pentagon and CIA teams are conducting
covert operations to stop the smuggling of Iranian arms into Iraq. Such operations contribute to the increase in anti-Americanism throughout the region
. U.S. response to the
attacks of 9/11 has brought a new dimension to the national security state : the increase in largely unaccountable security
contractors, such as the notorious Blackwater (now brandishing the benign corporate name of Academi LLC), and consulting agencies that act as intermediaries between the federal government and defense
contractors. They operate without any apparent code of conduct, and the uncontrolled violence of Xe, another of Blackwater's incarnations, is well known. Working with these contractors has involved huge
payments to consulting agencies managed by former administration officials such as Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, national security adviser Stephen Hadley, directors of homeland security Michael Chertoff
and Tom Ridge, and CIA director Michael Hayden. More than one-third of the personnel in the intelligence community are private contractors, with the relatively new Department of Homeland Security and Office
of National Intelligence relying most extensively on them. Private contracts now consume 70 percent of the intelligence budget, and private contractors represent more than half of the employees at the new
National Counterterrorism Center. The overwhelming U.S. presence in Iraq is largely contractual, and in 2011, for the first time, deaths among contractors in Afghanistan exceeded fatalities of U.S. soldiers and
. The U.S. reliance on military force has damaged U.S. national interests at a time
when the world is facing severe economic stress. The Iraq and Afghan Wars have been costly in
terms of blood and treasure, and they have not made America more secure. The war on terror
has created more terrorists than it has eliminated, and the war is expanding in the Persian Gulf
and Africa, particularly in Yemen and Somalia. The United States is no longer seen as a beacon
military personnel
of liberty to the world, but as an imperialistic bully with little respect for international law .
The economic costs of our emphasis on the military have been enormous, coming at a time of
necessary constraint for U.S. expenditures and investment policy. As the military expands, the
Department of State declines, losing resources and influence ; it is no longer able to provide
robust diplomatic alternatives to militarization . During the crucial decision-making in 2009 to
determine troop levels in Afghanistan, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton merely echoed the
positions taken by Secretary of Defense Robert M. Gates , making no effort to question the
strategic and geopolitical implications of a wider war in Southwest Asia. The budget of the
Department of Defense, exceeding levels reached during the worst days of the Cold War, needs
to be significantly constrained. The United States devotes little attention to one of the
greatest losses in wartime, the civilian casualties that have taken place in Afghanistan, Iraq,
Libya, and Pakistan over the past decade. As General Tommy R. Franks infamously said during
the first years of the Afghan War, "We don't do body counts." In view of the scale of destruction
that has taken place at the hands of the U.S. military, particularly in Afghanistan and Iraq, we
certainly should. The United States prefers to ignore the loss of civilian life as it does the
destruction of the civilian economy, let alone schools, infrastructure, and even hospitals . The
U.S. military failed to understand that the lack of security provided to civilians in Iraq led to
greater success and recruitment for militias and insurgent groups. The lack of U.S.
understanding of Afghan opposition to midnight raids and house-to-house searches has
compromised Washington's relations with the government of Hamid Karzai. The U.S. killing of
two dozen Pakistani soldiers in November 2011 and the belated unwillingness to apologize
exposed a cavalier attitude toward loss of human life and further damaged the troubled U.S.Pakistani relationship. It is past time to hold a national debate on the role and purpose of U.S.
power in today's global environment . It is time to define a new international policy that
recognizes the constraints and limitations of military power . A good start would be to heed
the arguments of realists such as Dean Acheson and George Kennan , who opposed extended
military involvements . Over the past four decades, the United States has deployed large numbers
of forces to Vietnam, Iraq, and Afghanistan with no gains for national security and huge setbacks
to U.S. interests. We must understand how the United States reached the point of willingness
to expand its national security interests to all areas on the globe. There are no national security interests, let alone vital interests,
in areas that we have invaded and occupied for the past fifty years: twelve years in Vietnam; eight in Iraq, where the U.S. military withdrawal is mostly complete; and more than a decade in Afghanistan, where a
modest withdrawal has begun. Nevertheless, Admiral William H. McRaven, the commander of the Special Operations Command (SOCOM), is pressing for a larger role for his elite units and more personal
autonomy to position his forces in troubled areas. McRaven, who oversaw the operation that killed Osama bin Laden in May 2011, wants to deploy 12,000 special forces around the world at all times to strike
terrorist targets and rescue hostages. The Command has doubled in size since 2001, currently at a level of 66,000 military and civilian personnel, and its budget has more than doubled, from $4.2 billion to $10.5
billion. Greater authority for SOCOM would reduce the influence of the State Department in dealing with difficult political situations as well as the authority of the Pentagon's regional commanders. The
heightened secrecy would complicate the problem of congressional oversight
. Exaggeration of the threat has been a critical component in the
militarization of national security policy . Such exaggeration fostered the huge strategic buildup
during the Cold War, the unprecedented peacetime buildup by the Reagan administration, and
massive increases in defense spending during the Bush II administration. In an effort to assure
their own self-preservation, according to Harvard professor Daniel Yergin, nations often "push
the subjective boundaries of security outward to more and more areas, to encompass more
and more geography and more and more problems." This often leads to a paradox—an
expanded perception of threat rather than a greater sense of security . The United States has
created such an environment . We now view each example of terrorist activity as an existential
threat, and we are in the process of exaggerating the threat of China.
Gender
Full Text of RAWA Card
Women in Afghanistan face systematic oppression due to a legacy of Western
colonization. The removal of active forces in Afghanistan is the first step to
providing women a path to resistance and empowerment.
Revolutionary Association of the Women of Afghanistan (RAWA), July 3rd, 2013
(Organization established in Kabul, Afghanistan, in 1977 as an independent political/social
organization of Afghan women fighting for human rights and for social justice in Afghanistan
“Afghan women burn in the fire of the oppression of the occupiers and fundamentalists”
http://www.rawa.org/rawa/2013/03/07/rawa-statement-on-iwd-2013-english.html
A few dolled-up showpiece women in the government, parliament, and other official bodies, like
Fawzia Koofi, Sima Samar, Shukria Barikzai, Zahra Nadiri, Hassan Bano Ghazanfar, Shinkai
Karrokhail, Fawzia Sadaat, Fatima Gilani, Amina Afzali, Wazhma Forough, and others, whose
mouths have been sweetened with money, luxuries and foreign that come with their official
posts, do not want to speak a word about the bitter truth of the situation of women, let alone
stand up against, stop and prosecute, the real perpetrators of the ongoing disaster in support of
their fellow women. This handful of women who have found a position thanks to the
occupation, are themselves the enemies of our women in their unison with the killers in power.
Therefore, we cannot possibly view their presence in important posts as the cementing of the
deserving position women are supposed to have. These women, who can be regarded as
prepared nutriment to feed the US propaganda, realize that the end of the current colonial
system and the puppet Karzai regime means the end of their pompous lives. This is why they
themselves back the current deplorable and tragic situation. Most of these women who are
slaves of the reactionary elements and occupiers, are in the service of war criminals, and in the
best-case scenario, just want a few useless reforms in the rotten Karzai apparatus. For this
reason, intentionally or unintentionally, these women are at the service of and among the
enemies of the women of Afghanistan. These women can never represent the majority women,
who have been charred in Afghanistan’s hell. We wrote on March 8, 2005: “The persistence of
the current instability and the West's support of the "Northern Alliance" terrorists in
Afghanistan proves that the US and her allies pay no attention to human rights and women
rights, but seek only their political and economical interests.” Today, even the most optimistic
people in our country, confess that Afghan women have not been liberated, and have become
a commodity for the Western propaganda. Thanks to the presence of the US, women are
gang-raped by warlords, are flogged in many Taliban-controlled areas, are preys of acid attaks,
or are mercilessly stoned to death. But the US and its tail-wagging servants still show them a
green signal and want them to join the puppet government. A considerable number of our
women are forced into prostitution of beggary due to poverty and unemployment; the
maternal and infant mortality rate of Afghanistan is the highest in the world. In this country,
laws are just pieces of paper that aid only in deceiving people, and are never practically
applied. The law of Elimination of Violence Against Women (EVAW) made by Karzai is a
commendable document which has been set aside with no use. When criminal husbands,
fathers, or brothers kill women under different contexts, they are never punished. In many
cases, women are convicted by the judicial bodies and thrown into jails for the crime of
‘running away from home’, where they are further raped by the jail keepers. In such a hostile
situation, most women find self-immolation the only solution to free them from a slow
torturous death. The suicide rates among our women has risen in an unprecedented manner.
Here, blooming flowers like Sanobars, Saimas, Anisas, Zar Bibis, Gul Afrozes, Shakeelas,
Nafeesas , Azizas, and hundreds of other innocent girls, have been blown to pieces by the
filthy and blood-dripping hands of the fundamentalists. This is the agonizing reality of the life
of a woman in Afghanistan, not the distorted image the false propaganda machine of the US
gives to the people of the world to deceive them. Women can never have even their basic
rights in a country which is not independent, and whose people are captives in the chains of
colonialism and despotism. The exit of foreign troops and our country’s independence, can be
the first step in the path of the realization of values such as freedom and democracy, which
are vital conditions for the emancipation of women. Our people might be able to breathe with
relief without foreign troops, and their aid for fundamentalist criminals, and then labor for
values like freedom, democracy with secularism, social justice and their prosperity. In the
current situation, the US and NATO and its Afghan agents have suppressed the advocates of
such values, and cannot indulge in their activities, as they would want to.
Women in Afghan are not protected
The occupation of Afghanistan has created a worse situation for women – more
women are raped, sold, and commit suicide than when the Taliban were in
power….
Ian Sinclair and Mariam Rawi 2009 ( Ian is a journalist with Znet and Rawi is a member of
RAWA’s foreign relations committee, “Interview with the Revolutionary Association of the
Women of Afghanistan” April 29, 2009 http://www.zcommunications.org/interview-with-therevolutionary-association-of-the-women-of-afghanistan-by-ian-sinclair)
Despite many a hue and cry about "women's rights" and the "liberation of Afghan women",
Afghanistan still faces a women's rights catastrophe. There is no tangible change in the
conditions of Afghan women; in certain parts of the country the life is worse than under the
Taliban. The rate of kidnappings, rapes, selling of girls, forced marriages, acid attacks,
prostitution and self-immolation by young girls and women has reached a record high, even
compared to the Taliban regime. Due to forced marriages and domestic violence, selfimmolation by women aged between 18 and 35 is becoming an epidemic in Afghanistan.
There have been hundreds of such cases reported mostly in the provinces of Herat, Farah,
Ghor and Badghis. Where there is non-existent rule of law and legal support for women, they
have no other option but to get rid of their misery by burning themselves. Due to severe
poverty which affects over 80 percent of Afghanistan's population, life for hundreds of
thousands of war widows and poor women is disastrous and in many parts of Afghanistan the
level of prostitution and begging in the streets has risen to an unprecedented level. There have
been many reports of parents being forced to sell their children as they can't feed them. In the
western province alone 150 cases of the selling of children, especially girls, were officially
reported in 2008 -the actual numbers are much higher. of Herat There are many more that are
not reflected in the news as the media is strongly stifled under the shadow of guns and threats
of the warlords. In the past few years only some cosmetic changes were made in regard to
women's rights. For example, the Women's Ministry and 68 women members of parliament
was trumpeted as a big success. Meanwhile the Ministry has done nothing for women and is
just a showcase. The majority of women in the parliament are pro-warlord and cannot
represent Afghan women as they themselves are part of the problem. Afghan women have
been badly betrayed in the past seven years under the US occupation. Their plight was used to
justify the occupation of Afghanistan, but not only were no steps taken to heal their wounds,
rather the worst enemies of women's rights were empowered, supported and installed in key
posts. When the entire nation lives under the shadow of warlords, Taliban, drug-lords,
occupation forces and a corrupt, puppet and mafia government, how can its women enjoy the
most basic rights?
Military is Sexist
The US military is premised on the eroticization of violence and the valorization
of hyper-masculinity, which normalizes violence and socializes society to
dominate those deemed feminine.
Chew 5 [Huibin Amee, “Why the War is Sexist (And Why We Can’t Ignore Gender Anymore;
Here’s a Start for Organizing),” http://www.insurgentamerican.net/analysis/why-the-war-issexist/ October]
Even though women serve as soldiers, the U.S. military is a misogynist, homophobic institution
that relies on patriarchal ideologies and relations to function – with effects on larger society,
as well as the countries we occupy or station bases. While the racist ideologies behind the war
are regularly paid lip service by activists, we less frequently raise how this war depends on
sexism. But the military and its public support are based on deeply embedded patriarchal
values and practices. The U.S. military trains men to devalue, objectify and demean traits
traditionally associated with women. It molds men into a gender role of violent masculinity
defined in opposition to femininity. By ‘violent masculinity’ I mean a mode of operating that
glorifies violence as a solution to tension – and that is unaccountable to the feminine/civilian
‘protected,’ in that the masculine/soldier ‘protectors’ are encouraged not to view these people
as their equals. Feminist historian Catherine Lutz observes militarism teaches us, “we prove
and regenerate ourselves through violence.” 8 One soldier reported his training in boot camp:
“Who are you?” “Killers!” “What do you do?” “We kill! We kill! We kill!” Furthermore, soldiers
are purposefully trained to eroticize violence – from a heterosexual, male-aggressor
perspective, even if some soldiers are gay and some are women. For example, during the first
Gulf War, Air Force pilots watched pornographic movies before bombing missions to psyche
themselves up. 9 Until 1999, hardcore pornography was available at military base commissaries,
which were one of its largest purchasers. 10 The military teaches soldiers to internalize the
misogynistic role of violent masculinity, so they can function psychologically.
Military Otherizes and Feminizes
Military action is justified by the otherization and feminization of “enemies”…
we must be seen as the rational, advanced, moral masculine figure while our
foes are relegated to objectification
Peterson 10 [V. Spike: You should know who this is… but. Professor of International Relations
at the School of Government and Public Policy. Former fellow at the Gender Institute and
London School of Economics. “Gendered Identities, Ideologies, and Practices in the Context of
War and Militarism” Gender, War, and Militarism: Feminist Perspectives edited by Laura Sjoberg
and Sandra Via. Praeger security international, Santa Barbara p. 21-22]
The most familiar theme in war stories involves constructing the enemy as “other”: to
distinguish “us” from “them,” render others in some sense inferior, and thereby justify war’s
violence against “them.” The specifics of othering vary by history and context but invariably
involve some form of objectification so that “they” become objects to which norms of respect
and non-violation need not be extended. Historical othering ranges from early Greeks
characterizing Persians as effeminate to Christians casting nonbelievers as immoral to Europeans
depicting “natives” as uncivilized. Thinking through how othering occurs in nationalist, colonial,
and contemporary war stories reveals gendered identity investments and ideologies in
operation. Critics of European imperialism have produced a wealth of research documenting the
manipulation of ideologies to justify colonial wars and obscure their racist, economic, and
heteronormative dynamics.3 What surfaces repeatedly are characterizations of the colonized
as feminine: weak, passive, irrational, disorderly, unpredictable, lacking self-control, and
economically and politically incompetent. European power wielders (not only men or all men)
could then justify military interventions by casting themselves in favorable masculinist terms:
as uniquely rational, sexually and morally respectable, and more advanced economically and
politically. In colonial wars and geopolitical maneuvering, “civilization” became a code word for
European superiority. Through this lens, military interventions were perhaps a regrettable but
nonetheless a necessary component of “enlightening” and “civilizing” primitive, unruly
(feminized) “others.” As Eisenstein (2004, 75) observes, although they extolled the virtues of
reason as a progressive force, Europeans positioned rationality “against savagery (natives),
emotionality (women), and sexuality (racialized others).”
Militarism is Gendered
Militarism is highly gendered – the military industrial complex is fueled by the
assumption that men must prove their manhood by turning into killing
machines for the war effort while women must remain subservient.
Sjoberg and Via 10 [Laura: professor at University of Florida, feminist scholar of international
relations and international security, PhD from USC, JD from Boston College and Sandra:
professor of Political Science at Ferrum College. Gender, War, and Militarism: Feminist
Perspectives Praeger security international, Santa Barbara p. 8]
Feminists have pointed out that this militarism that pervades global politics is not gender
neutral, “natural or automatic” (Enloe 1993, 246). As Cynthia Enloe has explained,
“militarization occurs because some people’s fears are allowed to be heard, while other
people’s fears are trivialized and silenced” (1993, 246). Specifically, “the militarization of any
nationalist movement occurs through the gendered workings of power” (Enloe 1993, 246). In
the gendered process of militarization, “men are under constant pressure to prove their
manhood by being tough, adversarial, and aggressive. . . . In one highly legitimated and
organized institution within most societies, men not only can, but—to be successful—must
prove their masculinity” (Peterson and Runyan 1999, 118). This institution is the military,
where the functioning of the military-industrial or military-civilian4 complex needs men to be
willing to kill and die on behalf of their state to prove their manhood and “women to behave
as the gender women” (Enloe 1983, 212, emphasis added). In other words, “women must be
properly subservient to meet the needs of militaries” (Peterson and Runyan 1999, 118). The
impacts of militarization on women’s lives have been demonstrated in the lives of Korean
camptown prostitutes (Moon 1998), immigrant domestic workers in Malaysia (Chin 1998),
women soldiers in the First Gulf War (Enloe 1998), the U.S. military women accused of prison
abuse at Abu Ghraib (Sjoberg 2007), the Sri Lankan tourism industry (Enloe 1989), and many
other places around the world. Militarization is gendered in its aims (competitive power-over),
its means (the military industrial complex), its language (of strength and domination), and its
impacts (which disproportionately and negatively affect women).
WOT = hyper masculine
The war on terrorism is gendered – it creates a divide between the helpless
female civilian and male combatant and paints all Muslim men as terrorists
Wilcox 9 (Lauren Wilcox Political Theory Colloquium December 11, 2009, Body Counts: The
Politics of Embodiment in Precision Warfare)
In contrast to the masculine, cyborg subjectivity of the precision bomber and drone operator,
‘civilians’ are considered feminine figures. The gendering of the concept of ‘civilian’ has a long
history, as war-fighting has remained an almost-exclusively male province. Women,
considered to be inherently weak and defenseless, served as the quintessential civilian as
someone who not only is not, but cannot be a threat (Kinsella 2005). The phrase ‘women and
children’ is often used synonymously with ‘civilian’ such that men who are not taking part in
hostilities are often assumed to be combatants or at least potential combatants. The
transformation of civilians into a population of homines sacri is aided by the historical linkage
of the category of civilian with women and the feminine, as it builds upon the exclusion of
women, slaves, and foreigners from politics, due, among other reasons, to the association of
women and subordinate masculinities with the body and irrationality as opposed to the
rational mind deemed essential for participation in politics. As a ‘feminized’ population,
‘civilians’ are in need of protection, as they are ‘innocent’ of the violence of war. Yet, the
civilians of the enemy population are not afforded the same status of protection as ‘our’
civilians, on whose behalf the war is fought. The bodies of civilians are those who are ‘allowed to
die’ rather than those who are made to live, or those who must die, in the terms of Foucault’s
logic of biopolitics as a form of war. Their appearance politically as ‘mere bodies’ or ‘bare life’
not only reveals the political work needed to strip their bodies of subjectivity, but also the
interconnection between the bodies of civilians and the bodies of cyborg soldiers. The bodies of
civilians are produced in relation to the production of cyborg soldiers. order for the military
personnel to commit violence from afar, from a nearly disembodied ‘video game’ manner, the
bodies of civilians are produced as biopolitical bodies who live or die as a matter of rational
calculation and risk management. Subjected to the aleatory nature of precision weapons and
complicated formulae factoring into targeting decisions, including the weather and how much
a threat the intended target is, the civilians are not individualized as the targets of the bombs
are. They exist only as members of a population, whose management entails not the
injunction to ‘make live’ but rather the minimization of threat, rather than a serious effort at
its elimination.
The war on terrorism creates an us/them dichotomy in which we must destroy
the feminized, uncivilized, and barbaric Other – this justifies military expansion
and reifies the hyper masculine posture of America.
Wilcox 3 [Lauren, PhD in IR at University of Minnesota, BA at Macalester College, MA at
London School of Economics, “Security Masculinity: The Gender-Security Nexus”, Global Topics,
Vol. 2]
These statements give several clues as to the implications of ”barbaric‘ behavior. Terrorists are
barbaric and uncivilized, and opposed to democracy. Those who commit evil acts commit
attacks against civilization, therefore, being uncivilized is equivalent to being evil. Finally,
terrorists fight without rules, they kill innocents and women, and they are cowards, therefore
they are barbaric and uncivilized. Overall, the message is clearly that of a dichotomous world,
in which there are only two choices; civilization or barbarism, us or them. In order to
understand the significance of the use of the discourse of civilization versus barbarism in the
war on terror, a brief history of this discourse is helpful. Applying the label ”barbaric‘ to people
from the Middle East, or any non-white peoples is hardly a new historical development. In his
book Orientalism˙ Edward Said critiques the discipline of Oriental Studies in the European and
American academies for reproducing stereotypes and using their privileged status to create
knowledge about people in the Middle East that served to justify and increase their control and
domination over these people. 63 Said describes the relationship between West and the
Middle East, as seen from the West, —to be one between a strong and a weak partner,“ and
adds that, —many terms were used to express the relations…The Oriental is irrational, depraved
(fallen), childlike, ”different‘; thus the European is rational, virtuous, mature, ”normal.‘ “64
This relationship is gendered in that ”Orientals‘ are assigned traits associated with femininity
and inferiority. This dichotomous relationship is replicated in political discourses as well as in
academic and literary circles. The discourse of civilization/barbarism was used in order to
justify colonialism of non-white peoples throughout the world, and has a long history in US
foreign history. A people labeled ”uncivilized‘ is considered to be unable to rule themselves,
and is need of guidance from more civilized people. The use of force against ”barbarians‘ is
also justified.65 Furthermore, the rules of humane and civilized warfare do not apply to wars
against ”barbaric‘ peoples. Against this background, the use of the discourse of barbarism can
be seen as an attempt to foretell the coming war and to persuade people of the necessity of
using force against al-Qaeda and their hosts in Afghanistan. The additional measures of
control, surveillance, and detention of Middle Eastern and North African men in the process of
securitizing immigration served to harass, demean and subordinate this ”inferior‘ masculinity,
contributing to the constructing of the hegemonic masculinity of American men. The ”special‘
registration requirements for the National Security Entry-Exit System is evidence of the
gendered inside/outside, us/them distinction in regards to national identity. This program,
instituted as part of the securitization of immigration, serves to support the construction and
maintenance of the current articulation of hegemonic masculinity, which differentiates
American men as superior to men in the Middle East. The special registration requires that
men and boys over the age of fifteen with non-immigrant visas from countries in the Middle
East, Northern Africa, countries with large Muslim populations such as Indonesia and Pakistan,
and an outlier, North Korea, be interviewed and have their whereabouts tracked by the INS.66
These persons will be finger printed and photographed, with their fingerprints matched
against fingerprints of known or suspected terrorists and used by law enforcement. They are
also required to submit personal contact information, and are required to notify the Attorney
General when the change addresses. These measures are in addition to the detention and
questioning of thousands of men of Arab or Muslim background after the September 11 that
tacks, some allegedly detained without access to attorneys or proper food.67 The INS has also
recently changed its policy on asylum, as people seeking asylum from thirty-three countries,
mostly in the Middle East, are now being detained pending the processing of their applications,
where previously they have been released.68 By concentrating on men as the ”outsiders‘
Middle Eastern men specifically service not only as the ”other‘ that American identity is
contrasted again, but a feminized ”other‘ that American masculinity is defined against.
The War on Terror is an ideal example of gendered militarism – military
expansion is just another method to remasculinize the nation in the name of
freedom and democracy.
Peterson 10 [V. Spike: You should know who this is… but. Professor of International Relations
at the School of Government and Public Policy. Former fellow at the Gender Institute and
London School of Economics. “Gendered Identities, Ideologies, and Practices in the Context of
War and Militarism” Gender, War, and Militarism: Feminist Perspectives edited by Laura Sjoberg
and Sandra Via. Praeger security international, Santa Barbara]
The U.S.–led “war on terror” exemplifies how identity investments, ideological commitments,
and militarized practices interact. Some argue that George W. Bush’s forceful response to the
9/11 bombings involved not only his outrage and claim to military leadership but also his
desire to establish a hypermasculine image of himself and the United States. It is well-known
that Bush had personal reasons for enhancing his militarist (manly) identity. He had avoided
serving in Vietnam, was invested in the image of being a “guy’s guy,” and arguably hoped to
redeem his father’s failure to oust Saddam in the First Gulf War. For many Americans, the
identity and power of the United States had been feminized by its defeat in Vietnam, made
more humiliating by losing to a people stereotyped as ethnically/racially inferior. Feminization
anxiety was also fueled by the increasing visibility of women in politics and the workplace and
the growing strength of LGBT (lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender) political movements. A
yearning to remasculinize the nation (Jeffords 1989) was already present and readily tapped
by Bush and his advisers as the nation responded to 9/11 and its spectacular demonstration of
U.S. vulnerability to penetration by foreign men. The war story the Bush administration
immediately cultivated featured fanatical terrorists inexplicably committed to destroying
freedom, democracy, and (implicitly Western) civilization by any means. Enemies this
irrational and unpredictable could only be defeated by drawing an absolute line between
good and evil and adopting the strongest possible measures to eliminate those deemed evil.
Feminization operates here to construct enemies as so absolutely different from “us” that the
only viable strategy is their annihilation. Those who were fearful, were skeptical, or actively
opposed Bush’s strategies were rendered unequivocally suspect—unpatriotic, anti-American,
naively (irrationally) out of touch, or quite simply unmanly (lacking the guts to do what must be
done). In this instance, feminization operates to deny absolutely the rationality of dissenters
or any cogent reasons for critique. Dissenters are simply and irredeemably discredited:
unwilling to stand up for their country, ungratefully abandoning the United States and
freeloading on its military power, and/or failing to grasp real-world politics. Those seeking
debate and diplomacy are feminized—cast as behaving like cowardly women and
undermining U.S. interests by wimping out of military action. In effect, dissidents become a
less stark but ultimately an equally threatening enemy: “If you’re not with us, you’re against
us.” And as enemies, those who are against us lose any claim to inclusion, respect, or
(apparently) rights.
Paternalism
The east is framed as backwards and unimportant. This ethnocentric view
silences women’s issues even though it’s based on the myth that we are
liberating them. We should be skeptical of further attempts at intervention
Crowe 2007 (Lori, Grad Student in Pol. Sci. – York U., “The “Fuzzy Dream”: Discourse,
Historical myths, and Militarized (in)Security Interrogating dangerous myths of Afghanistan and
the ‘West’”, http://archive.sgir.eu/uploads/Crowe-loricrowe.pdf)
During the cold war, the Soviet and the Americans used Afghanistan as the battleground for
power, choosing to sponsor and condemn various regimes as they saw fit; this history of foreign
engagement contributed to state fragmentation, underdevelopment, and the self-sustaining
war-economy that persist today. An example of this is the use of rentier incomes during the
early 1900’s that were used as a means of control and coercion.92 That the West still
approaches Afghanistan with a ‘backwards’ mentality is also evident in the attitude towards
Afghan women. A critical analysis can explore how existing misrepresentations of the Third
World affect Western security agendas, and vice versa, and the resulting effect of these
agendas on the same women they supposedly aid. Under the guise of exporting
democratization and achieving emancipation, the US-led “liberating” coalition not only
ignored women’s security, they decreased their security. Even more troubling is that this was
committed while justifying the invasion of Afghanistan to the American public as a mission to
“save the women”. This proclamation is in and of itself illustrative of the Western
ethnocentricity and the persisting colonialist stance that endangers Third World women’s
security in a transnational world dominated by a US empire: “To position women’s rights as a
rallying point for war paints politicians and the public at large into a corner…It’s a calculated
exploitation of leftist concerns in order to suppress dissenting thought”.93 The US government repeatedly
referred to the oppression of women as being of paramount concern, leaving the impression that they would indeed “liberate” these women and in a sense justifying their
invasion to their populace. Then US Secretary of State Colin Powell stated: “The recovery of Afghanistan must entail the restoration of the rights of Afghan women. Indeed, it will
not be possible without them. The rights of the women of Afghanistan will not be negotiable.”94 In November 2001, even Laura Bush spoke on the topic of Afghan women in the
weekly radio address usually given by the President. She stated that “the brutal oppression of women is a central goal of the terrorists” and that “the fight against terrorism is
also a fight for the rights and dignity of women.”95 In wake of the US intervention, however, it appears that women’s oppression was used as justification for its own militarized
agenda. A Report of Rights & Democracy’s Mission to Afghanistan from the International Centre for Human Rights and Democratic Development states: “Women’s rights have
been brought to the forefront by political leaders who have learned to use the women’s human rights discourse to justify their military interventions.”96 And the media,
Maria Raha vibrantly conveys the
undeniable relationship between the U.S politically constructed narratives of Afghan women
(as oppressed and in need of “saving”) as legitimating for intervention and the media’s role in
disseminating them. I quote her here at length: The road of post-9/11 pop culture and news media is littered with as many nods to Afghan women as a typical
exclaims Christine Delphy, “drew a veil” over the histories that conflicted with these aims.97
Bush speech is with references to “the evildoers.” To wit: As reported in the USA Today in February 2002, the website for the Revolutionary Association of the Women of
Afghanistan received such heavy traffic after a mention on Oprah that it crashed. As of this writing, a total of seven books on Afghan women have been released by major
publishers since September 2001. Just weeks before the United States invaded Afghanistan, CNN re-ran Beneath the Veil, a documentary on the topic. Meanwhile, the word
“burqua” became ubiquitous: It showed up on the American Dialects Society’s 2001 Words of the Year list, and the American Heritage College Dictionary rushed to include it in
their last edition. Even the New York Post jumped on the burqua bandwagon (albeit in a completely bizarre way), using the word to describe the shroud with which Michael
Jackson covers his children.98 The final problematic element which, like the previous points, is intricately connected to the others, is the ahistorisation, or lack of history, of
. The representations of Afghanistan that have proliferated in the media
as well as in policy documents have for the most part been simplistic, ahistorical, or
historically selective and thus politically motivated. In her critique of the narratives that followed the events of September 11th,
Afghanistan in contemporary discourse
Butler explains how specific representations of history proliferated: There is no relevant pre-history to the events of September 11, since to begin to tell the story in a different
way, to ask how things came to this, is already to complicate the question of agency which, no doubt, leads to the fear of moral equivocation. In order to condemn these acts as
inexcusable, absolutely wrong, in order to sustain the affective structure in which we are, on the one hand, victimized and, on the other, engaged in a righteous cause of rooting
99 What happens, however, when we begin to
interrogate that history that has become ‘common sense’ and investigate other sources of
knowledge and experience outside of Western mainstream discourse? We might discover, for
example, as Pugh and Cooper revealed, that external intervention in Afghanistan’s past were
key factors in creating conditions of state fragmentation, ‘underdevelopment’, and a selfout terror, we have to start the story with the experience of violence we suffered.
sustaining war-economy. In the 1980’s, Soviet invasion contributed to the destabilization of the state’s primary functions, including its monopoly on the
use of force, which allowed the mujahidin to take control in the countryside. The Soviets “deliberate efforts to terrorize rural populations and destroy infrastructure” resulted in
an extreme decrease in food production, internal and external displacement, rapid urbanization, and refugee communities in neighboring India and Pakistan.100 From 1979 to
1992, massive military and financial support was continuously provided via the ‘CIA/ISI pipeline’, the logistic support system of the U.S. Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) and the
Pakistani InterServices Intelligence (ISI), in order to provide arms for resistance of the Soviets. The result was an extreme saturaturation of arms and ammunition which today
The role of the US in the development of the shadow economies in
Afghanistan is often absent from any discussion of ‘development’ or ‘security’ in the region.
The drug trade in the 1980’s was in fact, argues Goodhand, supported by the proxy backers of
the mujahidin as a “weapon of war to destabilize Soviet-controlled Afghanistan and the Central
Asian republics”.102 With the decline of ‘superpower patronage’ in the 1990’s, warlords began
to develop internal revenue sources and power and sovereignty fragmented with little incentive
to unite and abolish the ‘illicit’ economy. Thus, the state-building that had developed in the 18th
century was profoundly destabilized103. The trend of international involvement continued with
the arrival of oil companies and international diplomatic and aid organisations. Under the newly
perceived stability under the Taliban, U.S. and Argentine oil companies began to compete
fiercely for the valuable resource: “Afghanistan became a significant fulcrum for the ‘new Great
Game’ in Central Asia, as great powers competed for access to the energy reserves of the
Caspian Sea basin and the routing of pipelines in the region”.104 Following a shift in the US
attitude toward the Taliban, the UN Security Council began to impose sanctions in 1999 with the
goal of weakening the regime; as Goodhand argues, however, this resulted in the strengthening
of ‘hard-liners’ in the movement and fostering closer ties between the Taliban and radical
Islamic groups.
have achieved status as political currency.101
! – War and Colonialism
The West constructs an idealized feminine that is passive, pure, and maternal…
which is what justifies war to “save the brown women from the backwards
brown men”… reifying European norms of femininity and justifying colonial
expansion via unchecked war powers.
Peterson 10 [V. Spike: You should know who this is… but. Professor of International Relations
at the School of Government and Public Policy. Former fellow at the Gender Institute and
London School of Economics. “Gendered Identities, Ideologies, and Practices in the Context of
War and Militarism” Gender, War, and Militarism: Feminist Perspectives edited by Laura Sjoberg
and Sandra Via. Praeger security international, Santa Barbara]
At the same time—and complicating simplistic models of gender—the development of
European nationalism and normalization of bourgeois respectability produced an idealized
model of femininity: pure, dutiful, and maternal. This superficial valorization of femininity is
contradicted by the practices it invoked. Romanticizing the maternal feminine did less to
empower women than render them perpetual dependents. Feminine virtue and morality
were best ensured by confining these qualities—and (bourgeois) women—to a private sphere
of domesticity and assigning men the public-sphere responsibility of defending and protecting
feminized dependents. Rather than empowering European women, the idealization of
bourgeois (heteronormative) femininity became a tool for disempowering non-European men.
The patronizing and protectionist logic of bourgeois norms provided imperial governments
with a moral, and rational, justification for militarized colonization. In this war story, the
barbarity of “other” men was proven by their (allegedly) oppressive treatment of women, and
this demanded the rescue of victimized females by honorable, civilized men. In short, the
protection of idealized femininity (to paraphrase Spivak’s [1987] apt analysis) justified wars by
white men to save brown women from brown men. The crusading rhetoric and protectionist
logic obscured colonial government agendas, and it resurfaces with particular vengeance and
new complexities in contemporary militarism and war.4
! – Extinction
Patriarchy is the root cause of their impacts – Western civilization is premised
on militarized notions of insecurity and conquest which guarantees global
instability and leaves us on a collision course with extinction.
Clark 4 [Mary E.: professor of biological studies at Berkeley, "Rhetoric, Patriarchy & War:
Explaining the Dangers of ‘Leadership’ in Mass Culture,”
http://goliath.ecnext.com/coms2/gi_0199-4005307/Rhetoric-patriarchy-war-explainingthe.html]
I begin by questioning the notion that patriarchy is a "natural" or "inevitable" form of human
society. By "patriarchy" I do not mean a community or society where males hold political
positions as spokespersons for the whole and often are adjudicators of local disputes. This "male
function" is common in tribal and indigenous societies. But men's power over others is severely
limited and generally held only at the pleasure of the entire group, especially the elder women.
(4) Patriarchies, rather, are those much larger societies where not only is there gender
dominance; they also are highly class-structured, with a small, powerful elite controlling the
rest of society, A short history of these entities is necessary to understand today's dilemma.
Rigidly controlled patriarchies have evolved and disintegrated at many times and in many places
in the past few millennia of human existence-which, being the era of written history, is the
condition of humankind most familiar to us. But, as I have argued elsewhere (5) this was an
unknown political condition throughout earlier human existence, when small, egalitarian, highly
dialogic communities prevailed. Even today, small remnants of such societies still exist in
comers of the planet that escaped the socially destructive impact of Western colonization.
Modern Western "democracies" are, in fact, patriarchal in structure, evolving out of the old,
male-dominated aristocracies of late-Medieval Europe. Those historic class/caste hierarchies
were legitimized by embedded religious dogma and inherited royal authority. Together, church
and monarch held a monopoly of physical and economic power, creating politically stable, albeit
unjust, societies. During the gradual development of the religious Reformation, coupled with the
Enlightenment's concept of the "individual citizen," emerging egalitarian ideas threatened to
destabilize the social coherence of patriarchal regimes. At the same time, principalities and
dukedoms were fusing into kingdoms; kingdoms, in turn, were joining together as giant nation
states. The United Kingdom was formed of England, Wales and Scotland-each a fusion of local
earlier dukedoms. City States of Italy fused rather later. Bismarck created the "Second Reich"
out of diverse German-speaking princedoms in the 1870s. And, adding to this growth in the
sheer size of patriarchies there was a doubling of populations every couple of generations.
Nation-states emerged as "mass cultures," with literally millions of persons under the control of
a single, powerful government. The centralized physical power possessed by most of these
several industrializing European nations matched or exceeded that of ancient Rome. To
achieve coherence of such societies demanded a new legitimating force to create a broad base
of support among giant, diverse populations. The erosion of the belief that classes were a godgiven, "natural" state of affairs was hastened by the introduction of low-cost printing and rapidly
growing levels of literacy (both necessary to underpin the new Industrial Age). These politically
equalizing forces unleashed a host of social discontents that had to be controlled. The old
religious threats of damnation or excommunication were fast losing their force, and new legal
systems circumscribed the absolute powers of monarchs to control social behavior. This very
cacaphony of voices threatened the stability of the new giant states. The "solution," of course,
was to take control of the public dialogue, to define the legitimate "topics of conversation."
This is the primary role of political "leadership" in today's mass societies, and that leadership
uses two major tools to wield its influence: rhetoric and the mass media. I suggest, then, that
the high potential for internal instability in giant patriarchal states is a primary factor in
setting the stage for today's global insecurity and the extreme militaristic rhetoric that exists
both within and between nations. Before continuing this discussion of patriarchy's dangers, I
would note that, although in modern Western patriarchies the domination of women by men is
less evident as women have gained increasing political and economic status, women with such
status tend to assume the "shoulder pads" and "language" of men when it comes to political
and economic institutions. Women like Indira Gandhi, Prime Minister of India, Golda Melt,
Israeli Prime Minister; Jeane J. Kirkpatrick, Reagan's Ambassador to the United Nations;
Madeleine Albright, Clinton's Secretary of State; Margaret Thatcher, Britain's Prime Minister;
and Condoleezza Rice, George W. Bush's Security Advisor, come readily to mind. (Thatcher cites
the following terms the media applied to her: Iron Lady, Battling Maggie, and Attila the Hen. (6))
The glass ceiling in the corporate world has proved harder to crack, however, so fewer wellknown examples exist there of powerful females. (Katherine Graham, who became publisher of
the Washington Post after the death of her husband, was one of the few powerful women who
to her credit, did not adopt the patriarchal mode.) Hence, I regard the Western nations'
politico-economic world view as very much in accordance with that of historical patriarchies,
with perhaps one or two Scandinavian exceptions. I thus conclude that the language of
international politics today is "gendered" by the political insecurity experienced by leaders of
earlier patriarchies, and that the presence of women in such governments has little effect on
the framework of public dialogue. (I recall hearing Geraldine Ferraro, when running for VicePresident in 1984, assure an interviewer that she would not hesitate to push the "nuclear
button" if necessary.) Hence, it is not our X and Y chromosomes that are at issue here; it is the
gendered world view that underpins our institutions and frames our behaviors. As long as
those in power "think" in this patriarchal box, we will live in a globally-armed camp, where
war-leading even to the annihilation of our species-is a constant, real possibility.
Counter-narrative Solves
Endorsing a counter-narrative to the violent liberation politics of current
American politics helps establish a more inclusive vision of feminism against
structural violence.
Ayotte and Hussain ‘5 (Kevin, Assistant Prof. Comm. CSU Fresno, and Mary, Lecturer in
Comm. CSU Fresno, NWSA Journal, “Securing Afghan Women: Neocolonialism, Epistemic
Violence, and the Rhetoric of the Veil”, NWSA, 17(3), Fall, Ebsco)
The expansion of “security” in feminist international relations beyond the confines of realist
definitions of nation-state interest was a prerequisite for taking seriously the myriad gendered
practices that oppress both women and men throughout the world. The neocolonialism in
many Western representations of third-world women demonstrates the extraordinary power
of discourse to shape our understanding of the world. As has been argued in this essay, the
epistemic violence inflicted on Afghan women through the U.S. appropriation and
homogenization of covering practices makes possible (and more likely) the continuation of
physical and structural violence against women in Afghanistan. The argument at hand has
sought to identify the irreducible diversity of women’s lived experience “against the grain of
‘public’ or hegemonic history” in order to challenge dominant political discourses that have
elided Afghan women’s agency as subjects (Mohanty 1991a, 38–9). Of course, counter-memory
cannot nostalgically long for some lost “truth” of women’s experience, but it can add texture to
the always already woven tapestry that is the discursive representation of women. We close this
essay by offering an alternative representation of covering practices in Afghan society. In
contrast to the epistemic violence wrought by representations of burqa-clad Afghan women on
the Feminist Majority Foundation website, Kensinger describes the image of Meena Keshwar
Kamal, founder of RAWA, on the latter organization’s website. Kamal’s image accompanies a
counter-hegemonic discourse that requires viewers to confront Afghanistan’s neocolonial cold
war history with both the Soviet Union and the United States (Kensinger 2003, 8). The RAWA
website also represents a far more effective call for the elimination of imposed covering. The
RAWA argument contextualizes covering practices within and across cultures, noting that they
are not unique to Afghanistan, Islam, or the third world. “[F]undamentalists” are identified as
the root cause of the oppression of women. Through the use of inclusive language to explicate
their position on “[t]he Islamic hejab (veil),” RAWA avoids the myopic fixation on the burqa, a
particular regime, or geographic locale, as is characteristic of many U.S. representations of
Afghan women (Revolutionary Association of the Women of Afghanistan n.d.). RAWA’s
discourse thus opens up possibilities for transnational solidarity with women subjugated by diverse forms of
“fundamentalism” independent of covering practices. The criticism in this article should therefore not be read as a condemnation of U.S. interest in gender equality in
Afghanistan, but as a call for support of the experience and knowledge of indigenous activists working toward this goal. This reflexive alternative to uncritically speaking for
others will be more productive when conducted as a collective enterprise with those others, “by which aspects of our location less obvious to us might be revealed” (Alcoff 1995,
112). Against the portrayal of Islamic women in the United States post9/11, RAWA’s website also accurately presents covering as a cultural, rather than religious, issue. When
forcibly imposed, the burqa becomes a misogynistic instrument of terror designed to objectify women, relegating their social status to that of “chattel” by making them literally
invisible in the Afghan public sphere. Although a call is issued for “rejection of the veil as a symbolic form of resistance,” by recognizing and respecting the personal nature of
individual women’s decisions regarding covering, the social meaning of such practices is acknowledged in a fashion that preserves the agency of Afghan women while
challenging the structural power at work through imposed covering (Revolutionary Association of the Women of Afghanistan n.d.). RAWA thus seeks to empower women
through advocacy shaped by their shared experience of gender relations in Afghanistan (Brodsky 2003). The RAWA website also emphasizes the gendered Taliban policies that
target men, “a subtlety that disrupts any inclination to see the situation as simply one of Afghan men against Afghan women” (Kensinger 2003, 12). Although men cannot
become members, male supporters play a vital role in RAWA, recognizing that it is “not only a woman’s organization” (Brodsky 2003, 203). Philosophically and strategically,
RAWA’s vision and ongoing practice are consciously grounded in the struggle for democracy for all Afghans (194). Because of the cultural constraints on Afghan women’s
mobility and participation in activities outside the home, the support of men is vital. As one RAWA member explains, “[w]e are not anti-male. We also can’t work without men”
(193). Perhaps even more important than the elimination of the Taliban, raising the consciousness of Afghan men is one of the organization’s greatest achievements and
essential to their long-term goals (218). RAWA’s activism, on multiple levels, thus avoids Spivak’s concern about Western discourses that position white men as “saving brown
The reductive representations of burqa-clad Afghan women in U.S. media
and U.S. governmental discourse have inflicted their own sorts of violence—epistemic,
physical, and structural—on the bodies of Afghan women. In addition to shedding light on the
women from brown men” (1999, 284).
consequences of certain U.S. discourses that purport to rescue Afghan women from gender
oppression, the analysis herein also demonstrates the need for a synthesis of materialist and
poststructuralist approaches to feminist international relations theory. Critical attention to
the material conditions experienced by women is necessary not only to identify the physical
and structural violence inflicted on the bodies of women, but also to trace the diversity of
women’s experience that is flattened by many Western feminist discourses about third-world
women. The insights of poststructuralism also demonstrate that the categories so often
attributed to women are not essentially fixed, yet are frequently positioned as such by the very
language we use with the most altruistic intentions. Both theoretical “poles” contribute to this
analysis, and it is only by the refusal of both for the critical space in between that a more
reflexive feminist praxis becomes possible.
Race / Orientalism
Genocide
War makes genocide possible
Hansen-Bundy, 2013 (Benjy Hansen-Bundy "How Ronald Reagan Made Genocide Possible in
Guatemala”http://www.policymic.com/articles/34465/how-ronald-reagan-made-genocidepossible-in-guatemala Apr 16, 2013)
Efrain Rios Montt, who ruthlessly ruled Guatemala in the early 1980s, is currently standing trial
in his home country for the genocide of 1,771 indigenous people. This constitutes a
monumental step forward for human rights in Latin America. What the mainstream media
skates over in its coverage of the Rios Montt trial is the hand Ronald Reagan had in getting the
genocidal ball rolling. The early 1980s were particularly violent in the Latin American theater
of the Cold War. Smack in the middle of Guatemala's 36-year civil war which claimed 200,000
lives, Rios Montt edged out the winner of a sham election in a bloodless coup and began
systematically repressing support for the Marxist opposition,as his forces raped women,
burned villages, and murdered indigenous Mayan peasants. From day one Reagan backed
Rios Montt, feeding him millions first in jeeps and trucks, and then helicopter and plane parts,
despite clearly articulated reports from both the CIA and international watchdogs that
genocide was accumulating bodies in the ditches and gullies of Guatemala. A cache of internal
Guatemalan records from the time revealed the existence of Operation Sofia, which was the
operation that led to the massacre of indigenous peasants. It was used by the 1999 UNsponsored Historical Clarification Commission to classify the counterinsurgency campaign in the
summer of 1982 as "acts of genocide against groups of Mayan people." The horror described by
independent human rights reporters on the ground is enough to turn your stomach: "We heard
many, many stories of children being picked up by the ankles and swung against poles so their
heads [were] destroyed." Despite the fact that he knew all this, Reagan praised Rios Montt,
calling him "a man of great personal integrity and commitment" who wanted to "promote
social justice." President Bill Clinton apologized in 1999, saying that the U.S. support for the
death squads "was wrong." Reagan's foreign policy was dark and repressive, this much we
know. It's important to remember, as we witness this ground breaking trail — the first by the
way in which a Latin American head of state is tried for genocide under national jurisdiction —
that the culprit survives the global forces that helped make him what he was. At the end of the
day the burden of justice and nation healing falls on the Guatemalan people: it is their dictator
who stands trial and their people who suffered under him. But Americans (and Guatemalans)
ought to remember that Rios Montt had big friends in Washington.
War is used to promote racial hierarchies and dehumanizes indigenous people
Mertus, 99( Julie Mertus“ THE ROLE OF RACISM AS A CAUSE OF OR FACTOR IN WARS AND CIVIL CONFLICT,”
International Council on Human Rights Policy, 1999)
This paper examines the role of racism as a cause of or factor in wars and civil conflicts .“Racism” as
understood here is defined broadly to encompass acts and processes of dehumanisation.The
conflicts in Rwanda and Kosovo serve as case studies; the former illustrates a case where the
racist nature of the conflict has been clear to most observers, and the latter represents a case
where racism plays an important yet overlooked role. Racism did not cause either conflict.
Rather, the conflicts were the outcome of political manipulation and enlargement of already
existing group classification schemes and social polarisation, a history of real and imagined
oppression and deprivation, the absence of the rule of law and democratic structures, and
state monopoly over the provision of information. Under such conditions, political élites
could use racist ideology as a method of gaining power and, when necessary, waging war.
Hegemonic ideals of white identity pushed through colonization and war
perpetuated conflicts and created genocide
Mertus, 99( Julie Mertus“ THE ROLE OF RACISM AS A CAUSE OF OR FACTOR IN WARS AND CIVIL CONFLICT,”
International Council on Human Rights Policy, 1999)
Prior to European colonisation, Hutus and Tutsis had apparently lived in a somewhat divided
society, but not based upon racist divides. Hutus farmed and Tutsis raised cattle, but
otherwise they intermarried, fought together, shared a national god (“Imana”), a national
language (Kinyarwanda), lived in villages together, and were loyal to their Mwami (king)
regardless of his tribal background. Apparently, the mixing of the groups was so extensive
that “ethnographers and historians have lately come to agree that Hutus and Tutsis cannot
properly be called distinct ethnic groups.”1 There were few or no incidents of racism or
violence between the two groups prior to the late 1950s. 5. Germany was the first to colonise
Rwanda, and the Germans apparently subscribed to the “Victorian race theory” that the Hutus
were somehow the descendants of Ham and thus destined to be slaves. This led to a tendency
to favour the Tutsis over the Hutus, a trend that was continued in a more elaborate fashion by
the Belgians who gained Rwanda (from the League of Nations) after WWI. Belgian “scientists”
apparently engaged in physical studies of the Hutus and Tutsis in order to establish the
physical differences between the two tribes. The results of their studies focused primarily on
the size and shape of the two groups’ respective noses, and contributed to the conclusion
among Belgian colonisers that because the Tutsi nose was narrower and longer, the Tutsis
were somehow nobler. The Belgians subscribed to the belief that the Tutsis had an “innate
cognitive superiority to the Hutus and other Africans.”2 As a result, the “Belgian officials
reserved the best jobs in the administrative system for Tutsis, while the school system, largely
run by the Catholic Church, discriminated against Hutus.”3 Traditionally, therefore, there had
been “no age-old animosity” between the Hutus and Tutsis; the tensions between them were
of relatively recent origin, largely spurred on by European pseudo-science. Thus, when many
Western publications tended to represent the 1994 killings in Rwanda as merely an
embodiment of typical, historical tribal warfare, they were incorrect. More importantly
though, the historical background emphasises that when Rwandan radio propaganda
broadcast alleged “‘history lessons’ of ‘well-known’ Tutsi treachery and exploitation of the
Hutus,”4 these were largely fabricated or, at the very least, a gross misrepresentation of
German and Belgian oppression prior to the Hutu revolution in 1959 that overthrew Tutsi
rule and drove many Tutsis into exile. The 1959 revolution in Rwanda gave democratic
respectability to Hutu rule, but it failed to give institutional expression to the rights of the
Tutsi minority. Instead, it perpetrated systematic racial classification and discrimination on
group lines. The 1994 killings began after President Juvenal Habyarimana of Rwanda and the
President of Burundi were killed as their aircraft was trying to land at Kigali, but was instead
shot down in a rocket attack (April 6th).5 The government (Hutu controlled) blamed the
attack on Tutsi rebels of the Rwandan Patriotic Front. There are indications, however, that
the violence was instead an effort by the government to consolidate Hutu power by wiping
out the Tutsis. Human Rights Watch has argued since 1994 that the “the death of president
Jevénal Habarimana of Rwanda in a suspicious plane crash on April 6, 1994 was the pretext
for Hutu extremists from the late president’s entourage to launch a campaign of genocide
against the Tutsi.”6 As Human Rights Watch observed in their 1999 report: 8. This genocide
resulted from the deliberate choice of a modern elite to foster hatred and fear to keep itself
in power. This small, privileged group first set the majority against the minority to counter a
growing political opposition within Rwanda. Then, faced with RPF success on the battlefield
and at the negotiating table, these few power-holders transformed the strategy of ethnic
division into genocide. They believed that the extermination campaign would restore the
solidarity of the Hutu under their leadership and help them win the war, or at least improve
their chances of negotiating a favourable peace. They seized control of the state and used its
machinery and its authority to carry out the slaughter.7
Ordinary Violence/4th world
Nuclear explosions are happening now but go unnoticed in the first world
Kato, Department of Political Science @ U Hawaii, 93
(“Nuclear Globalism:Traversing Rocket, Satellites, and Nuclear War via the Strategic Gaze”,
Alternatives, 18.3)
In delineating the notion of "nuclear war," both of these discourses share an intriguing leap: from the bombings of
Hiroshima and Nagasaki to the "possible" nuclear explosions in an indefinite-yet-ever-closerto-the-present future.
Thus any nuclear explosions after World War II do not qualify as nuclear war in the cognitive
grid of conventional nuclear discourse. Significantly, most nuclear explosions after World War
II took place in the sovereign territories of the Fourth World and Indigenous Nations. This
critical historical fact has been contained in the domain of nuclear testing. Such obliteration of
the history of undeclared nuclear warfare by nuclear discourse does not merely posit the
deficiency of the discourse. Rather, what it does is reveal the late capitalist form of
domination, whereby an ongoing extermination process of the periphery is blocked from
constituting itself as a historical
The only way to resist this extermination is by forging a link between
antinuclear and environmental movements, which is blocked by their discourse
which hides the violence against indigenous nations.
Kato, Department of Political Science @ U Hawaii, 93
(“Nuclear Globalism:Traversing Rocket, Satellites, and Nuclear War via the Strategic Gaze”,
Alternatives, 18.3)
The question now becomes: Can there be a productive link between the struggles of the
Fourth World and Indigenous Peoples against the exterminating regime of nuclear
capital/state, and First World environmentalist and antinuclear social movement? This link is
crucial and urgent for a subversion of the global regime of capital/state. Nevertheless we have
not yet seen effective alliances due to the blockage the lies between these social movements.
The blockage,as I have shown in this article, is produced primarily by the perception and
discourse of the social movements in the North, which are rooted in technosubjectivity. The
possibility of alliances, therefore, depends on how much First world environmentalists and
antinuclear movements can overcome their globalist technosubjectivity, whose spatio—
temporality stands in diametrical opposition to the struggles of the Forth World and
Indigenous Peoples. In other words, it is crucial for the former to shatter their image-based
politics and come face to face with the “real’ of the latter.”
Nuclear war is not a fantasy, Nuclear war is happening now in the status quo
against indigenous groups and fourth world nations
Kato, Department of Political Science @ U Hawaii, 93
(“Nuclear Globalism:Traversing Rocket, Satellites, and Nuclear War via the Strategic Gaze”,
Alternatives, 18.3)
The vigorous invasion of the logic of capitalist accumulation into the last vestige of relatively
autonomous space in the periphery under late capitalism is propelled not only by the desire
for incorporating every fabric of the society into the division of labor but also by the desire for
"pure" destruction/extermination of the periphery.26 The penetration of capital into the social fabric
and the destruction of nature and preexisting social organizations by capital are not separable. However, what we
have witnessed in the phase of late capitalism is a rapid intensification of the destruction and extermination of the
periphery. In this context, capital is no longer interested in incorporating some parts of the periphery into the
international division of labor. The emergence of such "pure" destruction/extermination of the periphery can be
explained, at least partially, by another problematic of late capitalism formulated by Ernest Mandel: the mass
production of the means of destruction.27 Particularly, the latest phase of capitalism distinguishes itself from the
earlier phases in its production of the "ultimate" means of destruction/extermination, i.e., nuclear weapons. Let us
recall our earlier discussion about the critical historical conjuncture where the notion of "strategy" changed its nature
and became deregulated/dispersed beyond the boundaries set by the interimperial rivalry. Herein, the
perception of the ultimate means of destruction can be historically contextualized. The only
instances of real nuclear catastrophe perceived and thus given due recognition by the First
World community are the explosions at Hiroshima and Nagasaki, which occurred at this
conjuncture. Beyond this historical threshold, whose meaning is relevant only to the
interimperial rivalry, the nuclear catastrophe is confined to the realm of fantasy, for instance,
apocalyptic imagery. And yet how can one deny the crude fact that nuclear war has been
taking place on this earth in the name of "nuclear testing" since the first nuclear explosion at
Alamogordo in 1945? As of 1991, 1,924 nuclear explosions have occurred on earth.28 The
major perpetrators of nuclear warfare are the United States (936 times), the former Soviet
Union (715 times), France (192 times), the United Kingdom (44 times), and China (36 times).29
The primary targets of warfare ("test site" to use Nuke Speak terminology) have been
invariably the sovereign nations of Fourth World and Indigenous Peoples. Thus history has
already witnessed the nuclear wars against the Marshall Islands (66 times), French Polynesia
(175 times), Australian Aborigines (9 times), Newe Sogobia (the Western Shoshone Nation)
(814 times), the Christmas Islands (24 times), Hawaii (Kalama Island, also known as Johnston
Island) (12 times), the Republic of Kazakhstan (467 times), and Uighur (Xinjian Province, China)
(36 times).30 Moreover, although I focus primarily on "nuclear tests" in this article, if we are to
expand the notion of nuclear warfare to include any kind of violence accrued from the nuclear
fuel cycle (particularly uranium mining and disposition of nuclear wastes), we must enlist
Japan and the European nations as perpetrators and add the Navaho, Havasupai and other
Indigenous Nations to the list of targets. Viewed as a whole, nuclear war, albeit undeclared,
has been waged against the Fourth World, and Indigenous Nations. The dismal consequences
of "intensive exploitation," "low intensity intervention," or the "nullification of the sovereignty"
in the Third World produced by the First World have taken a form of nuclear extermination in
the Fourth World and Indigenous Nations. Thus, from the perspectives of the Fourth World and
Indigenous Nations, the nuclear catastrophe has never been the "unthinkable" single
catastrophe but the real catastrophe of repetitive and ongoing nuclear explosions and
exposure to radioactivity. Nevertheless, ongoing nuclear wars have been subordinated to the
imaginary grand catastrophe by rendering them as mere preludes to the apocalypse. As a
consequence, the history and ongoing processes of nuclear explosions as war have been
totally wiped out from the history and consciousness of the First World community. Such a
discursive strategy that aims to mask the "real" of nuclear warfare in the domain of imagery of
nuclear catastrophe can be observed even in Stewart Firth's Nuclear Playground, which
extensively covers the history of "nuclear testing" in the Pacific: Nuclear explosions in the
atmosphere . . . were global in effect. The winds and seas carried radioactive contamination
over vast areas of the fragile ecosphere on which we all depend for our survival and which we
call the earth. In preparing for war, we were poisoning our planet and going into battle
against nature itself.31 Although Firth's book is definitely a remarkable study of the history of
"nuclear testing" in the Pacific, the problematic division/distinction between the "nuclear
explosions" and the nuclear war is kept intact. The imagery of final nuclear war narrated with
the problematic use of the subject ("we") is located higher than the "real" of nuclear warfare in
terms of discursive value. This ideological division/hierarchization is the very vehicle through
which the history and the ongoing processes of the destruction of the Fourth World and
Indigenous Nations by means of nuclear violence are obliterated and hence legitimatized. The
discursive containment/obliteration of the "real" of nuclear warfare has been accomplished,
ironic as it may sound, by nuclear criticism. Nuclear criticism, with its firm commitment to global
discourse, has established the unshakable authority of the imagery of nuclear catastrophe over
the real nuclear catastrophe happening in the Fourth World and Indigenous Nations almost on a
daily basis.
Fanon
War causes permanent psychological trauma to pregnant women that are
terrorized because of their ethnic background
Fanon 63 (Frantz Fanon born in Martinque and studied medicine in France, specializing in psychiatry. He found his
sympathies turning toward the Algerian Nationalist Movement, which he later joined. The Wretched of the Earth
1963, Grove Press New York, NY pg 206-207)
Puerperal psychosis refers to those mental disorders which occur in women during maternity.
Such disorders can occur immediately before or several weeks after childbirth. Their psychological
determinism is highly complex. The two major causes are thought to be a disruption to the
endocrine glands and the occurrence of a "psychological shock" –a term that, although vague,
corresponds roughly to what is commonly known as a "bad fright." Ever since the French
government's decision to apply their scorched earth policy and establish a buffer zone over
hundreds of kilometers there are almost 300,000 refugees along the Tunisian and Moroccan
borders. The state of dire poverty they live in is no secret. International Red Cross commissions have paid
them a number of visits and on ascertaining their extreme poverty and precarious living conditions, they
recommended increased aid by international organizations. Given the malnutrition that is rampant
in these camps it is therefore inevitable that the pregnant women are particularly prone to
developing puerperal psychoses. These refugees live in an atmosphere of permanent
insecurity, the combined effects of frequent raids by French troops applying the "right to hunt
and pursue," aerial bombardments-there is no end to the bombing of Moroccan and Tunisian
territories by the French army, and Sakiet-Sidi-Youssef, the martyred village in Tunisia is the
bloodiest example-machine gun raids as well as the breakup of the family unit as a result of
flight. In truth, there are few Algerian women refugees who do not suffer from mental
disorders following childbirth. There are various symptoms: agitation sometimes accompanied by furor; deep
asthenic depression coupled with multiple suicide attempts; symptoms of anxiety accompanied by tears,
lamentations, and appeals for mercy, etc. Likewise, the delusional disorders present many different characteristics: a
delusion of vague persecution, aimed at anyone; a delirious aggressivity aimed at the French, who want to kill the
unborn or newborn child; an impression of imminent death in which the mothers beg the invisible killers to spare
their children. Once again we must point out that the underlying problem is not solved by sedation or a reversal of
the symptoms. Even after the patient has been cured, her predicament maintains and nurtures
these pathological complications
Colonial and imperialist war leads to mental disorders for the colonized
Fanon 63(Frantz Fanon born in Martinque and studied medicine in France, specializing in psychiatry. He found his
sympathies turning toward the Algerian Nationalist Movement, which he later joined. The Wretched of the Earth
1963, Grove Press New York, NY pg 181-182)
But the war goes on. And for many years to come we shall be bandaging the countless and
sometimes indelible wounds inflicted on our people by the colonialist onslaught. Imperialism,
which today is waging war against a genuine struggle for human liberation, sows seeds of
decay here and there that must be mercilessly rooted out from our land and from our minds.
We shall deal here with the problem of mental disorders born out of the national war of
liberation waged by the Algerian people. Perhaps the reader will find these notes on psychiatry
out of place or untimely in a book like this. There is absolutely nothing we can do about that. We
had no control over the fact that the psychiatric phenomena, the mental and behavioral
disorders emerging from this war, have loomed so large among the perpetrators of
"pacification" and the "pacified" population. The truth is that colonization, in its very essence,
already appeared to be a great purveyor of psychiatric hospitals. Since 1954 we have drawn the
attention of French and international psychiatrists in scientific works to the difficulty of "curing" a
colonized subject correctly, in other words making him thoroughly fit into a social environment of
the colonial type.
Orientalism
US Citizenship is not enough—Racism based on “Security” Goes
Deeper
US citizenship does not fight back against racism. Views of Japanese Americans
from US military officers demonstrate the type of deep seated racism that
emerges during wartime. Call to preserve national security become
instruments for expressing violent and contagious forms of racism.
Huong Vu, ’02 (US AGAINST THEM: THE PATH TO NATIONAL SECURITY IS PAVED BY RACISM, 50 Drake L. Rev.
639).
Lieutenant General John L. DeWitt, the
head of the Western Defense Command, aggressively
recommended internment of Japanese Americans because he believed they had a genetic
predisposition that made them a threat to national security. n104 His report stated: "'In the war in
which we are now engaged racial affinities are not severed by migration. The Japanese race is an enemy race and
while many second and third generation Japanese born on United States soil, possessed of
United States citizenship, have become 'Americanized,' the racial strains are undiluted.'" n105 In
newspaper interviews, DeWitt declared that "'a Jap's a Jap.'" n106 DeWitt claimed Japanese Americans signaled Japanese ships on the
Pacific Coast, that a significant amount of weapons and other contraband had been seized by the FBI from homes and businesses of
Japanese Americans, and that those of Japanese descent could never assimilate and had strong ethnic allegiance to Japan. n107
However, because little evidence existed to prove DeWitt's claims that all people of Japanese descent were threats to national
security, DeWitt also argued that it would be impossible to determine which Japanese American was loyal and which was not. n108
According to DeWitt, "'there isn't such a thing as a loyal Japanese and it is impossible to
determine their loyalty by investigation.'" n109 "[W]e must worry about the Japanese all the
time until [the Japanese are] wiped off the map." n110 Army intelligence, on the other hand, officially reported
that the internment camps were not needed.
Korematsu was built on widespread racism in the government. National
security became the tool for racist beliefs and anti-Japanese sentiment
Huong Vu, ’02 (US AGAINST THEM: THE PATH TO NATIONAL SECURITY IS PAVED BY RACISM, 50 Drake L. Rev.
639).
Japanese Americans were forced into internment camps because of their race. n95 "The myth
of military necessity was used as a fig leaf for a particular variant of American racism." n96
Before President Roosevelt signed Executive Order 9066, the push for internment became fierce
due to antiJapanese sentiment. n97 Many government officials believed that Japanese
Americans were loyal to Japan and not the United States. n98 President Roosevelt, holding
deep anti-Japanese feelings himself, believed every Japanese American posed a threat to
national security. n99 In hearings for the Tolan Committee, n100 future Chief Justice Earl Warren
stated that Japanese American organizations were heavily involved in seditious activities even
though no solid evidence existed to prove these activities. n101 The report of the House
Committee on UnAmerican Activities stated that "'no Japanese can ever be loyal to any other
nation than Japan.'" n102 Both the Secretary of the Navy, Frank Knox, and a government
investigative body led by Supreme Court Justice Owen Roberts, reported unsubstantiated claims
of Japanese Hawaiians committing espionage in support of the attack on Pearl Harbor. n103
Colonialism is the Problem, not war powers allocation. The impact they are
describing and they racism they pin-point—the narratives of Presidential War
Power they tell—are not about Executive authority as much as they are about
colonialism as a whole.
John Hayakawa Torok, CUNY Law, ’04 (Howard Law Journal, Fall, 2004 Doctoral
Candidate, Department of Ethnic Studies, University of California, Berkeley. J.D.
1991 C.U.N.Y. Law School. 48 How. L.J. 351, “Freedom Now! Race Consciousness
and the Work of De-Colonization Today.”)
Frantz Fanon, a central figure in the Algerian Revolution of 1952 to 1961, held that
colonialism is violence in its pure form. n187 Kwame Nkrumah of Ghana held that the "raison
d'etre of colonialism is the thorough exploitation of the subject peoples and territories." n188
Bert [*380] J. Thomas, the editor of the volume of essays I relied upon for my discussion here,
asserts: "Pan-Africanism is a coherent theory, which has as its aim the complete destruction of
all phases of colonialism and their consequences." n189 John Henrik Clarke in the preface to the
Thomas book states that the essays deal with "the African world struggle and the search for an
ideology of liberation." n190 The search for an ideology of liberation by and for people of color,
in the domestic and international spheres, is a complex, continuing task. European imperialism
led to the colonization of the Americas, Africa and Asia. n191 In aid of colonialism, the Portuguese
began the European slave trade from Africa over five centuries ago. Colonialisms begat racisms.
n192
Frantz Fanon found that racism had become an ideology in the colonial milieu.
"Metropolitan scholars, particularly anthropologists, keep this racism alive, since they are prone
to write that "before the advent of colonialism, [the native's] history was one which was
dominated by barbarism." n193 De-colonization involved and involves not only access to state
power in the former European colonies, but the colonized's rejection of internalized racism. n194
This, Frantz Fanon and Albert Memmi n195 posit, is necessarily a violent, painful process. n196 As
anti-subordination legal theorists and activists located in the United States, we live in, and
with, the legacies of colonial projects. As American lawyers and law teachers of color, we do
well to examine the life work of Charles Hamilton Houston and William Henry Hastie. n197
Re-racialization of Muslims is a HUGE category, sweeping a number of groups
into the “terrorist Other” category through religion, race, nationality, and
ethnicity.
Ibrahim, ’09 (Nagwa Ibrahim, The Origins of Muslim Racialization in U.S. Law, 7 UCLA J.
ISLAMIC & NEAR E.L. 121, 121 (2008/09) Nagwa Ibrahim is a civil rights attorney with the law
firm of Hadsell Stormer Keeny Richardson & Renick. She is also an alumna of the UCLA School of
Law Critical Race Studies Program)
Whereas the internment of Japanese-Americans during WWII centered on the racialization
of Japanese as a distinct ethnic group from other Asians, the re-racialization of Muslims as the
fictionalized "terrorist enemy" post 9/11 does not just indiscriminately conflate Arabs with
Muslims. Under this new Muslim-looking category, Muslims are conflated with non-Muslim
Middle Easterners and non-Muslim South Asians, including Sikhs and other people of color.
Thus "the Muslim terrorist other" is a pan-racial, pan-ethnic enemy that is identified both
through physical cues such as skin color and national origin, as well as actual or perceived
performative cues related to the practice of Islam in the U.S. and regions with large Muslim
populations such as the Middle East, Indonesia, Pakistan, or Afghanistan. These performative
cues include surnames, the head covering worn by some women, the beard worn by some
men, the practice of Islamic rituals like prayer, and even certain accents. n76 In addition,
national origin plays a role in the construction of the "Muslim terrorist other" where those
who come from countries with large Muslim populations, such as Arab Christians, are also
subjected to this racial construction.
American Militarism perpetuates the white supremacist racial hierarchy
JiYoung Um, 2012(Ji-Young Um is Visiting Assistant Professor with appointments in the American Studies Program and the English
Department at Williams College. Um has written and presented on representations of minority soldiers in the U.S., intersections of militarism, empire,
and racism, Asian Americans and U.S. wars in Asia, and visual cultures and race. She is currently working on a book manuscript that argues for reading
America's wars as racial projects that reveal the constitutive relationship between militarism and racism “Citizen and Terrorist, Citizen as Terrorist:
Military, Citizenship, and Race in the Age of War on Terror.” Postmodern Culture: Volume 22, Number 3, May 2012)
The enlistment of volunteers for the U.S. military in the years since the Cold War and the Vietnam War
has a particular relationship to the national body and racial ideology. As McAlister has shown, the post-
Vietnam War U.S. military not only functions as a representative microcosm of a diverse and
multi-racial nation, but also provides the justification for America's imperial militarism while
disavowing racism.2Thus, the citizen-soldiers of the modern U.S. military serve a dual
purpose: to protect and defend the nation-state, but also to stand in for the national
community they call upon to rally around the nation-state at war.3 The racialized soldier of
the multicultural military is invoked in an appeal to the national community to see itself as
pluralist, meritocratic, and multi-racial and simultaneously represents that national selfimage. Because of the powerful link between the military and citizenship, which I will elaborate on later
in the essay, the military continues to serve as the premier site through which race, racism,
belonging, and citizenship are negotiated and resolved. But if it has historically functioned as
such, the military has not, in fact, effectively resolved the contradictions of race and
citizenship in national and political life. While the military has appeared to promote racial
progress, its recruitment and integration of racial minorities in the U.S. reveal the
opposite.4The figure of the racialized soldier tasked with resolving these negotiations instead reveals the
military's complicity in the reproduction of conditions that compel racialized citizens and noncitizens to participate in militarism and warfare. By perpetuating and exploiting the narrative
that these racialized subjects "loved their country so much . . . that they were able to look
beyond the discrimination they experienced and in time overcame racism," militarism and
racism work hand in hand to sustain racial hierarchy and domination and exploit them for
warfare (Fujitani 262).
U.S. Military heavily recruits non-citizen immigrant soldiers to fight in wars
JiYoung Um, 2012(Ji-Young Um is Visiting Assistant Professor with appointments in the American Studies Program and the English
Department at Williams College. Um has written and presented on representations of minority soldiers in the U.S., intersections of militarism, empire,
and racism, Asian Americans and U.S. wars in Asia, and visual cultures and race. She is currently working on a book manuscript that argues for reading
America's wars as racial projects that reveal the constitutive relationship between militarism and racism “Citizen and Terrorist, Citizen as Terrorist:
Military, Citizenship, and Race in the Age of War on Terror.” Postmodern Culture: Volume 22, Number 3, May 2012)
The military has an intimate connection to formal citizenship as well as to symbolic citizenship . Military
service can expedite naturalization processes for both non-citizen green card
holders/permanent residents and non-green card holding immigrants.5 According to the
Department of Homeland Security, service in any branch of the U.S. Armed Forces can also
qualify service members for waivers of certain general naturalization requirements. During
peacetime, one or more years of service counts as qualifying service, while during "Periods of
Hostilities" any length of service qualifies, even for those who are not permanent residents. It
is worthwhile noting that this provision—requiring no minimum period of service—was authorized
after September 11, 2001, and that we have been in a "Period of Hostility" since that
date.6 The Pentagon also announced in 2008 plans to begin recruiting immigrants with temporary visas,
not just green card holders or permanent residents, for the military. 7 While the initiative itself is not
specifically geared towards racial and ethnic minorities, given the patterns of immigration to
the U.S. in the past several decades, it would be safe to assume that this initiative has the
potential to attract and increase the number of recruits from minority communities.
Significantly, a New York Times article reporting on this initiative notes that the program
specifically aims to attract and recruit native speakers, including Arabic-speaking immigrants,
as language specialists (Preston).
JiYoung Um, 2012(Ji-Young Um is Visiting Assistant Professor with appointments in the American Studies Program and the English
Department at Williams College. Um has written and presented on representations of minority soldiers in the U.S., intersections of militarism, empire,
and racism, Asian Americans and U.S. wars in Asia, and visual cultures and race. She is currently working on a book manuscript that argues for reading
America's wars as racial projects that reveal the constitutive relationship between militarism and racism “Citizen and Terrorist, Citizen as Terrorist:
Military, Citizenship, and Race in the Age of War on Terror.” Postmodern Culture: Volume 22, Number 3, May 2012)
The affinity of militarism, citizenship, and racism is also illuminated through the genealogy of
power that Michel Foucault outlines in his 1976 lectures.8 The decline of sovereign power and its
"right to take life or let live," as Foucault argues here and elsewhere, came to be transformed
into "the power to 'make' live and to 'let' die" (241). The difference between the two is, in
short, power over death versus power over life. Under biopower and disciplinary power,
management and regulation of life become the primary modes through which individual
bodies and populations are governed. We might also understand citizenship as a technology
or mechanism of regulatory State power. The nation, as Foucault theorizes, is not determined by
its ability to exercise domination but by "its ability to administer itself, to manage, govern,
and guarantee the constitution and workings of the figure of the State and State power"
(223). In other words, citizenship is one site or technology through which the State exercises
biopower.
The military is the main apparatus for biopower of nonwhite groups
JiYoung Um, 2012(Ji-Young Um is Visiting Assistant Professor with appointments in the American Studies Program and the English
Department at Williams College. Um has written and presented on representations of minority soldiers in the U.S., intersections of militarism, empire,
and racism, Asian Americans and U.S. wars in Asia, and visual cultures and race. She is currently working on a book manuscript that argues for reading
America's wars as racial projects that reveal the constitutive relationship between militarism and racism “Citizen and Terrorist, Citizen as Terrorist:
Military, Citizenship, and Race in the Age of War on Terror.” Postmodern Culture: Volume 22, Number 3, May 2012)
The military is a central apparatus for managing populations on the margins of the national
community—that is to say, those whose citizenship, formal or otherwise, has always already been in
question—and their relationship to the nation-state. The military, especially in times of war, has
offered itself as a vehicle through which various communities from which it solicits manpower
might gain the rights and benefits of citizenship. But if we understand that the military exists
primarily to provide State security, we must understand that it operates in the interests of the nationstate.9 Citizenship, at its simplest, names a juridical status within a particular state, with attendant rights
and benefits, yet its operation suggests much more. That various populations (including women and
African Americans) with formal citizenship status within the nation have been consistently
denied the rights and benefits that other citizens enjoy, while others (Asian Americans,
Latina/o Americans) have consistently been seen and treated as foreigners and non-citizens
regardless of formal citizenship status, speaks to the dynamic operations of citizenship and
citizenry as technologies of State power for the management of people and populations. The
history of the so-called second-class citizenry in the United States reveals the ideological and social
domains of citizenship that have implications far beyond one's legal status in the State. The promise or
guarantee of citizenship is always and necessarily conditional. Especially in times of war and
national crises, such promises are at once powerfully seductive and dangerous, revealing the
precariousness of citizenship and belonging.
War authorizes the logic of biopower using racism as permit for the state to kill
JiYoung Um, 2012(Ji-Young Um is Visiting Assistant Professor with appointments in the American Studies Program and the English
Department at Williams College. Um has written and presented on representations of minority soldiers in the U.S., intersections of militarism, empire,
and racism, Asian Americans and U.S. wars in Asia, and visual cultures and race. She is currently working on a book manuscript that argues for reading
America's wars as racial projects that reveal the constitutive relationship between militarism and racism “Citizen and Terrorist, Citizen as Terrorist:
Military, Citizenship, and Race in the Age of War on Terror.” Postmodern Culture: Volume 22, Number 3, May 2012)
The racialized citizen-soldier exists at the uneasy intersection of biopower and disciplinary
power, and consequently at the intersection of life and death. If, as Foucault suggests, racism
is the limit of making, controlling, and managing life, if it is "the indispensable precondition
that allows someone to be killed, that allows others to be killed," then the racialized soldier
exemplifies the paradox of how technologies oriented toward making live also make die (256).
Because of biopower's commitment to life, only racism permits the State to kill, and racism
makes it possible for subjects to be exposed not only to literal death but also to forms of
social death such as rejection and expulsion (256). Racism here, as Foucault explains, has two
functions: it allows for distinction, for "the break between what must live and what must die" (254). But it
does not simply authorize death. Racism also enables war by authorizing the logic of biopower,
which dictates that the destruction of one race is necessary for another race to live and
regenerate itself (255). In other words, war is not simply waged to kill enemy races but also to
continue and maintain one's own race. War and racism are twin expressions of a murderous
state that is otherwise obliged to preserve and guarantee life. That is to say, war and racism are
not defined by a causal relationship. Rather, if we follow Foucault and understand both as "basic
mechanism[s] of power" of the modern state, we might also see war and militarism as racism and vice
versa (254). And if war itself is an expression and function of racism that makes possible the operation of
State power, the racialized soldier is positioned simultaneously as agent and object of racism. As
members of the military responsible for State security and waging war who are at the same time targets
of the State power to let die, racialized soldiers occupy a paradoxical and precarious position between life
and death. To put it another way, the racialized soldier is a figure at once for citizen and enemy. Cynthia
Enloe shows how soldiers from minority communities reveal the ways in which imperatives of State
security come into conflict with those of national community. As Enloe's study notes, their inclusion and
participation in the military can lead to demands for equal standing and rewards befitting full members of
the national community. While such demands have led to some shifts in policy and public opinion, the
ethnic/minority soldiers' status does not necessarily shift accordingly. The perils of embodying
both citizen and enemy simultaneously are perhaps particularly hazardous for those who are
perceived as threats to State security.
Dispensability
Non-human world is seen as dispensable and dispensability leads to the
destruction of whole populations
Rabaka 2007 Department of Ethnic Studies Center for Studies of Ethnicity and Race in
America (CSERA), University of Colorado-Boulder
(Reiland , The Souls of White Folks, W.E.B. Du Bois’s Critique of White Supremacy and
Contributions to Critical White Studies, Journal of African-American Studies, pp. 1-15)
Moving beyond a strictly materialist (politico-economic and/or class-centered) account of race and racism, and hitting at the heart of white supremacy,
Du Bois, in “The Souls of White Folk,” queried the “colored world” and those whites who would open themselves to moral and materialist questions:
“How many of us today fully realize the current theory of colonial expansion, of the relation of Europe which is white, to the world which is black and
brown and yellow? Bluntly put, that theory is this: It
is the duty of white Europe to divide up the darker world
and administer it for Europe’s good” (1995a, p. 459). Part of Du Bois’s critique of white supremacy reveals his reliance on racial
materialist arguments, where the other portion of his critique revolves around his own homegrown cultural nationalism, which was more often later in
his life, what I will term, a cultural internationalism that sought to accent and highlight commonalities and kinships amongst people of color
based on their endurances and experiences of, and struggles against European imperial expansion and all out white (cultural, social, political, legal,
educational, religious, aesthetic and economic) domination and discrimination. Du Bois ’s critical comments in “The Souls of White Folk” deserve
quotation at length, as his argument is elaborated throughout several carefully constructed paragraphs that poignantly capture the crux of his critique
of white supremacy: The
European world is using black and brown men for all the uses which men
know. Slowly but surely white culture is evolving the theory that “darkies” are born beasts of
burden for white folk. It were silly to think otherwise, cries the cultured world, with stronger and shriller accord. The supporting
arguments grow and twist themselves in the mouths of merchant, scientist, soldier, traveler, writer, and missionary: Darker peoples are
dark in mind as well as in body; of dark, uncertain, and imperfect descent; of frailer, cheaper
stuff; they are cowards in the face of mausers and maxims; they have no feelings, aspirations,
and loves; they are fools, illogical idiots—“half-devil and half-child.” Such as they are civilization must,
naturally, raise them, but soberly and in limited ways. They are not simply dark white men. They are not “men” in the sense that
Europeans are men. To the very limited extent of their shallow capacities lift them to be
useful to whites, to raise cotton, gather rubber, fetch ivory, dig diamonds—and let them be
paid what men think they are worth— white men who know them to be well-nigh worthless.
Such degrading of men by men is as old as mankind and the invention of no one race or people. Ever have men striven to conceive of their victims as
different from the victors, endlessly different, in soul and blood, strength and cunning, race and lineage. It has been left, however, to
Europe
and to modern days to discover the eternal world-wide mark of meanness—color! Such is the silent
revolution that has gripped modern European culture in the later nineteenth and twentieth centuries. Its zenith came in Boxer times: White supremacy
was all but world-wide, Africa was dead, India conquered, Japan isolated, and China prostrate, while white America whetted her sword for mongrel
Mexico and mulatto South America, lynching her own Negroes the while. (p. 460)
U.S. Hegemony causes other non-European nations to massively dispose of
their own people in order to gain access to First world respect through
nuclearism
Mathur, 2001 President, India Region, Nielsen India, India
(Piyush, "Nuclearism : The Contours of a Political Ecology," Social Text, 66 (Volume 19, Number
1), Spring 2001, pp.2 (Article)Duke University Press)
Accordingly, to situate nuclear technology requires considering the ways through which the
global hierarchies of military and economic power have come to create a larger cross-cultural
psychological environment that tacitly accepts the technology as the final arbitrator of power
and prestige. As countries attempt to respond to this global order by actively participating in
nuclearism, as India and Pakistan have done, they inescapably incur unprecedented costs to
the local populations and commit violence regionally. In other words, like most universals,
nuclearism is a costly and violent enterprise in regional terms, but it outclasses all other
universals both quantitatively and qualitatively. The material and psychological contingencies of
nuclearism have been powerful enough to generate an environment of their own across geographies, which I shall
refer to as nuclearism’s “political ecology.”
You can never relate to the life in the concentration camp without
experiencing that horror, it is the state of being outside of life and death.
Mbembe 03 research professor in history and politics at the University of the Witwatersrand,
in Johannesburg, South Africa
Achille, "Necropolitics," Public Culture 15(1): 11–40
In order to answer these questions, this essay draws on the concept of biopower and explores
its relation to notions of sovereignty (imperium) and the state of exception.3 Such an analysis
raises a number of empirical and philosophical questions would like to examine briefly. As is well
known, the concept of the state of exception has been often discussed in relation to Nazism,
totalitarianism, and the concentration/ extermination camps. The death camps in particular
have been interpreted variously as the central metaphor for sovereign and destructive
violence and as the ultimate sign of the absolute power of the negative. Says Hannah Arendt:
“There are no parallels to the life in the concentration camps. Its horror can never be fully
embraced by the imagination for the very reason that it stands outside of life and death.”4
Because its inhabitants are divested of political status and reduced to bare life, the camp is, for
Giorgio Agamben, “the place in which the most absolute conditio inhumana ever to appear on Earth was
realized.”5 In the political-juridical structure of the camp, he adds, the state of exception ceases to be a
temporal suspension of the state of law. According to Agamben, it acquires a permanent spatial
arrangement that remains continually outside the normal state of law.
The extraction and looting of natural resources by militias has led to the
ruthless attempts of controlling categories of people
Mbembe 03 research professor in history and politics at the University of the Witwatersrand,
in Johannesburg, South Africa
Achille, "Necropolitics," Public Culture 15(1): 11–40
Second, the controlled inflow and the fixing of movements of money around zones in which specific
resources are extracted has made possible the formation of enclave economies and has
shifted the old calculus between people and things. The concentration of activities connected
with the extraction of valuable resources around these enclaves has, in return, turned the
enclaves into privileged spaces of war and death. War itself is fed by increased sales of the
products extracted.68 New linkages have therefore emerged between war making, war
machines, and resource extraction.69 War machines are implicated in the constitution of
highly transnational local or regional economies. In most places, the collapse of formal
political institutions under the strain of violence tends to lead to the formation of militia
economies. War machines (in this case militias or rebel movements) rapidly become highly
organized mechanisms of predation, taxing the territories and the population they occupy and
drawing on a range of transnational networks and diasporas that provide both material and
financial support. Correlated to the new geography of resource extraction is the emergence of an
unprecedented form of governmentality that consists in the management of the multitudes. The
extraction and looting of natural resources by war machines goes hand in hand with brutal
attempts to immobilize and spatially fix whole categories of people or, paradoxically, to unleash
them, to force them to scatter over broad areas no longer contained by the boundaries of a
territorial state. As a political category, populations are then disaggregated into rebels, child
soldiers, victims or refugees, or civilians incapacitated by mutilation or simply massacred on
the model of ancient sacrifices, while the “survivors,” after a horrific. exodus, are con. ned in
camps and zones of exception.70
War is longer fought between states, it now targets unarmed civilian
populations whose death has no value
Mbembe 03 research professor in history and politics at the University of the Witwatersrand,
in Johannesburg, South Africa
Achille, "Necropolitics," Public Culture 15(1): 11–40
This form of governmentality is different from the colonial commandement.71 The techniques
of policing and discipline and the choice between obedience and simulation that characterized
the colonial and postcolonial potentate are gradually being replaced by an alternative that is
more tragic because more extreme. Technologies of destruction have become more tactile,
more anatomical and sensorial, in a context in which the choice is between life and death.72 If
power still depends on tight control over bodies (or on concentrating them in camps), the new
technologies of destruction are less concerned with inscribing bodies within disciplinary
apparatuses as inscribing them, when the time comes, within the order of the maximal economy
now represented by the “massacre.” In turn, the generalization of insecurity has deepened the
societal distinction between those who bear weapons and those who do not (loi de repartition
des armes). Increasingly, war is no longer waged between armies of two sovereign states. It is
waged by armed groups acting behind the mask of the state against armed groups that have
no state but control very distinct territories; both sides having as their main targets civilian
populations that are unarmed or organized into militias. In cases where armed dissidents have
not completely taken over state power, they have provoked territorial partitions and
succeeded in controlling entire regions that they administer on the model of . efdoms,
especially where there are mineral deposits.73 The ways of killing do not themselves vary
much. In the case of massacres in particular, lifeless bodies are quickly reduced to the status
of simple skeletons. Their morphology henceforth inscribes them in the register of undifferentiated
generality: simple relics of an unburied pain, empty, meaningless corporealities, strange deposits plunged
into cruel stupor. In the case of the Rwandan genocide— in which a number of skeletons were
at least preserved in a visible state,if not exhumed—what is striking is the tension between
the petrification of the bones and their strange coolness on one hand, and on the other, their
stubborn will to mean, to signify something. In these impassive bits of bone, there seems to
be no ataraxia: nothing but the illusory rejection of a death that has already occurred. In other
cases, in which physical amputation replaces immediate death, cutting off limbs opens the way to the
deployment of techniques of incision, ablation, and excision that also have bones as their target. The
traces of this demiurgic surgery persist for a long time, in the form of human shapes that are alive, to be
sure, but whose bodily integrity has been replaced by pieces, fragments, folds, even immense wounds
that are dif. cult to close. Their function is to keep before the eyes of the victim—and of the people
around him or her—the morbid spectacle of severing.
Racism is tied to a politics of death which is linked to the biodpolitical
extermination of sovereign power, racism instrumental rationality conflates the
distinction between war and politics
Mbembe 03 research professor in history and politics at the University of the Witwatersrand,
in Johannesburg, South Africa
Achille, "Necropolitics," Public Culture 15(1): 11–40
In Foucault’s formulation of it, biopower appears to function through dividing people into those who must
live and those who must die. Operating on the basis of a split between the living and the dead, such a
power defines itself in relation to a biological field—which it takes control of and vests itself in. This
control presupposes the distribution of human species into groups, the subdivision of the population into
subgroups, and the establishment of a biological caesura between the ones and the others. This is what
Foucault labels with the (at first sight familiar) term racism.17 That race (or for that matter racism)
figures so prominently in the calculus of biopower is entirely justifiable. After all, more so
than class-thinking (the ideology that defines history as an economic struggle of classes), race
has been the ever present shadow in Western political thought and practice, especially when
it comes to imagining the inhumanity of, or rule over, foreign peoples. Referring to both this
ever-presence and the phantomlike world of race in general, Arendt locates their roots in the
shattering experience of otherness and suggests that the politics of race is ultimately linked to the politics
of death.18 Indeed, in Foucault’s terms, racism is above all a technology aimed at permitting the
exercise of biopower, “that old sovereign right of death.”19 In the economy of biopower, the
function of racism is to regulate the distribution of death and to make possible the
murderous functions of the state. It is, he says, “the condition for the acceptability of putting to
death.”20 Foucault states clearly that the sovereign right to kill (droit de glaive) and the mechanisms of
biopower are inscribed in the way all modern states function;21 indeed, they can be seen as constitutive
elements of state power in modernity. According to Foucault, the Nazi state was the most
complete example of a state exercising the right to kill. This state, he claims, made the
management, protection, and cultivation of life coextensive with the sovereign right to kill.
By biological extrapolation on the theme of the political enemy, in organizing the war against its
adversaries and, at the same time, exposing its own citizens to war, the Nazi state is seen as having
opened the way for a formidable consolidation of the right to kill, which culminated in the project of the
“.Final solution.” In doing so, it became the archetype of a power formation that combined the
characteristics of the racist state, the murderous state, and the suicidal state.It has been argued that
the complete conflation of war and politics (and racism, homicide, and suicide), until they are
indistinguishable from one another, is unique to the Nazi state. The perception of the existence of
the Other as an attempt on my life, as a mortal threat or absolute danger whose biophysical elimination would
strengthen my potential to life and security—this, I suggest, is one of the many imaginaries of sovereignty
characteristic of both early and late modernity itself. Recognition of this perception to a large extent underpins
most traditional critiques of modernity, whether they are dealing with nihilism and its proclamation of the will
for power as the essence of the being; with reification understood as the becoming-objectof the human being;
or the subordination of everything to impersonal logic and to the reign of calculability and instrumental
rationality.22 Indeed, from an anthropological perspective, what these critiques implicitly contest is a definition
of politics as the warlike relation par excellence. They also challenge the idea that, of necessity, the
calculus of life passes through the death of the Other; or that sovereignty consists of the will
and the capacity to kill in order to live. Taking a historical perspective, a number of analysts
have argued that the material premises of Nazi extermination are to be found in colonial
imperialism on the one hand and, on the other, in the serialization of technical mechanisms
for putting people to death—mechanisms developed between the Industrial Revolution and
the First World War. According to Enzo Traverso, the gas chambers and the ovens were the
culmination of a long process of dehumanizing and industrializing death, one of the original
features of which was to integrate instrumental rationality with the productive and administrative rationality of
the modern Western world (the factory, the bureaucracy, the prison, the army). Having become mechanized,
serialized execution was transformed into a purely technical, impersonal, silent, and rapid procedure. This
development was aided in part by racist stereotypes and the flourishing of a class-based racism that, in
translating the social conflicts of the industrial world in racial terms, ended up comparing the working classes
and “stateless people” of the industrial world to the “savages” of the colonial world.23
Eugenics
Militarism and war create the conditions for promoting eugenics. World War I
example proves.
Turda 09 RCUK Academic Fellow in Biomedicine in the Department of History at Oxford
Brookes University (Marius, "The Biology of War," Austrian History Yearbook 40 (2009): 238–
264, pp. 240-241). Available at http://www.academia.edu/213512/
The_Biology_of_War_Eugenics_in_Hungary_1914_-1918.
World War I nurtured an extraordinary proliferation of eugenic arguments.10 Such a literature
had already emerged in the nineteenth century as a biologically informed response to social problems perceived as endemic to
industrialized societies. The prewar years had witnessed the ideological consolidation of eugenics and its positioning at the
intersection of various scientific disciplines, such as sociology and anthropology, and political ideologies, such as
racism and nationalism.11 Eugenics strived to address and solve a range of demographic and hereditary issues linked to the alleged
Eugenicists feared both the adverse consequences of
declining fertility rates and the equally detrimental effects of the increased number, visibility,
and fiscal costs of disabled individuals on society. The relentless exposition of these anxieties
during the war contributed to the growing prestige eugenics and its solutions to demographic
and social crises eventually enjoyed. Nonetheless, these eugenic arguments, relevant as they were for countries
deterioration of the nation’s biological condition.
afflicted by war, were often couched in a nationalist rhetoric about racial supremacy and survival. In addition to occasioning the
introduction of social and medical policies dealing with particular groups, eugenics generated a resurgence of nationalist concerns
about the deterioration of the nation’s racial qualities.
U.S. Eugenics Laws inspired Nazi Germany’s holocaust
Grimes, Fleischman and Jaeger, 2009 doctoral student in the College of Information
Studies and a Graduate Research Assistant for the Center for Information Policy and Electronic
Government at the University of Maryland; Assistant Professors in the College of Information
Studies and Assistant Director & Director of the Center for Information Policy and Electronic
Government at the University of Maryland (Justin M., Kenneth R., & Paul T., "Virtual Guinea
Pigs: Ethical implications of Human Subjects Research in Virtual Worlds." International Journal of
Internet Research Ethics Vol.2(1), February 2009, http://ijire.net/issue_2.1/grimes.pdf)
History has repeatedly demonstrated that horrible atrocities can occur without proper ethical
guidelines and enforcement. Using historical landmarks in human research, several parallels
between research involving humans and research involving avatars can be seen. While issues of
ethics and human research have been intertwined through the annals of history, the
fundamental developments on the ethics of human research are concentrated during the 20th
century. Much of the work towards a set of universal moral codes in terms of human medical
and behavioral research bore out of a series of infamous events, the most distressing being,
the eugenics movement in the United States, the Tuskegee Syphilis study, and the Nazi human
experiments during World War II. The eugenics movement, which began in the mid-nineteenth
century by English scientist Sir Francis Galton, was based on the idea that only genetically fit
individuals should have the right to reproduce, having been based very inaccurately on the
principles of evolution (Cowan, 1985; Gray, 1999). This idea led to a “scientific” movement
became very popular through the mid-twentieth century in many parts of the world, particularly
in the United States. Along with reinforcing the racism and sexism of the time, eugenics
became the inspiration for a wide array of laws mandating the compulsory
institutionalization, sterilization, or even extermination of persons with physical and mental
disabilities (Jaeger & Bowman, 2002; 2005). These laws in the U.S. inspired many other
nations—Britain, Canada, Australia, Denmark, Norway, and Sweden, among them—to pass
similar laws (Jaeger & Bowman, 2005). California’s eugenics laws were so draconian that their
text served as the basis of the laws of Nazi Germany used to justify the slaughter of hundreds
of thousands of persons with disabilities in Europe (Reilly, 1991). Ultimately, most eugenics
laws were permanently abandoned when the practices of Nazi Germany became known (Jaeger
& Bowman, 2005).
Even after it the establishment of the Nuremberg code in the 40s to prevent
medical atrocities from occurring worldwide the U.S. continued its heinous
Eugenic practices in Tuskegee up until the 1970s
Grimes, Fleischman and Jaeger, 2009 Grimes, Fleischman and Jaeger, 2009
doctoral student in the College of Information Studies and a Graduate Research Assistant for the
Center for Information Policy and Electronic Government at the University of Maryland;
Assistant Professors in the College of Information Studies and Assistant Director & Director of
the Center for Information Policy and Electronic Government at the University of Maryland
(Justin M. Grimes, Kenneth R. Fleischman, & Paul T. Jaeger, "Virtual Guinea Pigs: Ethical
implications of Human Subjects Research in Virtual Worlds." International Journal of Internet
Research Ethics Vol.2(1) February 2009, http://ijire.net/issue_2.1/grimes.pdf)
During World War II, the Nazi regime also committed a significant number of horrifying human
medical experiments on prisoners of war and concentration camp inmates (Proctor, 1988;
Weindling, 2005). These experiments included infecting non-voluntary 'participants' with
malaria, freezing them for frostbite research, performing pressurization experiments with
high altitudes, exposing their boides to various industrial materials, and introducing them to
various deathly gases, bacterium, viruses, and poisons (Spitz, 2005). These experiments were
often carried out in sadistic manner with no concern for scientific principles and the
participant's ultimate well being. Many survivors suffered severe pain and experienced
horrible deaths in large numbers, with little to negligible gain in the area of knowledge for
their unwilling sacrifices (Weindling, 2005). After the war, the Nazi doctors and officials who
carried out the experiments were tried before an international tribunal in Nuremberg,
Germany. While the doctors were found guilty and punished, there was a sense in the
international medical and scientific communities that proper rules of conduct should be
established to prevent such atrocities from reoccurring in the form of the Nuremberg Code
(Barnbaum & Byron, 2001). The Nuremberg Code consisted of ten ethical principles on
medical human experimentation, including requirements of voluntary and informed consent,
properly formulated scientific experimentation practices, and a lack of coercion and
deception. Informed consent is the concept that a participant understands the facts and
implications of a given situation. In the research context, informed consent is an important
ethical component, as informed consent gives the power to the participant and prevents
abuses from a lack of understanding. By giving the power of choice to the participant, this
eliminates most potential for participants to be used as a means to an end, which follows
deontological ethics, notably Kantianism. Informed consent has become an important staple
of ethical human research. The Tuskegee Syphilis experiment, which began in 1932 and
continued until 1970s, was a study were the participants were denied proper medical
treatment for Syphilis (Barnbaum & Byron, 2001). The study was particularly notorious as it
used and abused poor people who were uneducated or misinformed about their medical
conditions and who were overwhelmingly African American (Barnbaum & Byron, 2001).
Beyond that fact that patients were denied treatment, they were also intentionally deceived.
Crucial information about the study and the explanations of the researchers' activities were
withheld, which, if understood, would have affected the decision making process of the
participants, potentially leading to the unnecessary suffering and deaths of many of the
participants (Barnbaum & Byron, 2001).
Biopolitics
Ground Troops are Biopolitical
The forward deployment of troops represents our “objects in battle”.
John Morrissey 2011 (Department of Geography, National University of Ireland, Galway,
Ireland “Liberal Lawfare and Biopolitics: US Juridical Warfare in the War on Terror” Geopolitics,
16 p.284-285)
For CENTCOM Commander General David Petraeus, and the other five US regional commanders
across the globe, the ‘population’ of primary concern in their respective AORs is the US military
personnel deployed therein. For Petraeus and his fellow commanders, US ground troops
present perhaps less a collection of “juridical-political” subjects and more what Foucault calls
“technical-political” objects of “management and government”.25 In effect, they are tasked
with governing “spaces of security” in which “a series of uncertain elements” can unfold in
what Foucault terms the “milieu”.26 What is at stake in the ‘milieu’ is “the problem of
circulation and causality”, which must be anticipated and planned for in terms of “a series of
possible events” that need to “be regulated within a multivalent and transformable
framework”.27 And the “technical problem” posed by the eighteenth-century town planners
Foucault has in mind is precisely the same technical problem of space, population and
regulation that US military strategists and Judge Advocate General Corps (JAG) personnel have
in the twenty-first century. For US military JAGs, their endeavours to legally securitize the AORs
of their regional commanders are ultimately orientated to “fabricate, organize, and plan a
milieu” even before ground troops are deployed (as in the case of the first action in the war on
terror, which I return to later: the negotiation by CENTCOM JAGs of a Status of Forces
Agreement with Uzbekistan in early October 2001).28 JAGs play a key role in legally
conditioning the battlefield, in regulating the circulation of troops, in optimising their
operational capacities, and in sanctioning the privilege to kill. The JAG’s milieu is a “field of
intervention”, in other words, in which they are seeking to “affect, precisely, a population”.29
To this end, securing the aleatory or the uncertain is key. As Michael Dillon argues, central to the
securing of populations are the “sciences of the aleatory or the contingent” in which the
“government of population” is achieved by the sciences of “statistics and probability”.30 As he
points out elsewhere, you “cannot secure anything unless you know what it is”, and therefore
securitization demands that “people, territory, and things are transformed into epistemic
objects”.31 And in planning the milieu of US ground forces overseas, JAGs translate regional
AORs into legally enabled grids upon which US military operations take place. This is part of
the production of what Matt Hannah terms “mappable landscapes of expectation”;32 and to
this end, the aleatory is anticipated by planning for the ‘evental’ in the promissory language of
securitization. The ontology of the ‘event’ has recently garnered wide academic engagement.
Randy Martin, for example, has underlined the evental discursive underpinnings of US military
strategy in the war on terror; highlighting how the risk of future events results in ‘preemption’
being the tactic of their securitization.33 Naomi Klein has laid bare the powerful event-based
logic of ‘disaster capitalism’;34 while others have pointed out how an ascendant ‘logic of
premediation’, in which the future is already anticipated and “mediated”, is a marked feature of
the “post-9/11 cultural landscape”.35 But it was Foucault who first cited the import of the
‘evental’ in the realm of biopolitics. He points to the “anti-scarcity system” of seventeenthcentury Europe as an early exemplar of a new ‘evental’ biopolitics in which “an event that
could take place” is prevented before it “becomes a reality”.36 To this end, the figure of
‘population’ becomes both an ‘object’, “on which and towards which mechanisms are directed
in order to have a particular effect on it”, but also a ‘subject’, “called upon to conduct itself in
such and such a fashion”.37 Echoing Foucault, David Nally usefully argues that the emergence
of the “era of bio-power” was facilitated by “the ability of ‘government’ to seize, manage and
control individual bodies and whole populations”.38 And this is part of Michael Dillon’s
argument about the “very operational heart of the security dispositif of the biopolitics of
security”, which seeks to ‘strategize’, ‘secure’, ‘regulate’ and ‘manipulate’ the “circulation of
species life”.39 For the US military, it is exactly the circulation and regulation of life that is
central to its tactics of lawfare to juridically secure the necessary legal geographies and
biopolitics of its overseas ground presence.
Our ground forces are apart of a permanent manifestation of the militaryindustrial complex in the Middle east. This is merely apart of the hegemonic
strategy to securitize and dominate the rest of the world.
John Morrissey 2011 (Department of Geography, National University of Ireland, Galway,
Ireland “Liberal Lawfare and Biopolitics: US Juridical Warfare in the War on Terror” Geopolitics,
16 p.289-290)
The sheer extent of the current US military forward presence in the GCC/Persian Gulf region is
new in the American experience. For the first time, there now appears the contour of a
continuous US ground presence, which has been further facilitated by the ongoing Iraq War
and broader war on terror. And, of course, a host of US foreign policy strategists and security
experts have enthusiastically scripted the geostrategic and geoeconomic opportunities attained
under the rubric of the long war.57 Indeed, as Asli Bâli and Aziz Rana underline, both the
Republicans and Democrats “continue to take as given the centrality of pacification and global
omnipresence for the promotion of American interests, despite the extent to which the
experience of the last decade underscores the counter-productivity of these policies”.58
Today, as the long war continues unabated across the Middle East and Central Asia, the United
States holds an unprecedented number of bases and access facilities across the most energyrich region on earth. In Iraq, the US military has 45 major bases and well over 100 forward
operating bases in total; in Afghanistan, it utilises over a dozen major base and airfield facilities;
and, in addition, key bases and access facilities are maintained in Bahrain, Djibouti, Egypt,
Jordan, the Kyrgyz Republic, Oman, Pakistan, Qatar, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab
Emirates.59 It has become clear too that the Pentagon is intent on establishing at least 14
“enduring bases” as the spoils of the Iraq War;60 and there are various other ‘projects of
securitization’ being planned for that reveal the ‘long-term’ vision for a permanent US ground
presence across the Persian Gulf.61 For the ‘long war of securitization’, the Pentagon’s
contingency plans for maintaining and extending its global ground presence – what it calls
‘full-spectrum dominance’ – can be read as a stark warning that on the US military’s Zulu Time
the sun never sets. But all of its ‘land power’ must still be secured and capacitated by
extending the architecture and operation of the US military’s biopolitical power on the
ground. This is where biopolitics merges with geopolitics. The US military’s geostrategic
forward presence in the Persian Gulf and elsewhere becomes only fully realised when its
‘geopolitical operational capacity’ is paralleled by a ‘biopolitical operational capacity’ on the
ground. The latter must be enabled by a legal architecture allowing for, and governing, land
access, troop circulation and conduct. This is the “toxic combination of geopolitics and
biopolitics” that Michael Dillon has in mind when he observes the securitization practices of the
war on terror.62 For Dillon, the “geopolitics of security” revolve around the space of
“territory”, while the “biopolitics of security” revolve around the space of “population”, yet
both are indelibly intertwined.63 Dillon’s observation has been echoed by many. For Derek
Gregory, for example, “biopolitics is not pursued outside the domain of sovereign power but is
instead part of a protracted struggle over the right to claim, define and exercise sovereign
power”.64 Of course, it could be argued that geo-politics has always centrally involved biopolitics too and that any recent drawing out of the multiple overlaps between the two simply
reflects inadequate prior definitions of both classical and critical geopolitics.65 In any case,
what undoubtedly remains a challenge is the task of revealing and expounding how biopolitical
strategies “relate to broader scale issues such as geopolitics and national economic and political
policy, and vice versa”.66 It is this theorising of the complex relations between ‘micro’ and
‘macro’ scales of power that is key to Schlosser’s call to “avoid dualistic notions of bio-political
and sovereign power”.67
Solvency
Bleiker
Fiat
Policy + Discourse Key
Extend the Bleiker evidence from the 1st Affirmative.
Attempts to separate discourse from action are incoherent – policy change can
only take place when discursive dynamics are also changed through the slow
transformation of cultural values.
Bleiker 2000 [Roland, Prof of International Relations, Popular Dissent, Human Agency, and
Global Politics, p. 183-4]
While the previous chapter explained why great revolutionary events do not always uproot discursive systems of domination, the present chapter
discursive dynamics are among the driving forces behind great events. Both of these
heroic uprisings and mass demonstrations,
are much less influential in triggering social change than their spectacular appearance
suggests. The events that deserve our analytical attention are not the moments when overthrowers hurl statues into the mud. Key
historical events are more elusive, more inaudible in their appearance. They evolve around the slow
transformation of societal values. Foucault: An event, consequently, is not a decision, a treaty, a reign,
or a battle, but the reversal of a relationship of forces, the usurpation of power, the appropriation of a vocabulary
suggested that transversal
arguments entail that commonly perceived instances of popular dissent, such as
turned against those who once used it, a feeble domination that poisons itself as it grows lax, the entry of a masked ‘other’.20 In an attempt to
comprehend processes through which this ‘masked other’ precipitates social change, this chapter has supplemented Foucault’s approach to power with
Gramsci’s concept of hegemony. A discursive rereading of the East German case has served to illustrate the practical usefulness of this theoretical
fusion. From such a perspective, the
collapse of the Berlin Wall can be read as resulting from the slow and
transversal transformation of values that preceded the more overt and spectacular acts of
rebellion. Expressed in Gramscian terms, the resistance movement could only exert agency and establish a new and
stable order once the classes or social groups that conducted the revolutionary struggle enjoyed
widespread popular support. Without having first won this so-called ‘war of position’, and having
achieved hegemonic leadership within civil society, dissident voices will most likely be
silenced by the repressive state apparatus. While appreciating the discursive dimension of social change, it is important not to
separate civil society from spheres that lie beyond it. It is precisely in the fusion of the local and the global, in the spaces that lie between the domestic
and the international that some of the most important discursive dynamics take place. Influential technological and communicative innovations have
led to an increasing annihilation of space by time, to the blurring of conventional boundaries of sovereignty and identity. The fall of the Berlin Wall is a
case in point.
A2: State args
Our approach recognizes the importance of the state, but is not state centric –
agency transverses a multitude of actors and institutions, which makes it
essential for policy analysis to account for transversal discursive dissent
Bleiker 2000 [Roland, Prof of International Relations, Popular Dissent, Human Agency, and
Global Politics, p. 6-8]
At a time when processes of globalisation are unfolding and national boundaries are becoming increasingly porous, states can no longer
be viewed as the only consequential actors in world affairs. Various scholars have thus begun to question the
prevalent spatial modes of representation and the artificial separation of levels of analysis that issues from them. They suggest, as mentioned above,
that global life is better understood as a series of transversal struggles that increasingly challenge what Richard
Ashley called ‘the paradigm of sovereign man.’ Transversal struggles, Ashley emphasises, are not limited to established spheres of sovereignty. They are
neither domestic nor international. They know no final boundaries between inside and outside. 18 And they have
come to be increasingly recognised as central aspects of global politics. James Rosenau is among several scholars who now acknowledge that it is along
the shifting frontiers of transversal struggles, ‘and not through the nation state system that people sort and play out the many contradictions at work in
the global scene’.19 Once one accepts the centrality that transversal struggles play in today’s world it becomes impossible to differentiate between
political dynamics that take place in local, national or international spheres. It is the very transgressions of these spheres that drive and shape much of
global life today. And once one has accepted the presence of these transgressions and the ensuing spatial contingencies, then, Campbell stresses, the
levels of analysis problem is no more.20 If we are to gain an adequate understanding of contemporary dissent, and of global life in general, we must
look beyond the lines that have been arbitrarily drawn into the sand of international politics. We must think past the current framing of the levels of
analysis problem. It is the steady breeze, the gusty bursts of energy, the transversal forms of agency, that are gradually transforming the lines and
shapes of contemporary global life. Expressed in more prosaic words, a
multitude of actors, actions, spheres and issues
must be recognised and discussed as legitimate parts of international relations debates. Needless to say, there are countless forms
of dissent and agency that are operative within transversal struggles. Various authors have already identified the international in spheres hitherto
unseen, unappreciated and untheorised. Feminist scholars, for instance, have located women and their influence on the global economy in such spaces
as households, assembly lines, sweat shops, farms, secretariats, guerrilla wars and brothels that have sprung up around foreign military bases.21 To
expand the scope of international theory and to bring transversal struggles into focus is not to declare the state obsolete. States remain central actors
in international politics and they have to be recognised and theorised as such. In fact, my analysis will examine various ways in which states and the
boundaries between them have mediated the formation, functioning and impact of dissent. However, my
reading of dissent and
agency makes the state neither its main focus nor its starting point. There are compelling reasons for such a
strategy, and they go beyond a mere recognition that a state-centric approach to international theory engenders a form of
representation that privileges the authority of the state and thus precludes an adequate
understanding of the radical transformations that are currently unfolding in global life. Michael Shapiro is among an increasing
number of theorists who convincingly portray the state not only as an institution, but also, and primarily, as a set of
‘stories’ – of which the state-centric approach to international theory is a perfect example. It is part of a legitimisation process that highlights,
promotes and naturalises certain political practices and the territorial context within which they take place. Taken together, these stories
provide the state with a sense of identity, coherence and unity. They create boundaries
between an inside and an outside, between a people and its others. Shapiro stresses that such state-stories
also exclude, for they seek ‘to repress or delegitimise other stories and the practices of identity and space they reflect.’ And it is these processes of
exclusion that
impose a certain political order and provide the state with a legitimate rationale for
violent encounters.22 Transversal dissident practices can be seen as forms of thought and action that not only
transgress, but also challenge the political order which has developed around the assertion of
national sovereignty. They either question the arbitrariness of this division and its corresponding system of exclusion, or simply reveal how
inadequate it has become in a world that has undergone fundamental change since the state system emerged with the Peace of Westphalia in 1648.
Aff Solvency
Preventing Reintroduction of US Armed Forces into hostilities in
Afghanistan Key
We are killing the revolutionary potential of Afghani people. We need to stop
deploying foreign troops as a first step to ending murder, rape, and lack of
freedom.
Ian Sinclair and Mariam Rawi 2009 ( Ian is a journalist with Znet and Rawi is a member of
RAWA’s foreign relations committee, “Interview with the Revolutionary Association of the
Women of Afghanistan” April 29, 2009 http://www.zcommunications.org/interview-with-therevolutionary-association-of-the-women-of-afghanistan-by-ian-sinclair)
RAWA strongly believes that the withdrawal of foreign troops should be the first step,
because today, with the presence of thousands of foreign troops from many countries in
Afghanistan, the majority of our people are suffering from insecurity, killings, kidnapping,
unemployment, rape, acid throwing on schoolgirls, hunger, lawlessness, lack of freedom of
speech and many more awful disasters. Peace, security, democracy and independence can
only be achieved by our own people. It is our responsibility to become united as an alternative
against the occupation, to rise up, to resist and to organize our people. Right now our people
are sandwiched between three enemies. From one side we have the Taliban, from the other
side are the US air strikes, and from another side are the Northern Alliance warlords in
different provinces. With the troop withdrawal our people will at least get rid of one of these
enemies. The justice-loving people of the US and its democratic-minded allies should
continue to pressure their government to change its fundamentalists-fostering policy and
work for the disarmament of armed groups who are in the pay of the US. We think the peaceloving people around the world should support democratic-minded individuals and forces of
Afghanistan who are being suppressed and weakened by the US and its fundamentalist stooges.
Only the emergence of a powerful democratic movement can lead Afghanistan towards
independence and democracy. Afghan people are deeply fed up with their current conditions
and are on the verge of rising up against it. We have already seen protests and rising up of
people in the face of threats and terror in a number of provinces of Afghanistan. In the future
this wave will without a doubt gain momentum. With the emergence of a third front whose
slogan is "Neither Occupation Nor Taliban Freedom and Democracy," Afghans will rise up to get
their rights with their own power. This is a long and painful process, but the only option to
lead Afghanistan toward peace and prosperity.
AT: Positive Actions by US Armed Forces in Afghanistan
Preventing reintroduction of the Armed Forces is a key signal for ending US
imperialism
Ely 2 (Mike Ely, founder Kasama Project, Demand Complete and Immediate Withdrawal from
Afghanistan, 2002, http://revolutionaryfrontlines.wordpress.com/2010/03/26/demandcomplete-and-immediate-withdrawal-from-aghanistan/)
I think what is posed in Medea Benjamin’s interview is a rather simple and important question:
Can U.S. imperialism and its troops play a positive role in some circumstances? The U.S.
invades the remote and impoverished Afghanistan in 2001, topples the fragile regime of Taliban
theocrats (which never consolidated countrywide power in the civil war). And now it is argued
that the U.S. invaders “can’t” leave in an “irresponsible” way because the survival of a number
of people (including women’s activists) would be in danger and because their withdrawal would
most likely mean a return of the Taliban. Should we carefully evaluate U.S. aggressions on a
case-by-case basis? Is this U.S. military base good, and that one bad? Is this U.S. bombing
helpful, and that one excessive? Is this U.S. nuclear threat helpful, and that one unfair? Is this
U.S. drone doing good work, and that one intruding dangerously? Is this U.S. occupation
shielding and promoting positive forces — while that U.S. occupation cultivates more negative
puppets? Do we support U.S. domination until someone better comes along (who we approve
of) to take their place? Or does the U.S. military (globally and everywhere) represent a
coherent means of imposing and enforcing a particular global order on humanity generally —
an order that is rooted in horrific oppression and exploitation (including the widespread
commodification of women as both workers and sexual slaves, and the traditional domestic
servitude of literally billions of women and girls)? What we need is a clear uncompromising
unapologetic position: We must demand that U.S. imperialism leave Afghanistan immediately
and unconditionally — without finding ways to prop up residual collaborators and puppet
forces, without continuing to “provide air cover” for continuing war crimes. The Afghanistan
people need to be left to resolve their political affairs (and develop their own very difficult
struggle for liberation) without U.S. domination and violence. And because this is apparently
quite controversial (even on the left): We should deepen our own understanding that these
armed forces cannot and will not help the people in any part of the world. Are there other
reactionary forces in the world? Taliban? Al Qaida? Saddam Hussein? Islamic theocrats in Iran?
Somali warlords? French colonial troops? Genocidal Israeli settlers and commanders? Turkish
military commandos? Russian death squads in Chechnia? Catholic priests and bishops doing
their secret crimes against humanity? And so on. Of course. There are many other reactionary
forces in the world. Some of them are U.S. allies. Some of them have sharp contradictions with
U.S. imperialism. Some of them flip back and forth. But U.S. occupation of Afghanistan (or Iraq)
is itself a means of strengthening the world’s most odious and oppressive force. And the impact
of a successful pro-U.S. pacification of Afghanistan cannot just be measured in terms of how it
impacts people or sections of the people in Afghanistan. A victory for the U.S. in Afghanistan or
stabilization of pro-U.S. arrangements in Afghanistan will be a major negative influence on the
dynamics of the world as a whole. This is true, objectively. And pointing out this truth is
especially important within the U.S. itself — where illusions about the U.S. role in the world are
especially strong (even on the left). Far too many people delude themselves that there can be a
“more democratic U.S. foreign policy” that “helps” people. No, we have a special
responsibility to fight the criminal actions of “our” government — and to expose its nature.
Our goal is not to “more effectively” serve “U.S. national interests.” We do not seek to “improve
the U.S. image around the world.” We are not worried that “the wrong policies will get even
more people to oppose U.S. initiatives.” We do not want to “preserve and promote the
American way of life.” We don’t want to figure out some “people’s foreign policy” or some
way for the fucking Marines to “play a good role.” We don’t want a “more accountable CIA.”
No. We want to bring down U.S. imperialism from without and from within. Not only must we
demand that the U.S. withdraw immediately and without delay from its many overt and
covert wars — but we must put forward a larger vision that the dismantling of all the vicious
U.S. armed instruments of power is in the historic interests of humanity. That means the
systematic and unilateral destruction of its nuclear arsenals, the disbanding of its armed forces,
the abolition of its CIA, the public revelation of its crimes, the dismantling of its global military
bases, listening posts and secret torture prisons, the destruction of its schools for coups and
torture like the SOA, the scuttling of its imperial fleet and more.) We should proclaim this
publicly — knowing full well that these are not demands that the U.S. government would ever
agree to, but they are a much needed program that only the people can carry out through
historic actions. The U.S. government, its military and spy forces, are a central prop of global
capitalism at this stage in world history. And any confusion about this, any daydreaming that
“maybe they can do some good,” needs to be explored and engaged.
S – Our Feminist Critique is K2 PM
As long as we hold onto the policymaking assumptions built upon gendered
power relations, the status quo will continue and error replication is inevitable.
Our critical feminist analysis of security and military discourses is a precursor to
effective political action – we must choose a critical consciousness that seeks to
fully deactivate the embedded policy tools used to perpetuate patriarchy.
Bensimon and Marshall 3 [Estela, professor at the University of Southern California, and
Catherine, professor at the University of North Carolina, “Like It Or Not Feminist Critical Policy
Analysis Matters”, The Journal of Higher Education, 74(3)]
Earlier we said that the master's preoccupation is how to absorb feminism into policy analysis.
In contrast, the feminist preoccupation is the inverse, "How to make policy analysis
accountable to critical feminism." 4 The difference between the feminist and the master is that
they are motivated by different interests. The master's interest is to maintain [End Page 345]
policies and practices intact. For example, Anderson applauds "the number of academic texts
that claim feminism as a subject heading" (p. 5), but who is reading them? Is feminist critical
policy analysis a topic in the policy analysis canon of public administration, higher education,
and policy analysis and planning curricula? Do governments ask for studies, and do university
presidents pay big bucks to bring in feminist critical policy consultants? Do even the readers of
this higher education journal feel compelled to get "up to speed" on such tools and
perspectives? When the answers are yeses, policy analysis can assist institutional change. Then,
any well-trained and credible policy analyst will know to: Recognize that past policies
constructed in arenas where the discourse was conducted without feminist critique are flawed
and conduct policy archeology (Scheurich, 1994) to search how and by whom policies were
framed as they were, thus facilitating re-framing; Re-construct policy arenas and discourses,
knowing the need to engage and even champion the needs and voices of people heretofore
excluded, or included in token ways; Include feminist questions as they scrutinize decision
premises, language, and labels while constantly asking, "what do feminisms tell me to critique?"
Employ alternative methodologies (e.g., narrative and oral history) to uncover the intricacies of
meaning systems in individual and collective stories both to expose the emotional and personal
results of exclusions but also to create alternative visions that transcend boundaries "to shape
the formation of culturally appropriate social and educational policy" (Gonzalez, 1998, p. 99);
Search for the historically created and embedded traditions, social regularities, and practices
that inhibit women's access, comfort, and success; Take an advocacy stance, knowing that policy
analysts are change agents, carriers of insurrectionist strategies and subjugated knowledges
that will be subjected to discourses of derision by powerful forces benefiting from the status
quo. Anderson worries that policy analysis is a tool of managers, planners, and leaders and is
not always seen as an academic discipline. As a result, she believes policy analysts must serve
those leaders, must take as given the questions as framed for them. But taking such a servant
position is exactly why policy analysis gets no respect. And deeper feminist questions will never
come up if we accept Anderson's recommendation that [End Page 346] we recommend step-bystep change. Quoting Anderson, who quotes Gill and Saunders, "Policy analysis in higher
education requires an understanding of the higher education environment" (p. 16), we say "of
course!" But instead of then concluding, as she does, that we must tread carefully in that
environment, we assert that the policy questions must mount major challenges to that very
environment! We are not seeking policy recommendations of the "add women and stir" ilk,
nor are we seeking simplistic affirmative action. We want policy analyses that rearrange
gendered power relations, not ones that simply create our inclusion in institutions that have
not been rearranged. We advocate policy analysis that creates a new discourse about
gender—one that can facilitate transformation of the academy and "envision what is not yet"
(Wallace, 2002). In sum, in our chapter laying out the need for feminist critical policy analysis,
we are, indeed, building upon academic traditions, traditions of critique and debate, and now
we continue using these master's tools. However, we place our work in power and politics
feminisms to show that playing only the master's tools games will leave us spinning our
wheels, playing a game that was structured for white males and that has culturally embedded
tools for keeping it, basically, that way. Until the questions are asked differently, until we
construct policy analyses with overt intentions to create gender consciousness, to expose the
limits of gender-neutral practices, to expose the asymmetric gender power relations, certain
women will not be welcome in academia. And, finally, no, Anderson and readers should not
fear that we want to "invert the old logic of the academic hierarchy and exclude men" (p. 19).
However, we are saying that until we use our feminist theory and language of critique as
grounding to command forceful critique of continuing cultural exclusions, the only women who
will be comfortable in academia are those who expend some of their workplace energies to be
pleasing (as women) to men. Anderson wants us to "hold the attention of those [who] are
already predisposed to turn the other way when the word feminism enters the conversation" (p.
24). Sure, that is called strategic feminism and recognizes that feminists are challengers from the
fringes, trying to get the hegemonic center to listen.
S – Prez War Powers Key
Curtailing presidential war power is necessary check against militarism
Andrew J. Bacevich 13 Jr. (born 1947) is an American political scientist specializing in
international relations, security studies, American foreign policy, and American diplomatic and
military history. He is currently Professor of International Relations and History at Boston
University.[1] He is also a retired career officer in the United States Army. He is a former director
of Boston University's Center for International Relations (from 1998 to 2005) and author of
several books, including American Empire: The Realities and Consequences of US Diplomacy
(2002), The New American Militarism: How Americans are Seduced by War (2005) and The
Limits of Power: The End of American Exceptionalism (2008). He has also appeared on television
shows such as The Colbert Report and the Bill Moyers Report and has written op-eds which have
appeared in papers such as The New York Times, Washington Post, Wall Street Journal, Boston
Globe, Los Angeles Times, and Financial Times. He is also a member of the Council on Foreign
Relations. “The new American militarism: how Americans are seduced by war,” 2013, Oxford
University Press, DOA: 8-1-13, y2k
Several decades after Vietnam, in the aftermath of a century filled to overflowing with
evidence pointing to the limited utility of armed force and the dangers inherent in relying
excessively on military power , the American people have persuaded themselves that their best
prospect for safety and salvation lies with the sword. Told that despite all of their past martial
exertions, treasure expended, and lives sacrificed, the world they inhabit is today more
dangerous than ever and that they must redouble those exertions, they dutifully assent. Much
as dumping raw sewage into American lakes and streams was once deemed unremarkable, so
today global power projection, a phrase whose sharp edges we have worn down through
casual use, but which implies military activism without apparent limit has become standard
practice, a normal condition , one to which no plausible alternatives seem to exist. All of this
Americans have come to take for granted: it’s who we are and what we do. Such a definition of
normalcy cries out for a close and critical reexamination. Surely, the surprises, disappointments,
painful losses, and woeful, even shameful failures of the Iraq War make clear the need to
rethink the fundamentals of U.S. military policy . Yet a meaningful reexamination will require
first a change of consciousness, seeing war and America’s relationship to war in a
fundamentally different way. Of course, dissenting views already exist. A rich tradition of
American pacifism abhors the resort to violence as always and in every case wrong. Advocates
of disarmament argue that by their very existence weapons are an incitement to violence. In the
former camp, there can never be a justification for war. In the latter camp, the shortest road to
peace begins with the beating of swords into ploughshares. These are principled views that
deserve a hearing, more so today than ever. By discomfiting the majority, advocates of such
views serve the common good. But to make full-fledged pacifism or comprehensive
disarmament the basis for policy in an intrinsically disordered world would be to open the
United States to grave danger . The critique proposed here offering not a panacea but the
prospect of causing present-day militaristic tendencies to abate.rests on ten fundamental
principles. First , heed the intentions of the Founders , thereby restoring the basic precepts that
animated the creation of the United States and are specified in the Constitution that the
Framers drafted in 1787 and presented for consideration to the several states. Although
politicians make a pretense of revering that document, when it comes to military policy they
have long since fallen into the habit of treating it like a dead letter . This is unfortunate.
Drafted by men who appreciated the need for military power while also maintaining a healthy
respect for the dangers that it posed, the Constitution in our own day remains an essential point
of reference. Nothing in that compact, as originally ratified or as subsequently amended,
commits or even encourages the U nited S tates to employ military power to save the rest of
humankind or remake the world in its own image nor even hints at any such purpose or
obligation. To the contrary, the Preamble of the Constitution expressly situates military power
at the center of the brief litany of purpose enumerating the collective aspirations of we the
people. It was to form a more perfect union, establish justice, insure domestic tranquility,
provide for the common defense, promote the general welfare, and secure the blessings of
liberty to ourselves and our posterity that they acted in promulgating what remains the
fundamental law of the land. Whether considering George H. W. Bush1992 incursion into
Somalia, Bill Clinton1999 war for Kosovo, or George W. Bush2003 crusade to overthrow Saddam
Hussein, the growing U.S. predilection for military intervention in recent years has so mangled
the concept of common defense as to make it all but unrecognizable. The beginning of
wisdom and a major first step in repealing the new American militarism lies in making the
foundational statement of intent contained in the Preamble once again the basis of actual
policy . Only if citizens remind themselves and remind those exercising political authority why
this nation exists will it be possible to restore the proper relationship between military power
and that purpose, which centers not on global dominance but on enabling Americans to enjoy
the blessings of liberty. Such a restoration is long overdue. For over a century, since the closing
of the frontier, but with renewed insistence following the end of the Cold War, American
statesmen have labored under the misconception that securing the well-being of the United
States requires expanding its reach and influence abroad. From the invasion of Cuba in 1898 to
the invasion of Iraq in 2003 , policymakers have acted as if having an ever larger perimeter to
defend will make us safer or taking on burdens and obligations at ever greater distances from
our shores will further enhance our freedoms . 3 In fact, apart from the singular exception of
World War II, something like the opposite has been the case. Such a restoration is long overdue.
For over a century, since the closing of the frontier, but with renewed insistence following the
end of the Cold War, American statesmen have labored under the misconception that securing
the well-being of the United States requires expanding its reach and influence abroad. From the
invasion of Cuba in 1898 to the invasion of Iraq in 2003 , policymakers have acted as if having an
ever larger perimeter to defend will make us safer or taking on burdens and obligations at ever
greater distances from our shores will further enhance our freedoms. 3 In fact, apart from the
singular exception of World War II, something like the opposite has been the case. The remedy
to this violation of the spirit of the Constitution lies in the Constitution itself and in the need
to revitalize the concept of separation of powers . Here is the second principle with the
potential to reduce the hazards by the new American militarism . In all but a very few cases,
the impetus for expanding Americas security perimeter has come from the executive branch . In
practice, presidents in consultation with a small circle of advisers decide on the use of force;
the legislative branch then either meekly bows to the wishes of the executive or provides the
sort of broad authorization (such as the Tonkin Gulf Resolution of 1964 ) that amounts in effect
to an abrogation of direct responsibility. The result , especially in evidence since the end of
World War II, has been to eviscerate Article I, Section 8 , Clause 11 of the Constitution, which
in the plainest of language confers on the Congress the power To declare War. The problem is
not that the presidency has become too strong. Rather, the problem is that the Congress has
failed.indeed, failed egregiously.to fulfill its constitutional responsibility for deciding when and
if the United States should undertake military interventions abroad. Hiding behind an ostensible
obligation to support our commander-in-chief or to support the troops, the Congress has
time and again shirked its duty. An essential step toward curbing the new American militarism is to
redress this imbalance in war powers and to call upon the Congress to reclaim its constitutionally
mandated prerogatives. Indeed, legislators should insist upon a strict constructionist definition of war
such that any use of force other than in direct and immediate defense of the United States should
require prior congressional approval.
S – Congress
Congress can stop the president from sending armed forces by cutting funds
and burying him under paperwork.
Howell and Pevehouse 2005 (William G. Howell and Jon C. Pevehouse “Presidents,
Congress, and the Use of Force” International Organization, Vol. 59, No. 1 Winter, 2005 p 213)
Dismantling the President's Military Venture. Congress can actively work against the president,
materially affecting the course of a military campaign. It can refuse to appropriate needed
funds, call for the return of troops sent on ill-conceived foreign missions, or raise concerns
about the efficacy of an intervention. Grimmett has documented numerous instances since
1970 when Congress cut off military funding to compel the withdrawal of forces, typically
using the appropriations powers to restrict military operations.22 In their study of the War
Powers Resolution, Auerswald and Cowhey show that Congress regularly places obligations on
presidents (reporting requirements, budgetary limitations) that can prove burdensome.23
Having to stave off a mobilized opposition party within Congress during the course of a
military campaign may dissuade presidents from initiating force at all.
S – Constitutional Check Key
Militarization of presidency now---constitutional check is key
Andrew J. Bacevich 13 Jr. (born 1947) is an American political scientist specializing in
international relations, security studies, American foreign policy, and American diplomatic and
military history. He is currently Professor of International Relations and History at Boston
University.[1] He is also a retired career officer in the United States Army. He is a former director
of Boston University's Center for International Relations (from 1998 to 2005) and author of
several books, including American Empire: The Realities and Consequences of US Diplomacy
(2002), The New American Militarism: How Americans are Seduced by War (2005) and The
Limits of Power: The End of American Exceptionalism (2008). He has also appeared on television
shows such as The Colbert Report and the Bill Moyers Report and has written op-eds which have
appeared in papers such as The New York Times, Washington Post, Wall Street Journal, Boston
Globe, Los Angeles Times, and Financial Times. He is also a member of the Council on Foreign
Relations. “The new American militarism: how Americans are seduced by war,” 2013, Oxford
University Press, DOA: 8-1-13, y2k
Rendering this civil-military relationship even more problematic is the ongoing process of militarizing
the presidency itself. The framers of the Constitution designated the president as commander-inchief as a means of asserting unambiguous civilian control. Their clear expectation and intent was that the chief
executive would be in all respects a civilian . This point was not lost even on generals elected to the office: upon becoming president, for
example, George Washington, Ulysses S. Grant, and Dwight D. Eisenhower each went out of his way to set aside his prior soldierly identity. Since the day that Michael Dukakis
it has been a political truism that any would-be president
must at least be able, when called upon, to strike a soldierly pose . In recent years, however, serving presidents have
took his ill-advised ride in an M 1 Abrams tank, if not before,
gone further, finding it politically expedient to blur the hitherto civilian character of their office.
Astute political operatives have learned that when it comes to concealing embarrassing blemishes,
outfitting a president in battle dress may be even more effective than wrapping him in the flag . In the
theater of national politics, Americans have come to accept the propriety of using neatly
turned out soldiers and sailors as extras, especially useful in creating the right background for presidential photo ops. 55 Of late, they have
also become accustomed to their president donning military garb, usually a fighter jocks' nappy leather jacket when visiting the troops or huddling with his advisers at Camp
David. More recently still, this has culminated in George W. Bush styling himself as the nation-first full-fledged warrior-president. The staging of Bush's victory lap shortly after
the conquest of Baghdad in the spring of 2003 .the dramatic landing on the carrier USS Abraham Lincoln, with the president decked out in the full regalia of a naval aviator
emerging from the cockpit to bask in the adulation of the crew was lifted directly from the triumphant final scenes of the movie Top Gun, with the boyish George Bush standing
in for the boyish Tom Cruise. For this nationally televised moment, Bush was not simply mingling with the troops; he had merged his identity with their own and made himself
one of them--the president as warlord. In short order, the marketplace ratified this effort; a toy manufacturer offered for $ 39 .99 a Bush look-alike military action figure
advertised as Elite Force Aviator: George W. Bush: U.S. President and Naval Aviator.56 Inevitably, given the nature of American politics, the partisan advantage that President
Bush derived from portraying himself as a warrior-leader induced a partisan reaction. As the 2004 presidential campaign heated up, Democrats scrutinized Bush's military bona
fides and claimed to find his duty performance as a Vietnam-era reservist to be sketchy at best. The more extreme critics asserted that Bush had been AWOL--absent without
leave. They contrasted this with the heroics of the Democratic candidate, Massachusetts Senator John Kerry, who had been wounded and decorated for valor for his Vietnam
service. Thirty years after the fact, Kerry was still milking his membership in the brotherhood of warriors for all of the political benefit that it was worth and, indeed, presented
himself to the nation as his party's presidential nominee with a smart salute and the announcement that he was reporting for duty. Thus did the 2004 presidential election turn,
at least in part, around questions of military service in a war three decades past.
S – Openness to other traditions K2 political responsibility
For any political engagement to occur, we just accept that Western/secular
reason may object valuable subversions – openness to nonliberal traditions is
intrinsic to politically responsible practice
Mahmood 02 [Saba: professor of anthropology at UC Berkeley “Feminist Theory,
Embodiment, and the Docile Agent: Some Reflections on the Egyptian Islamic Revival” Cultural
Anthropology p. 225]
My argument simply is that in order for us to be able to judge, in a morally and politically informed
way, even those practices we consider objectionable, it is important to take into consideration
the desires, motivations, commitments, and aspirations of the people to whom these
practices are important. Thus, in order to explore the kinds of injury specific to women located in
particular historical and cultural situations, it is not enough simply to point, for example, that a
tradition of female piety or modesty serves to give legitimacy to women’s subordination.
Rather it is only by exploring these traditions in relation to the practical engagements and
forms of life in which they are embedded that we can come to understand the significance of
that subordination to the women who embody it. This is not simply an analytical point, but reflects, I
would contend, a political imperative born out of the realization that we can no longer presume
that secular reason and morality exhaust the forms of valuable human flourishings. In other
words, a particular openness to exploring nonliberal traditions is intrinsic to a politically
responsible scholarly practice, a practice that departs not from a position of certainty but one
of risk, critical engagement, and a willingness to reevaluate one’s own views in light of the
Other’s. In other words, this is an invitation to embark on an inquiry in which the analyst does not
assume that the political positions she upholds will necessarily be vindicated, or provide the
ground for her theoretical analysis. Instead, it is to hold open the possibility that one may come to ask of
politics a whole series of questions that seemed settled when one embarked on an inquiry.
S Subtle Activism
Don’t let the subtle nature of womyn’s activism fool you – condemning existing
initiatives only silences their symbolic and transgressive potential – the subtle
acts are the best way to navigate patriarchal systems, comparisons to other
regions only destroy local hegemonic power
Skalli 06 [Loubna H.: assistant professor of International Development at American University,
Fullbright Scholar, PhD mass comm Penn State, MA cross-cultural studies Essex U
“Communicating Gender in the Public Sphere: Women and Information Technologies in the
MENA” Journal of Middle East Women’s Studies, Volume 2, Number 2, Spring, Indiana University
Press, p. 53].
It is easy to be skeptical about the portent of women’s uses of communication within an environment that weakens
women’s legal position and marginalizes their political and economic participation. It is also easy to dismiss the
implications of women’s communication strategies when access to technology is largely still an urban and elite
phenomenon marked by class differences. However, the subtle nature of women’s activism and the
fairly limited scope of interventions should not urge us to condemn existing initiatives to
silence or invisibility nor minimize their symbolic and/or real transgressive acts. The impact of
women’s interventions and initiatives are often more subtle and symbolic than openly radical
or revolutionary—this is precisely how women activists bargain with structures of patriarchy in
the MENA. Attempts to measure women’s interventions by standards of achievement in regions
with different politico-economic and sociocultural realities are simply counterproductive.
Hasty comparisons risk condemning women’s creative efforts to double marginality:
overlooked by the local hegemonic structures of power, they are condemned to invisibility by
unrealistic comparative measures
S Different Conception of Agency
A conception of agency that is understood as the capacity to realize one’s own
interests against the weight of custom, tradition, transcendental will, or
obstacles allows for Middle Eastern womyn to subvert dominant hegemonies
Mahmood 02 [Saba: professor of anthropology at UC Berkeley “Feminist Theory,
Embodiment, and the Docile Agent: Some Reflections on the Egyptian Islamic Revival” Cultural
Anthropology p. 206]
The ethnographic richness of this study notwithstanding, for the purposes of my argument, what is most relevant is the degree to which the
female agent in this analysis seems to stand in for a sometimes repressed, sometimes active
feminist consciousness, articulated against the hegemonic male cultural norms of Arab
Muslim societies.15 Even in instances when an explicit feminist agency is difficult to locate,
there is a tendency to look for expressions and moments of resistance that may suggest a
challenge to male domination. When women’s actions seem to reinscribe what appear to be
“instruments of their own oppression,” the social analyst can point to moments of disruption
of, and articulation of points of opposition to, male authority that are either located in the
interstices of a woman’s consciousness (often read as a nascent feminist consciousness), or in the
objective effects of the women’s actions, however unintended they may be. Agency, in this form of analysis, is understood as the
capacity to realize one’s own interests against the weight of custom, tradition, transcendental
will, or other obstacles (whether individual or collective). Thus the humanist desire for autonomy and self-expression
constitute the substrate, the slumbering ember that can spark to flame in the form of an act of
resistance when conditions permit.16
S – Agency Conceptions
The processes and conditions that secure subordination are also the means one
gains agency
Mahmood 02 [Saba: professor of anthropology at UC Berkeley “Feminist Theory,
Embodiment, and the Docile Agent: Some Reflections on the Egyptian Islamic Revival” Cultural
Anthropology p. 210]
In trying to move beyond the teleology of emancipation underwriting many accounts of women’s agency, I have
found insights offered by poststructuralist theorists into power and the constitution of the subject useful in analyzing
the women’s mosque movement. Germane to this formulation is the reconceptualization of power as
a set of relations that do not simply dominate the subject, but also, importantly, form the
conditions of its possibility. In following Foucault, feminist theorist Judith Butler calls this the paradox
of subjectivation, insomuch as the very processes and conditions that secure a subject’s
subordination are also the means by which she becomes a self-conscious identity and agent
(Butler 1997b; Foucault 1980, 1983). Stated otherwise, one may argue that the set of capacities
inhering in a subject—the abilities that define its modes of agency—are not the residue of an
undominated self that existed prior to the operations of power but are themselves the
product of those operations. Such a conceptualization of power and subject formation also
encourages us to understand agency not simply as a synonym for resistance to relations of
domination, but as a capacity for action that specific relations of subordination create and
enable. In order to clarify this point, we might consider the example of a virtuoso pianist who submits herself to the,
at times painful, regime of disciplinary practice, as well as hierarchical structures of apprenticeship, in order to
acquire the ability—the requisite agency—to play the instrument with mastery. Importantly, her agency is
predicated on her ability to be taught, a condition classically referred to as docility. Although
we have come to associate docility with abandonment of agency, the term literally implies the
malleability required of someone to be instructed in a particular skill or knowledge—a
meaning that carries less a sense of passivity and more that of struggle, effort, exertion, and
achievement.30 Such a way of thinking about agency draws our attention to the practical ways in which
individuals work on themselves to become the willing subjects of a particular discourse. Importantly, to
understand agency in this manner is neither to invoke a self-constituting autonomous subject
nor subjectivity as a private space of cultivation. Rather, it draws our attention to the specific
ways in which one performs a certain number of operations on one’s thoughts, body, conduct,
and ways of being, in order to “attain a certain kind of state of happiness, purity, wisdom,
perfection, or immortality” (Foucault 1997:24) in accord with a particular discursive tradition.31
S Context of Subversion/Agency Key
Context of subordination is key – a priori claims of “change” should be rejected,
passivity and docility in a progressive sense may be a form of agency in
another.
Mahmood 02 [Saba: professor of anthropology at UC Berkeley “Feminist Theory,
Embodiment, and the Docile Agent: Some Reflections on the Egyptian Islamic Revival” Cultural
Anthropology p. 212]
Simply put my point is this: if the ability to effect change in the world and in oneself is
historically and culturally specific (both in terms of what constitutes “change” and the
capacity by which it is effected), then its meaning and sense cannot be fixed a priori, but
allowed to emerge through an analysis of the particular networks of concepts that enable
specific modes of being, responsibility, and effectivity. Viewed in this way, what may appear to
be a case of deplorable passivity and docility from a progressivist point of view, may very well
be a form of agency—one that must be understood in the context of the discourses and
structures of subordination that create the conditions of its enactment. In this sense, agentival
capacity is entailed not only in those acts that result in (progressive) change but also those
that aim toward continuity, stasis, and stability (see my discussion of the virtue of pabr below).
Framework
Role of the Ballot – Break the Silence
We just break the silence in security discourses that have resulted from the war
on terror and perpetuated the domination of women – that’s key to
reconceptualizing politics and our entire security regime.
Stabile and Rentschler 5 [Carol: Associate Professor in the Department of Journalism and
Mass Communication at the University of Wisconsin–Milwaukee, and Carrie, Assistant Professor
of Communication Studies in the Department of Art History and Communication Studies at
McGill University, “States of Insecurity and the Gendered Politics of Fear”, Feminist Formations,
17(3)]
Feminists need to work together to undo the silences in the discourses of security that have
followed from the war on terror—the media’s, as well as our own. Like the women of
Greenham Common, who for nineteen years occupied that space in protest of the North Atlantic
Treaty Organization’s decision to site cruise missiles there, we need to make noise about issues
of security that matter to more than a handful of the world’s elites.3 We need to speak back to
all our would-be protectors and to pay attention to the silences in narratives about security. We
need to demand discussion of competing discourses about security and to listen across the
boundaries of class, race, ethnicity, sexual orientation, ability, age, and national origin to
understand the limits of individual and individualized constructions of fear, threats, and
security. Those of us who enjoy more privilege and comparative security urgently need to
mobilize against the militarized futures currently on sale. Feminists need to continue to fight
over the meanings of security being foisted upon us and to work to appropriate the word
security for feminist purposes and a feminist political agenda. Working within a discipline itself
born out of political resistance to androcentrism, women’s studies teachers, students, and
supporters have a unique and urgent responsibility to respond to the states of insecurity being
created by an arrogant and androcentric militarized culture. No single volume can even begin
to address the complicated web of issues that converge around gender, security, and fear, and
research cannot substitute for political action. Our hope for this volume is that in some modest
way it can provide a starting point for the conversations, conferences, research projects, and
direct action projects that we need to begin having in collective, collaborative, and everlouder ways. In the midst of this growing political and economic gloom, we can find hope and
sustenance for the struggles ahead in the courage, energy, creativity, and dedication of all
those women fighting against the states of insecurity being thrust upon us. As Rachel Corrie
said shortly before her death, “I look forward to increasing numbers of middle-class privileged
people like you and me becoming aware of the structures that support our privilege and
beginning to support the work of those who aren’t privileged to dismantle those structures”
(2003). Together, we need to find ways to make a whole symphony of women’s voices heard
above the din of militarism, aggression, and androcentric self-interest.
Epistemology
Be skeptical of their knowledge-production
Andrew J. Bacevich 13 Jr. (born 1947) is an American political scientist specializing in
international relations, security studies, American foreign policy, and American diplomatic and
military history. He is currently Professor of International Relations and History at Boston
University.[1] He is also a retired career officer in the United States Army. He is a former director
of Boston University's Center for International Relations (from 1998 to 2005) and author of
several books, including American Empire: The Realities and Consequences of US Diplomacy
(2002), The New American Militarism: How Americans are Seduced by War (2005) and The
Limits of Power: The End of American Exceptionalism (2008). He has also appeared on television
shows such as The Colbert Report and the Bill Moyers Report and has written op-eds which have
appeared in papers such as The New York Times, Washington Post, Wall Street Journal, Boston
Globe, Los Angeles Times, and Financial Times. He is also a member of the Council on Foreign
Relations. “The new American militarism: how Americans are seduced by war,” 2013, Oxford
University Press, DOA: 8-1-13, y2k
Contrast this with earlier turning points in U.S. military history. When the U nited S tates in 1917 plunged into the European
war, Senator Robert M. La Follette, a stalwart progressive from Wisconsin, warned Americans that under a pretext of
carrying democracy to the rest of the world,
Woodrow
Wilson was actually
doing
more to undermine and
destroy democracy in the U nited S tates than it will be possible for us as a Nation to repair in a generation.
10 Two decades later, as
Franklin Roosevelt maneuvered the country toward a second world war, Senator Robert A. Taft, stalwart conservative from Ohio, testified eloquently to
the results likely to follow. If the United States took it upon itself to protect the smaller countries of the Old World, he said in a speech on May 17 ,
1941 , we will have to maintain a police force perpetually in Germany and throughout Europe. As Taft saw it, this was not Americaproper role.
Frankly, the American people don’t want to rule the world, he said, and we are not equipped to do it. Such imperialism is wholly foreign to
our ideals of democracy and freedom. It is not our manifest destiny or our national destiny. 11 Nor were La Folletteand Taftthe only voices raised
against war and militarism. The point here is not to argue that in their time La Follette and Taft got things exactly right. They did not.although events
proved them to be more prescient than either Wilson or FDR, each of whom prophesied that out of war would come lasting peace. Rather, the
point is that in those days there existed within the national political arena a lively awareness
that war is inherently poisonous, giving rise to all sorts of problematic consequences, and that
military power is something that democracies ought to treat gingerly. Today , in sharp contrast, such
sensitivities have been all but snuffed out . When it comes to military matters, the national
political stage does not accommodate contrarian voices, even from those ostensibly most
critical of actually existing policy.
Military controls policymaking
Andrew J. Bacevich 13 Jr. (born 1947) is an American political scientist specializing in
international relations, security studies, American foreign policy, and American diplomatic and
military history. He is currently Professor of International Relations and History at Boston
University.[1] He is also a retired career officer in the United States Army. He is a former director
of Boston University's Center for International Relations (from 1998 to 2005) and author of
several books, including American Empire: The Realities and Consequences of US Diplomacy
(2002), The New American Militarism: How Americans are Seduced by War (2005) and The
Limits of Power: The End of American Exceptionalism (2008). He has also appeared on television
shows such as The Colbert Report and the Bill Moyers Report and has written op-eds which have
appeared in papers such as The New York Times, Washington Post, Wall Street Journal, Boston
Globe, Los Angeles Times, and Financial Times. He is also a member of the Council on Foreign
Relations. “The new American militarism: how Americans are seduced by war,” 2013, Oxford
University Press, DOA: 8-1-13, y2k
Today, having dissolved any connection between claims to citizenship and obligation to serve, Americans entrust their security to a class of mili-tary professionals who see
military is led by an officer corps that has
evolved its own well-defined worldview and political agenda . Senior military leaders have
sought, albeit with mixed results, to wield clout well beyond the realm falling within their nominal purview.
They aim not simply to execute policy; they want a large say in its formulation . Highly protective
themselves in many respects as culturally and politically set apart from the rest of society. 53 That
of their own core institutional interests , these senior officers have also demonstrated considerable
skill at waging bureaucratic warfare, manipulating the media, and playing off the executive
and legislative branches of government against each other to get what they want. The
present-day officer corps , writes the historian Richard H. Kohn, is more bureaucratically active, more
political, more partisan, more purposeful, and more influential than at any earlier time in American history. 54 The
resulting fractious, at times even dysfunctional, relationship between the top brass and
civilian political leaders is one of Washington’s dirty little secrets . recognized by all of the
inside players, concealed from an electorate that might ask discomfiting questions about who is actually in charge. This too is an expression of what
militarism has wrought.
Pragmatism Key
Adopting a pragmatic policy solution is necessary---radical shift fails
Andrew J. Bacevich 13 Jr. (born 1947) is an American political scientist specializing in
international relations, security studies, American foreign policy, and American diplomatic and
military history. He is currently Professor of International Relations and History at Boston
University.[1] He is also a retired career officer in the United States Army. He is a former director
of Boston University's Center for International Relations (from 1998 to 2005) and author of
several books, including American Empire: The Realities and Consequences of US Diplomacy
(2002), The New American Militarism: How Americans are Seduced by War (2005) and The
Limits of Power: The End of American Exceptionalism (2008). He has also appeared on television
shows such as The Colbert Report and the Bill Moyers Report and has written op-eds which have
appeared in papers such as The New York Times, Washington Post, Wall Street Journal, Boston
Globe, Los Angeles Times, and Financial Times. He is also a member of the Council on Foreign
Relations. “The new American militarism: how Americans are seduced by war,” 2013, Oxford
University Press, DOA: 8-1-13, y2k
There is , wrote H. L. Mencken, always a well-known solution to every human problem ; neat,
plausible, and wrong. Mencken’s aphorism applies in spades to the subject of this account. To
imagine that there exists a simple antidote to the military metaphysic to which the people and
government of the United States have fallen prey is to misconstrue the problem. As the
foregoing chapters make plain, the origins of Americapresent-day infatuation with military
power are anything but simple. American militarism is not the invention of a cabal nursing
fantasies of global empire and manipulating an unsuspecting people frightened by the events
of 9 / 11 . Further, it is counterproductive to think in these terms to assign culpability to a
particular president or administration and to imagine that throwing the bums out will put
things right . Yet neither does the present-day status of the United States as sole superpower
reveal an essential truth, whether positive or negative, about the American project. Enthusiasts
(mostly on the right) who interpret America’s possession of unrivaled and unprecedented
armed might as proof that the United States enjoys the mandate of heaven are deluded . But
so too are those (mostly on the left) who see in the far-flung doings of today’s U.S. military
establishment substantiation of Major General Smedley Butler’s old chestnut that war is just a
racket and the American soldier a gangster for capitalism , sent abroad to do the bidding of Big
Business or Big Oil. Neither the will of God nor the venality of Wall Street suffices to explain how the
United States managed to become stuck in World War IV . Rather, the new American militarism is a
little like pollution the perhaps unintended, but foreseeable by-product of prior choices and
decisions made without taking fully into account the full range of costs likely to be incurred. In
making the industrial revolution, the captains of American enterprise did not consciously set out
to foul the environment, but as they harnessed the waters, crisscrossed the nation with rails,
and built their mills and refineries, negative consequences ensued. Lakes and rivers became
choked with refuse, the soil contaminated, and the air in American cities filthy. By the time that
the industrial age approached its zenith in the middle of the twentieth century, most Americans
had come to take this for granted; a degraded environment seemed the price you had to pay in
exchange for material abundance and by extension for freedom and opportunity. Americans
might not like pollution, but there seemed to be no choice except to put up with it. To
appreciate that this was, in fact, not the case, Americans needed a different consciousness. This
is where the environmental movement, beginning more or less in the 1960 s, made its essential
contribution. Environmentalists enabled Americans to see the natural world and their
relationship to that world in a different light. They argued that the obvious deterioration in the
environment was unacceptable and not at all inevitable. Alternatives did exist. Different policies
and practices could stanch and even reverse the damage . Purists in that movement insisted
upon the primacy of environmental needs, everywhere and in all cases. Theirs was (and is) a
principled position deserving to be heard . To act on their recommendations , however, would
likely mean shutting down the economy, an impractical and politically infeasible course of action.
Pragmatists advanced a different argument. They suggested that it was possible to negotiate
a compromise between economic needs and environmental imperatives. This compromise might
oblige Americans to curtail certain bad habits, but it did not require changing the fundamentals
of how they lived their lives. Americans could keep their cars and continue their love affair with
consumption; but at the same time they could also have cleaner air and cleaner water.
Implementing this compromise has produced an outcome that environmental radicals (and on
the other side, believers in laissez-faire capitalism) today find unsatisfactory. In practice, it turns
out, once begun negotiations never end. Bargaining is continuous, contentious, and deeply
politicized. Participants in the process seldom come away with everything they want. Settling for
half a loaf when you covet the whole is inevitably frustrating. But the results are self-evident.
Environmental conditions in the United States today are palpably better than they were a half
century ago . Pollution has not been vanquished, but it has become more manageable.
Furthermore, the nation has achieved those improvements without imposing on citizens
undue burdens and without preventing its entrepreneurs from innovating, creating, and
turning a profit. Restoring a semblance of balance and good sense to the way that Americans think
about military power will require a similarly pragmatic approach . Undoing all of the negative effects
that result from having been seduced by war may lie beyond reach, but Americans can at least
make them more manageable and thereby salvage their democracy. In explaining the origins
of the new American militarism, this account has not sought to assign or to impute blame.
None of the protagonists in this story sat down after Vietnam and consciously plotted to
propagate perverse attitudes toward military power any more than Andrew Carnegie or ]ohn D.
Rockefeller plotted to despoil the nineteenth-century American landscape. The clamor after
Vietnam to rebuild the American arsenal and to restore American self—confidence, the
celebration of soldierly values, the search for ways to make force more usable: all of these came
about because groups of Americans thought that they glimpsed in the realm of military affairs
the solution to vexing problems. The soldiers who sought to rehabilitate their profession, the
intellectuals who feared that America might share the fate of Weimar, the strategists wrestling
with the implications of nuclear weapons, the conservative Christians appalled by the apparent
collapse of traditional morality: none of these acted out of motives that were inherently
dishonorable. To the extent that we may find fault with the results of their efforts, that fault is
more appropriately attributable to human fallibility than to malicious intent. And yet in the end
it is not motive that matters but outcome.
Discourse / Myth of Afghanistan
The dominant representation of Afghanistan relies on a false political myth. We
must understand the militarist and hypermasculinized hierarchies that are
forgotten in America’s quest for liberation.
Crowe 2007 (Lori, Grad Student in Pol. Sci. – York U., “The “Fuzzy Dream”: Discourse,
Historical myths, and Militarized (in)Security Interrogating dangerous myths of Afghanistan and
the ‘West’”, http://archive.sgir.eu/uploads/Crowe-loricrowe.pdf)
The historical production of particular myths of Afghanistan have relied on representations of
the country in the West that are largely simplistic, ahistorical, and politically motivated.
Afghanistan is a sort of “fuzzy dream” for most in the West: embodied in a series of fabricated
images of war and poverty, de-contextualized photos without names or places, numbers and
graphs claiming statistical quantification, and disjointed yet often repeated phrases and
metaphors. A particular mythic representation of Afghanistan is being (and has been)
proliferated in the international community, through media, history books, foreign policy
documents, political commentators, academia, and virtually any other body of communication.
The vigor with which particular discourses have materialized since 9/11 are representative of
their link to the Wests militarized ‘War on Terror’ and more generally of the embedded
relationship between political policies and militarized discourses which legitimate the West’s
military engagement and development policies. That is, Afghanistan serves as an unfortunate
example of the very real power of discourse and myth-making which affect the form that
international engagement takes; this in turn reproduces those myths in a cycle of destructive
imperial engagement. In trying to understand the current political situation in Afghanistan,
and in attempting to formulate international policy in the region, it is vital that we are aware
of the dominant narratives or ‘myths’ that are being produced, who it is that is producing
them and for what purpose, and what is at stake in failing to interrogate them. Any policy that
does not take the role of deliberately constructed narratives and the mediums throough
which they are disseminated into account will not only continue to replicate them, perhaps
unknowingly, but any “securitizing”, “peacebuilding” and “development” efforts built on
these terms can never result in long-term success. The emancipatory possibilities of such a
critical project of discourse deconstruction lie in: 1) understanding the raced/classed/gendered
power hierarchies that are their foundation; 2) uncovering the nationalized militarization and
the hypermasculinized and hyperfeminized normativities that are are embedded within these
myths, and; 3) the recognition of the detrimental effect of the West’s ‘myths’ and configuring
the reconceptualisation of policy alternatives through its contestation. By looking critically at
what has become the common language of foreign engagement in Afghanistan, the foundation
of historical narratives or ‘myths’ that perpetuate a certain image of Afghanistan, and which in
turn results in very particular attitudes that imbue foreign policy, begin to be revealed. I will
utilize two broad (and inextricably linked) categorizations which most accurately encapsulate
the dominant strains of discourse to help clarify how this relationship is constructed and by thus
identifying them as such attempt to de-bunk the myths they create. These ‘myths’ which have
become normalized and banal in foreign policy, media, and some academic discourse I define
as the ‘heroism’ discourse/myth and the ‘militarization’ discourse/myth. Superman and G.I.
Joe “When we read the history books given to children in the United States, it all starts with
heroic adventure – there is no bloodshed – and Columbus Day is a celebration.”57 The ‘heroism’
narrative can be called by several names: the ‘saviour syndrome’, “mediatically generated” or
“hybrid techno-medical” humanitarianism58, “foreign aid”, “humanitarian intervention”, etc.
This narrative constructs foreign engagement in a region as spectacle and as prized
commodities to be admired and ‘sold’ to the public; it constructs the West as ‘saviours’ and
the ‘Other’, in this case Afghanistan, as the victim in need of saving, accomplished through
images and tales of passion and fervour that often pathologize the other and valorize the
Western interveener. When the US, with the support of the UN, bombed Afghanistan in 2001in
response to the events of September 11th, the mission was entitled “Operation Enduring
Freedom”. Today, as reconstruction and ‘peace-building’ efforts are underway in Afghanistan in
tandem with military operations, political conversations and media productions are saturated
with calls to “win the hearts and minds” of the people of Afghanistan and of the necessary and
benevolent role the West must play in instilling ‘freedom’, ‘justice’ and ‘democracy’ in the wartorn and poverty stricken region. Debrix, offers an analysis of what he calls “the global
humanitarian spectacle” to demonstrate how medical and humanitarian NGO’s simulate
“heroism, sentiment, and compassion”; medical catastrophes and civil conflicts, he explains,
have indeed become prized commodities for globalizing neoliberal policies of Western states
and international organizations to sell to ‘myth readers’: “They give Western states and the UN
the opportunity to put their liberal humanistic policies into practice, while, for Western media,
humanitarianism simply sells”.59 There are several repercussions of this myth, explains Debrix.
First, this has resulted in real humanitarian and moral issues being overlooked; Second, images
are being purged of their content. Myth has thus becoming the very real enemy of true
humanitarianism; that is, we’ve become so inundates with superhero mythologization of real
world events that the embedded paternalism and unrealistic goals go unnoticed.60
Additionally, this narrative reinforces a victimology of the ‘Other’ and in fact capitalises on it,
while simultaneously hiding the paternalistic and neo-colonialist ideologies in humanitarian
garb. The role of the media and consciously generated and disseminated images is particularly
pronounced here, as passion and spectacle are valued in the commodification of images over
content and history. Jean Baudrillard states “There is no possible distinction, at the level of
images and information, between the spectacular and the symbolic, no possible distinction
between the ‘crime’ and the crackdown”.61
Discourse in Material Reality
Grounding discourse in material reality produces effective politics
Mohanty 2004 Professor of Women’s Studies at Hamilton College
Chandra Talpade, Feminism without Borders p 52-53
In foregrounding the need to build our politics around the struggles of the most exploited
peoples of the world, and in drawing attention to the importance of a materialist definition of
class in opposition to identity based social movements and discourses, Sivanandan
underscores both the significance and the difficulty of rewriting counter hegemonic histories.
His analysis questions the contemporary identity-based philosophy of social movements that define
"discourse" as an adequate terrain of struggle. While discursive categories are clearly central
sites of political contestation, they must be grounded in and informed by the material politics
of everyday life, especially the daily life struggles for survival of poor people-those written out
of history.
Discourse Key to Political Agency
Domination is constituted through the transversal dynamics of discourse –
dissent must also occur on this terrain or it will be absorbed.
Bleiker 2000 [Roland, Prof of International Relations, Popular Dissent, Human Agency, and
Global Politics, p. 222-7]
Language and discourse overlap in many ways, but are by no means the same. Michael Shapiro points out how a postmodern interpretation of global
politics emphasises ‘discourse rather than language because the concept of discourse implies a concern with the meaningand value-producing practices
in language rather than simply the relationship between utterances and their referents’.20 The concept of discourse may thus illuminate the
arbitrariness of the seemingly inevitable evolution and conduct of global politics. It is a way of examining, in Mikhail Bakhtin’s words, ‘language in its
concrete living totality’.21 Discourse
and language are forms of concealment that offer opportunities to reveal. They are
transversal forms of domination that offer opportunities to resist and transform. These practices of
concealing and revealing must be examined in their cyclical existence. Without paying attention to the domineering
aspects of language one cannot understand its potential for resistance. This is not unproblematic. For many
authors the subjugating power of language is overwhelming. According to Heidegger ‘man acts as though he were the shaper and master of language,
while in fact language remains the master of man’.22 Benjamin Lee Whorf, in his path-breaking study of Hopi conceptualisations of time and space,
object and subject, argues that the individual is utterly unaware of the power of language to construct his/her consciousness and ‘constrained
completely within its unbreakable bonds’.23 Roland Barthes goes even further in his notorious remarks during the inaugural lecture at the Colle`ge de
France. For him, freedom can exist only outside language. But languages have no outside. A language always imposes. It is, in this sense, ‘neither
reactionary nor progressive, it is simply fascist, for fascism does not prevent speech, it forces speech’.24 Barthes’ claim, largely dismissed as polemics,
has the merit of reminding us that there is always an aspect of subjugation in the use of languages , no matter
how objective, neutral and open they may appear. George Orwell’s fictional world provides a perfect illustration for this subjugating power of
languages. Consider how Oceania introduced Newspeak to accommodate its official ideology, Ingsoc. New words were invented and undesirable ones
either eliminated or stripped of unorthodox meanings. The objective of this exercise was that ‘when Newspeak had been adopted once and for all and
Oldspeak forgotten, a heretical thought – that is, a thought diverging from the principles of Ingsoc – should be literally unthinkable’.25 By then history
would be rewritten to the point that even if fragments of documents from the past were still to surface, they simply would be unintelligible and
untranslatable. We find similar dynamics at work in the more ‘real’ (but equally Orwellian) world of defence intellectuals. Carol Cohn demonstrates
how the particular language that they employ not only removes them from the ‘reality’ of nuclear war, but also constructs a new world of abstraction
that makes it impossible to think or express certain concerns related to feelings, morality, or simply ‘peace’. The consequences, Cohn stresses, are
fateful because the language of defence intellectuals has been elevated to virtually the only legitimate medium of debating security issues.26 The fact
that this language is male dominated is widely recognised at least since Dale Spender has claimed that the English language is man made and largely
under male control. This, she argues, has constructed language and thought patterns that define the male as norm and the female as deviant. Spender
reinforces her point by showing how the introduction and legitimisation of ‘man’ and ‘he’ as terms to denote both male and female ‘was the result of a
deliberate policy and was consciously intended to promote the primacy of the male as a category’.27 Noam Chomsky provides another example of the
links between language and transversal politics. He argues that mainstream discourses linguistically presented the American ‘involvement’ in Vietnam
such that the actual thought of an ‘aggression’ or ‘invasion’ was unthinkable, and this despite readily available evidence in support of such an
interpretation.28 The same linguistic dynamic of exclusion is at work in international relation theory, where the dominant realist language renders
discussions of epistemology virtually impossible. Consider how Robert Gilpin criticises the post-structuralist language of Richard Ashley by declaring
entirely unintelligible his claim that ‘the objective truth of the discourse lies within and is produced by the discourse itself’.29 The concepts used in this
sentence not only make perfect sense to any critical social theorist, but also are essential for the articulation of an epistemological critique. Yet, read
through the Newspeak of scientific realism, the very idea of epistemological critique is a heretic thought and the sentence thus becomes simply
untranslatable. The language of realism has rendered any challenge to its own political foundations unthinkable. How can one turn language from a
system of exclusion to a practice of inclusion, from a method of domination to an instrument of resistance? And how can one appreciate the
transversal dimensions that are entailed in these sites of everyday struggle? The starting point lies with what is aptly called Sprachkritik in German.
Literally translated as ‘critique
of language’, Sprachkritik is, at least according to the linguist Fritz Mauthner, ‘the most
important task (Gescha¨ft) of thinking humanity’. The poet Paul Vale´ry probably captured its objective best when claiming that
‘the secret of well founded thinking is based on suspicion towards language’.30 If challenges to practices of domination and
attempts to open up thinking space are to avoid being absorbed by the dominant discourse,
then they must engage in a struggle with conventionally recognised linguistic practices , or at least
with the manner in which these practices have been constituted. The form of speaking and writing becomes as important as their content. Dissent
cannot be separated from critique of language, for it remains ineffective as long as it does not
interfere with the ways in which linguistic systems of exclusion constitute and objectivise
social practices. But can a language so easily be appropriated as a tool of dissent against its own subjugating power? Is it enough, as
Nietzsche suggests, to ‘create new names, estimations and probabilities to create eventually new ‘‘things.’’’31 Of course not. One can never be free
within language. One can never break free from language. The point is, rather, to acknowledge that an individual has no possibility to function as an
authentic perceiver or agent, that the spaces for action opened up by critique are still circumscribed by the larger boundaries of linguistic structures.
Moreover, critique of language must be careful not be trapped in an idealism that suggests the world exists only because it is perceived by our mind,
that objects outside this mental sphere have no qualities of their own. Such a working assumption would go astray in a futile search for the perfect
language and, by doing so, fall back into the logical positivism from which the later Wittgenstein so carefully tried to escape. Because there is no direct
and logical correspondence between words and meaning, between a name and a thing, a spear-heading into unexplored linguistic terrains can
only be socially meaningful if it stretches the rules of existing language games while never losing sight of
the ways in which these language games constitute and are constituted by concrete forms of life. The point, then, is to articulate resistance at the edge
of language games, that is, to avoid lifting words out of their social and dialogical context while, at the same time, exploring to the utmost the unstable
and transformative nature of languages. This
is best done, I argue, by interfering with the ways in which languages
constitute sites of political practice, sites where realities are formed, reformed, legitimised and
objectivised through a series of transversal discursive dynamics.
Agency operates discursively through a slow transformation of values
Bleiker 2000 [Roland, Prof of International Relations, Popular Dissent, Human Agency, and
Global Politics, p. 35-7]
A transversal interpretation of the collapse of the Berlin Wall implies that practices
of dissent in global politics should be
viewed in discursive terms. This is to say that dissent exerts human agency not primarily through
localised spatial dynamics, but through a transformation of values that takes place across a
variety of political territories. Viewing dissent in discursive terms opens up possibilities to recognise practices of resistance that have
hitherto been obscured. The third and last part of this study explores their potential and limits. But before such a task can begin, a number of difficult
conceptual questions must be confronted. How to lift a concept of human agency out of a genealogical critique? How to ground thought, critique,
action, norms, transversal life itself, if there are no universal values that can enable such a process of grounding? How to retain a positive approach to
the problem of agency without having to anchor one’s position in stable foundations? Evoking the notion of discourse as a way of investigating the
framing of global politics often elicits suspicion. Is discourse not merely a faddish term, destined to wax and wane with fleeting intellectual trends of
the postmodern and poststructural kind? Does the concept of discourse, as many fear, reduce the world to playful interactions of texts and meanings
that are void of any relevance to the so-called ‘real’, the concrete daily aspects of our lives? These questions are being posed very often today, and they
must be taken seriously. The prologue has already shown how many international relations theorists are sceptical of authors who employ the concept
of discourse. They fear that such an approach cannot but lead, in Robert Keohane’s representative words, to ‘an intellectual and moral disaster’.26 This
scepticism goes far beyond the domain of international relations. Critics of so-called postmodern scholarship often draw attention to the pitfalls of
discursive approaches, particularly their alleged inability to speak of agents and agency. Seyla Benhabib represents many concerned scholars when
arguing that a postmodern position mistakenly dissolves the subject into chains of signification that lie beyond human influence.27 We would find
ourselves in a conceptual order dominated by overarching discursive systems. People would be reduced to mere bystanders, passive, impotent,
irrelevant. Crushed into oblivion. But is this elusive spectre called postmodernism really so menacing that it must be warded off at any cost? Is it leading
us into an apocalyptic world in which ‘man would be erased’, as a famous Foucauldian passage speculates, ‘like a face drawn in the sand at the edge of
the sea’?28 the interest of the stronger’ cannot be dismissed on objective grounds by Plato’s position that ‘justice is goodness’.30 Hence Plato needed
a cheering public to support his critique, he needed a discursive context that rendered his position rational. Thrasymachus is portrayed as wild, noisy,
offensive, irrational. Plato then strengthened his position in the dialogues by discursive reinforcements from the gallery, like ‘Glaucon and the others
backed up my request’ or ‘it was clear to everyone that his [Thrasymachus] definition of justice had been reversed’.31 Once the discursive order and its
corresponding power relations were established, at the end of book I, there was no more need for a gallery. Plato could go on and dismiss on newly
established rational grounds what was left of the Sophist challenge. Discursive dynamics in the realm of global politics function not unlike those in
Plato’s rhetorical dialogues. Foreign
policy decisions, for instance, are not taken based on purely objective
grounds, they are formed, articulated and justified in relation to a set of transversally
recognised values that render these decisions rational – or irrational, depending on the issue
and the perspective. Transversal forms of dissent are the thoughts and actions that interfere
with these rationalisations. They are discursive in nature, but they do not necessarily operate in a void of values.
A discursive approach is key to human agency in contemporary global politics
Bleiker 2000 [Roland, Prof of International Relations, Popular Dissent, Human Agency, and
Global Politics, p. 209-11]
Discourse is the most central concept in a non-essentialist assessment of human agency. A shift from grand theoretical representations of dissent
towards a
discursive understanding of power relations is necessary to reach a more adequate
understanding of the role that human agency plays in contemporary global politics. A discursive
approach is not only able to deal better with entrenched systems of exclusion, but also
minimises the danger of imposing one’s own subjective vision upon a series of far more complex social events.
Instead of focusing on ahistorical theories of power, a discursive approach investigates how social dynamics have been imbued with meaning and how
this process of rendering them rational circumscribes the boundaries within which the transversal interaction between domination and resistance takes
place. While providing compelling evidence of subtle forms of domination, a discursive approach may run the risk of leaving us with an image of the
world in which the capacity for human agency is all but erased, annihilated by impenetrable discursive forces. This risk is particularly acute in a world
that is characterised by increasingly heterogeneous and perhaps even elusive cross-territorial dynamics. But recognising these transversal complexities
does not necessarily lead into a pessimistic cul de sac. Discourses, even if they take on global dimensions, are not as overarching as some analysts
suggest. They contain
fissures and cracks, weak points which open up chances to turn discursive
dynamics against themselves. The previous chapter has outlined this position in detail. A brief rehearsal – even at the risk of
appearing slightly repetitive – is necessary to provide the prerequisite for an adequate discursive conceptualisation of human agency in global politics.
For this purpose we must, as the prologue has already stressed, seek to see beyond the levels of analysis problematique that has come to frame
international relations theory. Rather
than limiting the study of global politics to specific spheres of inquiry – those
related to the role of states and the restraints imposed on them by the structures of the international system – an analysis of
transversal struggles pays attention to various political terrains and the crossterritorial dynamics through which
they are intertwined with each other. One of these terrains is the sphere of dailiness, which is all too often eclipsed by investigations that limit the
domain of global politics to more visible sites of transversal struggle, such as wars, diplomatic negotiations, financial flows or trade-patterns. The
domain of dailiness, though, is at least as crucial to the conduct of global politics, and an investigation into
discursive dynamics illustrates why this the case. Cracks and weaknesses in globalised discursive practices can be seen best by shifting foci from
epistemological to ontological issues. This is to say that in addition to analysing how discourses mould and control our thinking process, we must
scrutinise how individuals,
at the level of Being, may or may not be able to escape aspects of the prevalent
discursive order. Being is always a product of discourse. But Being also is becoming. It contains future
potential, it is always already that which it is not. Being also has multiple dimensions. Hyphenated identities permit a person to shift viewpoints
constantly, to move back and forth between various ways of constituting oneself. Resulting methods of mental deplacement, of situating knowledge,
open up possibilities for thinking beyond the narrow confines of the transversally established discursive order. This thinking space provides the
opportunity to
redraw the boundaries of identity which control the parameters of actions available
to an individual. Exploring this thinking space already is action, Heidegger claims, for ‘thinking acts insofar as it thinks’. Such action, he
continues, is ‘the simplest and at the same time the highest, because it concerns the relation of Being to man’.3 But how is one to understand
processes through which critical thinking breaks through the fog of discourse and gives rise to specific and identifiable expressions of human agency?
Power does not operate in a direct or immediate manner – it discursively
frames the terrain upon which thought can occur
Bleiker 2000 [Roland, Prof of International Relations, Popular Dissent, Human Agency, and
Global Politics, p. 134-6]
Since a systematic theory cannot capture the intricate functioning of power, one must explore different ways of understanding the frameworks within
which domination, resistance and social change take place. One must search for more subtle foundations that could, maybe, provide momentary
ground for understanding how human agency functions in a transversal context. But how is one to embark upon this intricate task? Foucault continues
to provide useful guidance, at least up to a certain point. He approaches power by adding an extra step to understanding it. Power, he argues, is
not simply the relationship between individuals or groups, a type of force that one person
exerts on another. It works in a more intricate, more indirect way: [W]hat defines a
relationship of power is that it is a mode of action which does not act directly and
immediately on others. Instead it acts upon their actions: an action upon an action, on existing
actions or on those which may arise in the present or the future. . .[T]he exercise of power. . .is a total structure of actions brought to bear upon
possible actions.29 Power
is a complex strategic situation, something that shapes and frames the
boundaries within which actions can be carried out. Such a definition inevitably raises a number of questions. What
mediates the exercise of power? What is the space that lies between actions, this mesh of social forces through which actions frame the actions of
others? One mediating factor is the relationship between power and knowledge. Foucault, drawing once more on Nietzsche, argues that knowledge
and power are intrinsically linked. There are no power relations which do not constitute corresponding fields of knowledge. And there are no forms of
knowledge that do not presuppose and at the same time constitute relations of power.30 Power is not a stable and steady force, something that exists
on its own. There is no essence to power, for its exercise is dependent upon forms of knowledge that imbue certain actions with power. This is to say
that the manner in which we view and frame power also influences how it functions in practice. ‘It is within discourse,’ Foucault claims, ‘that power and
knowledge articulate each other.’31 Discourses
are subtle mechanisms that frame our thinking process.
They determine the limits of what can be thought, talked and written in a normal and rational
way. In every society the production of discourses is controlled, selected, organised and diffused by certain procedures. This process
creates systems of exclusion in which one group of discourses is elevated to a hegemonic
status while others are condemned to exile. Discourses give rise to social rules that decide
which statements most people recognise as valid, as debatable or as undoubtedly false. They
guide the selection process that ascertains which propositions from previous periods or foreign cultures are retained, imported, valued, and which are
forgotten or neglected.32 Although these boundaries change, at times gradually, at times abruptly, they maintain a certain unity across time, a unity
that dominates and transgresses individual authors, texts or social practices. Not
everything is discourse, but everything is
in discourse. Things exist independently of discourses, but we can only assess them through
the lenses of discourse, through the practices of knowing, perceiving and sensing which we
have acquired over time. Nietzsche: That mountain there! That cloud there! What is ‘real’ in that? Subtract the phantasm and every
human contribution from it, my sober friends! If you can! If you can forget your descent, your past, your training – all of your humanity and animality.
There is no ‘reality’ for us – not for you either, my sober friends. . .33 Nietzsche’s point, of course, is not that mountains and clouds do not exist as such.
To claim such would be absurd. Mountains and clouds exist no matter what we think about them. And so do more tangible social practices. But they are
not ‘real’ by some objective standard. Their appearance, meaning and significance is part of human experiences, part of a specific way of life. A
Nietzschean position emphasises that discourses
render social practices intelligible and rational – and by
doing so mask the ways in which they have been constituted and framed. Systems of
domination gradually become accepted as normal and silently penetrate every aspect of
society. They cling to the most remote corners of our mind, for ‘all things that live long are gradually so saturated with reason that their
emergence out of unreason thereby becomes improbable’.34 Discourses are more than just masking agents. They provide us with
frameworks to view the world, and by doing so influence its course. Discourses express ways of life that
actively shape social practices. But more is needed to demonstrate how the concept of discourse can be of use to illuminate transversal dissident
practices. More is needed to outline a positive notion of human agency that is not based on stable foundations. This section has merely located the
terrains that are to be explored. It is now up to the following chapters to introduce, step by step, the arguments and evidence necessary to develop and
sustain a discursive understanding of transversal dissent and its ability to exert human agency.
Language is the domain of domination and resistance – discourse engenders
human agency
Bleiker 2000 [Roland, Prof of International Relations, Popular Dissent, Human Agency, and
Global Politics, p. 41-2]
Language penetrates all aspects of transversal struggles. Whatever we think and do is framed
by the language within which these acts are carried out. Hence, an engagement with the philosophy of language must
be part of an adequate approach to questions of agency in global politics, especially if this approach rests upon a view of human life as constituted by
self-understanding.40 From such a vantage point language must be seen not as an image of the world or a way of representing realities, but, as
Wittgenstein’s famous dictum holds, as ‘part of an activity, a way of life’.41 This position has far-reaching consequences. If
language
expresses a particular way of life it is also responsible, at least in part, for the constitution of this
way of life. Human agency cannot take place outside language, in some preor extra-linguistic
realm. It can only take place through language. Expressed differently: languages are not just
frameworks to assess actions. They are themselves forms of action. There are, of course, countless domains in
which language interferes with transversal struggles. We live at a time when ever-increasing communicative capabilities account for an ever-shrinking
globe. Moreover, transversal politics revolves not only around interactions between various national languages, but also between different types of
speech. When
a liberal, a realist, a defence technician or a peace movement member describes
the same event, they use very different languages to interpret the realities they see. Each of
these languages has its own set of rules. Each embodies a world-view that implicitly promotes
certain social values and certain political, ethical and spatial perceptions of global politics. The
clash between these forms of speech is the domain where domination and resistance is
carried out. It is the process that engenders human agency
Discourses regulate the production of knowledge, disciplining bodies and
behaviors
Berman 03 [Jacqueline, Senior Research Analyst with Berkeley Policy Associates, “(Un)Popular
Strangers and Crises (Un)Bounded,” European Journal of International Relations 9.1, p.47-8]
If sex-trafficking discourses, especially criminalization, do not assist and may indeed deleteriously impact the women they seek to assist, the question
becomes, how has this construction come to dominate EU and US media and governmental approaches to trafficking? I want to argue that its
dominance follows from how sex-trafficking functions as a discourse and thus from how discourses more generally operate. Discourses function to
associate a number of concepts or ‘continuities’ that ‘do not come about of themselves, but are always the result of a construction’ with one another
(Foucault, 1972: 25–6). From these associations emerge a set of definitions, understandings and outcomes that appear logical. In The History of
Sexuality, Vol. I, for example, Michel Foucault explains that in the 18th century, sexuality became understood as in need of regulation ‘through useful
and public discourses’ (1980a: 25). In this sense, discourse is not separate from nor against power but is, in fact, a way of exercising it. Discourses
function as ‘ways of constituting knowledge, together with the social practices, forms of
subjectivity and power relations which inhere in such knowledges and relations between them’ (Weedon, 1997:
105). They emerge as organized, controlled practices that circulate or discipline utterance and behavior at certain sites and under specific conditions.
Discursive ‘mechanisms’ found in ‘economy, pedagogy, medicine, and justice incite, extract, distribute, and institutionalize’ discourse (Foucault, 1980a:
33). Discourses create certain prohibitions on the form, content, speaker and location of speech. The multiplicity of devices ‘invented for speaking
about it, for having it spoken about, for inducing itself to speak, for listening, recording, transcribing, and redistributing what is said about it’ constitute
‘a regulated and polymorphous incitement to discourse’ (Foucault, 1980a: 34). They constitute an intersecting and fortifying set of prohibitions in a
fluid and complex ‘grid’, excruciatingly enmeshed around sexuality and politics. Discourses neither antedate nor express some truth or reality.
Instead, they form
regularities that emerge and become systematized in and through the
articulation and reiteration of particular norms and practices, not because they are logical or true but rather
because of this regularity. These regularities have constructive effects, creating identities and practices
and disciplining bodies and behaviors through articulation and repetition. While discourses function as
both an instrument and an effect of power in strategies of domination, they also form sites of resistance at which counterstrategies can be articulated
and deployed.
Linguistic Dissent Challenges Dominant Discourse
Challenging dominant power structures requires the slow transformation of
social values at the level of the everyday through discursive dissent
Bleiker 2000 [Roland, Prof of International Relations, Popular Dissent, Human Agency, and
Global Politics, p. 222-7]
Language and discourse overlap in many ways, but are by no means the same. Michael Shapiro points out how a postmodern interpretation of global
politics emphasises ‘discourse rather than language because the concept of discourse implies a concern with the meaningand value-producing practices
in language rather than simply the relationship between utterances and their referents’.20 The concept of discourse may thus illuminate the
arbitrariness of the seemingly inevitable evolution and conduct of global politics. It is a way of examining, in Mikhail Bakhtin’s words, ‘language in its
concrete living totality’.21 Discourse
and language are forms of concealment that offer opportunities to reveal. They are
transversal forms of domination that offer opportunities to resist and transform. These practices of
concealing and revealing must be examined in their cyclical existence. Without paying attention to the domineering
aspects of language one cannot understand its potential for resistance. This is not unproblematic. For many
authors the subjugating power of language is overwhelming. According to Heidegger ‘man acts as though he were the shaper and master of language,
while in fact language remains the master of man’.22 Benjamin Lee Whorf, in his path-breaking study of Hopi conceptualisations of time and space,
object and subject, argues that the individual is utterly unaware of the power of language to construct his/her consciousness and ‘constrained
completely within its unbreakable bonds’.23 Roland Barthes goes even further in his notorious remarks during the inaugural lecture at the Colle`ge de
France. For him, freedom can exist only outside language. But languages have no outside. A language always imposes. It is, in this sense, ‘neither
reactionary nor progressive, it is simply fascist, for fascism does not prevent speech, it forces speech’.24 Barthes’ claim, largely dismissed as polemics,
has the merit of reminding us that there is always an aspect of subjugation in the use of languages , no matter
how objective, neutral and open they may appear. George Orwell’s fictional world provides a perfect illustration for this subjugating power of
languages. Consider how Oceania introduced Newspeak to accommodate its official ideology, Ingsoc. New words were invented and undesirable ones
either eliminated or stripped of unorthodox meanings. The objective of this exercise was that ‘when Newspeak had been adopted once and for all and
Oldspeak forgotten, a heretical thought – that is, a thought diverging from the principles of Ingsoc – should be literally unthinkable’.25 By then history
would be rewritten to the point that even if fragments of documents from the past were still to surface, they simply would be unintelligible and
untranslatable. We find similar dynamics at work in the more ‘real’ (but equally Orwellian) world of defence intellectuals. Carol Cohn demonstrates
how the particular language that they employ not only removes them from the ‘reality’ of nuclear war, but also constructs a new world of abstraction
that makes it impossible to think or express certain concerns related to feelings, morality, or simply ‘peace’. The consequences, Cohn stresses, are
fateful because the language of defence intellectuals has been elevated to virtually the only legitimate medium of debating security issues.26 The fact
that this language is male dominated is widely recognised at least since Dale Spender has claimed that the English language is man made and largely
under male control. This, she argues, has constructed language and thought patterns that define the male as norm and the female as deviant. Spender
reinforces her point by showing how the introduction and legitimisation of ‘man’ and ‘he’ as terms to denote both male and female ‘was the result of a
deliberate policy and was consciously intended to promote the primacy of the male as a category’.27 Noam Chomsky provides another example of the
links between language and transversal politics. He argues that mainstream discourses linguistically presented the American ‘involvement’ in Vietnam
such that the actual thought of an ‘aggression’ or ‘invasion’ was unthinkable, and this despite readily available evidence in support of such an
interpretation.28 The same linguistic dynamic of exclusion is at work in international relation theory, where the dominant realist language renders
discussions of epistemology virtually impossible. Consider how Robert Gilpin criticises the post-structuralist language of Richard Ashley by declaring
entirely unintelligible his claim that ‘the objective truth of the discourse lies within and is produced by the discourse itself’.29 The concepts used in this
sentence not only make perfect sense to any critical social theorist, but also are essential for the articulation of an epistemological critique. Yet, read
through the Newspeak of scientific realism, the very idea of epistemological critique is a heretic thought and the sentence thus becomes simply
untranslatable. The language of realism has rendered any challenge to its own political foundations unthinkable. How can one turn language from a
system of exclusion to a practice of inclusion, from a method of domination to an instrument of resistance? And how can one appreciate the
transversal dimensions that are entailed in these sites of everyday struggle? The starting point lies with what is aptly called Sprachkritik in German.
Literally translated as ‘critique
of language’, Sprachkritik is, at least according to the linguist Fritz Mauthner, ‘the most
important task (Gescha¨ft) of thinking humanity’. The poet Paul Vale´ry probably captured its objective best when claiming that
‘the secret of well founded thinking is based on suspicion towards language’.30 If challenges to practices of domination and
attempts to open up thinking space are to avoid being absorbed by the dominant discourse,
then they must engage in a struggle with conventionally recognised linguistic practices , or at least
with the manner in which these practices have been constituted. The form of speaking and writing becomes as important as their content. Dissent
cannot be separated from critique of language, for it remains ineffective as long as it does not
interfere with the ways in which linguistic systems of exclusion constitute and objectivise
social practices. But can a language so easily be appropriated as a tool of dissent against its own subjugating power? Is it enough, as
Nietzsche suggests, to ‘create new names, estimations and probabilities to create eventually new ‘‘things.’’’31 Of course not. One can never be free
within language. One can never break free from language. The point is, rather, to acknowledge that an individual has no possibility to function as an
authentic perceiver or agent, that the spaces for action opened up by critique are still circumscribed by the larger boundaries of linguistic structures.
Moreover, critique of language must be careful not be trapped in an idealism that suggests the world exists only because it is perceived by our mind,
that objects outside this mental sphere have no qualities of their own. Such a working assumption would go astray in a futile search for the perfect
language and, by doing so, fall back into the logical positivism from which the later Wittgenstein so carefully tried to escape. Because there is no direct
and logical correspondence between words and meaning, between a name and a thing, a spear-heading into unexplored linguistic terrains can
only be socially meaningful if it stretches the rules of existing language games while never losing sight of
the ways in which these language games constitute and are constituted by concrete forms of life. The point, then, is to articulate resistance at the edge
of language games, that is, to avoid lifting words out of their social and dialogical context while, at the same time, exploring to the utmost the unstable
and transformative nature of languages. This
is best done, I argue, by interfering with the ways in which languages
constitute sites of political practice, sites where realities are formed, reformed, legitimised and
objectivised through a series of transversal discursive dynamics.
Language is the key site of transversal politics because it unconsciously frames
entire worldviews
Bleiker 2000 [Roland, Prof of International Relations, Popular Dissent, Human Agency, and
Global Politics, p. 215-7]
Language is one of the most fundamental aspects of human life. It is omnipresent. It penetrates every aspect of transversal
politics, from the local to the global. We speak, Heidegger stresses, when we are awake and when we are asleep, even when we do not utter a
single word. We speak when we listen, read or silently pursue an occupation. We are always speaking because we cannot think without
language, because ‘language is the house of Being’, the home within which we dwell.2 But languages are
never neutral. They embody particular values and ideas. They are an integral part of transversal power relations and
of global politics in general. Languages impose sets of assumptions on us, frame our thoughts so subtly
that we are mostly unaware of the systems of exclusion that are being entrenched through
this process. And yet, a language is not just a form of domination that engulfs the speaker in a web of discursive constraints, it is
also a terrain of dissent, one that is not bound by the political logic of national boundaries. Language is itself a form of
action – the place where possibilities for social change emerge, where values are slowly
transformed, where individuals carve out thinking space and engage in everyday forms of
resistance. In short, language epitomises the potential and limits of discursive forms of transversal
dissent. This chapter provides the theoretical basis necessary to appreciate the far-reaching political and transversal potential that is entailed in
everyday forms of dissent that engage the linguistic constitution of global politics. The subsequent, final chapter will then examine, through an
additional reading of the events that led to the fall of the Berlin Wall, the practical potential of such dissident practices. To scrutinise the role of
language in global politics is not simply to examine the clash of values between different national languages. Interactions between them, as for instance
in translating activities at diplomatic summits, is of course a central aspect of international relations. But the political struggle over language also occurs
in an array of other, far more subtle domains. Consider how a key event in global politics, such as the fall of the Berlin Wall, can be represented through
different types of speech, each of which embodies a subjective but discursively objectified way of looking at the world. The turbulent events of 1989
can, for instance, be understood through the vocabulary of high politics, which revolves around great power relations and diplomatic negotiations; or
through the vocabulary of strategic studies, which stresses military capacities, state repression and relations of coercive force; or through the
vocabulary of international political economy, which places emphasis on market performances and their impact on political stability; or through the
vocabulary of peace studies, which focuses on popular dissent and its ability to uproot systems of domination; or through the vocabulary of feminist
theory, which illuminates the gendered dimensions of crumbling walls; or through the vocabulary of the common men and women in the street, which
epitomises the daily frustrations of living in a suffocating society; or through any other vocabulary that expresses the subjective dimensions of
interpreting events. In each case, though, the
specific vocabulary that is used embodies and objectifies a
particularly, discursively embedded world-view – one that is inherently political, even though it presents its view-points,
often convincingly, as unbiased representations of the real. But all of these view-points, no matter how detached and impartial they seem, do more
than merely interpret the events that led to the collapse of the Berlin Wall. In rendering it meaningful, they are not only describing and representing,
they are actually intervening in the events.3 A sustained engagement with the philosophy of language is necessary to recognise the potential for
transversal social change that is entailed in dissident practices that interfere with the linguistically entrenched objectification of global politics. This
chapter is, of course, unable to survey this complex issue in an exhaustive way. The focus will rest with two authors, Nietzsche and Wittgenstein, who
represent key elements of an approach that perceives language
not as a way of representing the world, but as an
way of life. An engagement with this approach serves to prepare the ground for a practical and more overtly political reading of
language and its relation to transversal struggles. Language, then, is no longer seen as a mere medium of
communication. It is also the very site where politics is carried out. Critiquing practices of
global politics is thus a process that cannot be separated from critiquing the languages
through which these practices have become normalised and objectified. To outline how such a rethinking of
activity, a
politics may engender human agency, this chapter focuses on dissident potentials that are entailed in the practice of writing, understood not in its
narrow sense as a mere act of inscribing signs, but as everything which makes this act possible – in short, language itself.
Language is action
Bleiker 2000 [Roland, Prof of International Relations, Popular Dissent, Human Agency, and
Global Politics, p. 221-2]
For the later Wittgenstein, then, language is no longer a picture of the world. The speaking of a language
is part of an activity, or a form of
life’.15 This does not mean, however, that there is no life outside language. David Pears emphasises that the position of the later Wittgenstein is not
that our view of the world owes nothing to its nature. That would be absurd. Wittgenstein’s point is only that, if we try to explain our
view of the world by saying something about its nature, what we say will necessarily belong to
our view of it. We have no independent standpoint from which to assess the relation between our usual standpoint and the world.16 From this
perspective, one does not try to grasp the meaning and representational aspects of words, but instead pays attention to their function, to the ‘workings
of our language’.17 Wittgenstein uses the term ‘language game’ to draw attention to the ways in which languages are part of culturally specific forms
of life. There are countless language games that come and go. He mentions such examples as giving orders and obeying them, translating from one
language to another, or asking, thanking, cursing, greeting, praying.18 An approach that perceives language as human activity, rather than a way of
categorising phenomena, opens a whole range of opportunities to study the relationship between language and human agency. Hanna Pitkin, for
instance, shows how our
understanding of action may be enriched by asking no longer what action is
or how it functions, but how we talk about it, how language games guide the implementation
of this particular aspect of practice. Language thus becomes action itself because ‘we use
language not merely to talk about action, but to act – to carry on actions, to teach actions, to plan or
produce actions, to assess actions done and redress any ways in which they have gone wrong’.19 With Wittgenstein, language is revealed as
one of the most central aspects of our lives and, by extension, of politics. It is self-evident that in today’s age of
globalisation this political dimension entails very explicit transversal components. At a time when media-networks and other technological features
facilitate an immediate and global flow of information, the political struggle over language is a worldwide struggle. Language has thus become
one of the central features that fuses the local with the global, and elevates the transversal linkages between them to the site where
many decisive political battles are waged. The key is to recognise the centrality of these largely inaudible sites of contestation, and to find ways of
understanding how they shape our lives.
Using concepts in dissonant ways is key to challenge discursive domination
Bleiker 2000 [Roland, Prof of International Relations, Popular Dissent, Human Agency, and
Global Politics, p. 231-2]
The daring task is to open up with concepts what does not fit into concepts, to resist their
distorting power and return the conceptual to the non-conceptual. This disenchantment with the concept is the antidote of critical
philosophy. It prevents the concept from becoming an absolute in itself.53 The first step towards disenchanting the
concept is simply refusing to define it monologically. Concepts should achieve meaning only gradually, in relation to
each other. Adorno even goes as far as intentionally using the same concept in different ways in order to
liberate it from the narrow definition that language itself had already imposed upon it.54 That
contradictions could arise out of this practice does not bother Adorno. Indeed, he considers them essential. One cannot eliminate the
contradictory, the fragmentary and the discontinuous. Contradictions are only contradictions if one assumes the
existence of a prior universal standard of reference. What is different appears as divergent, dissonant, and
negative only as long as our consciousness strives for a totalising standpoint, which we must avoid if we
are to escape the dangers of identity thinking.55 Just as reality is fragmented, we need to think in fragments. Unity is not found by
evening out discontinuities. Contradictions are to be preferred over artificially constructed meanings and the silencing of underlying conflicts. Thus
Adorno advocates writing in fragments, such that the resulting text appears as if it always could be interrupted, cut off abruptly, any time, any place.56
Here too we hear the advice of Nietzsche, who recommends that one should approach deep problems like taking a cold bath, ‘quickly into them and
quickly out again’.57 The belief that one does not reach deep enough this way, he claims, is simply the superstition of those who fear cold water. But
Nietzsche’s bath has already catapulted us into the vortex of the next linguistic terrain of resistance, the question of style.
There are no quick solutions – human agency operates slowly through linguistic
dissent
Bleiker 2000 [Roland, Prof of International Relations, Popular Dissent, Human Agency, and
Global Politics, p. 241-3]
Through an engagement with the philosophy of language, this chapter has sought to provide the prerequisite for understanding the crucial role that
linguistic practices play in transversal struggles. At a time when
the cross-territorial flow of information is among
the most central features of global politics, the linguistic dimensions of transversal struggles
has become a domain where important interactions between domination and resistance are carried out. To recognise the political
centrality of this domain not only brings into view a range of hitherto obscured dissident potential, but also facilitates an alternative, discourse-oriented
understanding of transversal struggles. Such an understanding underlines how the role of human agency in global politics is intrinsically linked to the
manner in which this role is perceived and objectified. Language-based
forms of transversal dissent operate
through complex and often contradictory processes. An author who tries to exert human
agency by engaging in linguistic dissent must defy the language of dominant political
perspectives in order not to get drawn into their powerful vortex. But s/he must also articulate alternative
thoughts such that they are accessible enough to constitute viable tools to open up dialogical interactions. This can, of course, only be achieved if
alternative knowledge can break out of intellectual obscurity, if it can reach and change the minds of most people. However, a text that breaks with
established practices of communication to escape their discursive power has, by definition, great difficulties in doing this. Hence, writing is, as Roland
Barthes claims, always a compromise between memory and freedom, between, on the one hand, being constrained by the long history of words, by the
power of language to penetrate every single aspect of our writing, and, on the other hand, affirming one’s freedom by an act of writing that is not just
communication or expression, but a leap beyond the narrow confines of existing language games.89 A contemporary reading of Nietzsche is particularly
suited to recognise these intricate links between language and politics. Zarathustra is constantly torn back and forth between engaging with people and
withdrawing from them. The masses fail to comprehend his attempts to defy herd instincts and problematise the unproblematic. ‘They do not
understand me; I am not the mouth for these ears’, he hails. ‘Must one smash their ears before they learn to listen with their eyes?’90 At times he
appears without hope: ‘what matters a time that ‘‘has not time’’ for Zarathustra?. . .why do I speak where nobody has my ears? It is still an hour too
early for me here’.91 Succumbing to the power of language, Zarathustra returns to the mountains, withdraws into the solitude of his cave. But thoughts
of engaging with humanity never leave him. He repeatedly climbs down from his cave to the depths of life, regains hope that monological discourses
will give way to dialogue, that the herds will understand him one day: ‘But their hour will come! And mine will come too! Hourly they are becoming
smaller, poorer, more sterile – poor herbs! poor soil! and soon they shall stand there like dry grass and prairie – and, verily, weary of themselves and
languishing even more than for water – for fire.’92 No dissenting writer can hope to incinerate immediately the dry grass of orthodox linguistic prairies.
Discourses live on and appear reasonable long after their premises have turned into anachronistic relics. More inclusive ways of thinking and acting
cannot surface overnight. There
are no quick solutions, no new paradigms or miraculous political settlements that one could hope for.
Discursive forms of resistance, even if they manage to transgress national boundaries, do not engender human
agency in an immediate and direct way. Writing dissent is a long process, saturated with obstacles and
contradictions. It operates, as outlined in the Interlude preceding this chapter, through tactical and temporal transformations of discursive practices.
But this lengthy and largely inaudible process is not to be equated with political impotence. The
struggles over the linguistic dimensions of transversal politics are as crucial and as real as the
practices of international Realpolitik. They affect the daily lives of people as much as so-called
‘real-world issues’. Language, in both speech and writing, is a disguised but highly effective political
practice. With this recognition emerges a new kind of activist, situated, as Barthes notes, ‘half-way between militant and writer’, taking from the
former the commitment to act and from the latter the knowledge that the process of writing constitutes such an act.93 The task now consists of
removing one more layer of abstraction, so that the practical and transversal dimensions of language-based forms of dissent can become visible. For
this purpose the next chapter now examines how a specific stylistic form of resistance, usually thought to be the most esoteric of all – poetry – may be
able to engender human agency by transgressing the spatial and discursive boundaries of global politics.
A2: Fiat
Theories of direct action have romantic attachments to the heroism of the
autonomous subject
Bleiker 2000 [Roland, Prof of International Relations, Popular Dissent, Human Agency, and
Global Politics, p. 96-7]
During the twentieth century practices of popular dissent surged and became increasingly global in nature and scope. There is no way a survey could
possibly do justice to the complexity of these phenomena and the various perceptions of human agency that they espouse. An analysis can, however,
evoke some of the main themes that have come to play a crucial role in our understanding of dissent. For this purpose I investigate practices of direct
action, a specifically la Boe´tiean form of resistance that is employed when the official channels for political action, such as elections, referenda,
petitions or lobbying do not exist or are considered inadequate for the resolution of the conflict in question. Direct
action aims to
empower those who do not have access to conventional forms of political influence. It seeks to open
up possibilities for social change that are absent within the context of the established legal system.2 Direct action entered the twentieth century
through a number of authors who have interpreted and expanded Gandhian practices of resistance. After analysing two of its early advocates, Clarence
Marsh Case and Richard B. Gregg, the inquiry will focus on the work of Martin Luther King Jr and Gene Sharp to reveal the
images of
human agency that are implied in their approach to popular dissent. The investigation remains genealogical insofar as it seeks to
draw attention to the constitution of meaning by focusing on a relatively unfamiliar representation of dissent, direct action, to then reveal how more
familiar images of popular resistance have emerged out of it. They are
images of heroic rebellion, of social change
through great events. To be more precise, the common image that underlies many contemporary
forms of dissent reflects a legacy of thought that emerged from interactions between
romantic attachments to an autonomous Self and an Enlightenment quest for certainty in an
age of turmoil and constant flux. The resulting fusion of reason and free will upholds and
freezes one specific image of dissent to the detriment of others. The present chapter takes the first step towards
demonstrating how this image has shaped and delineated not only our understanding of human agency but also its practical applicability.
Narratives
Transform Agency
Narratives transform our understanding of agency and actors
Stone-Mediatore 03 Assistant Professor of Philosophy at Ohio Wesleyan University
(Shari Reading Across Borders: Storytelling and Knowledges of Resistance 2003
http://books.google.com)
Marginal experience narratives playa role in oppositional politics that discourse analysis, social
theory, and factual data cannot replace. When storytellers use writing creatively to grapple with
obscure or contradictory experiences and when they situate t3hese experiences historically, they
bring into public view the social pressures and social alternatives that have shaped many
people's daily lives but that have been systematically omitted from ruling narratives. Moreover,
when marginal experience narratives bring into our language and historical memory the muted
tensions and ambiguities of daily experience, they initiate new ways of constructing the
categories bywhich we interpret historical life. They sketch, for instance, "actors" that cross
cultural and national boundaries, "action" that is enacted in diffuse gestures by people who
are excluded from public life, and "historical events" that develop outside the parameters of
official events and government arenas. Narration of historical experience is, in fact, crucial to a
meaningful rethinking of these categories, for only close attention to the nuances and
contradictions of historical life can recast such categories in a way that resonates in our daily
lives, moves us to engage in political projects, and enables us to do so with attention to the
complex contours of our world. While a theory of language or society may contribute to
ideology critique or to the development of counterhegemonic discourses, only the continual
reckoning with historically specific experiences ensures that those alternative discourses do
not themselves become dogmatic but are responsive to evolving, multifaceted historical
struggles. Finally, when writers use narration strategically to publicize obscured experiences,
they enrich not only language practices but experience itself, for they provide a new lens
through which we can organize our everyday experience and historical world. Neither
empirical reporting nor discourse analysis has this effect on our experience of our identity and
history. Certainly the reporting of empirical data can add crucial, missing information to
historical documents. And the rhetorical analysis of such documents can elucidate the
ideological mechanisms that structure our interpretation of our world. Beyond this, however,
narratives that probe ways to articulate and situate unspoken tensions in everyday life can
transform experience, helping those of us who have been reduced to "victim" or "cheap labor"
to claim agency and helping all of us to identify with cross-border, cross-culture demo~ eratic
struggles.
K2 Political Solidarity
Narratives are important to political solidarity
Mohanty 04 Professor of Women’s Studies at Hamilton College
Chandra Talpade, Feminism Without Borders, p 77
This section focuses on life story-oriented written narratives, but this is clearly only one, albeit
important, context in which to examine the development of political consciousness. Writing is
itself an activity marked by class and ethnic position. However, testimonials, life stories, and
oral histories are a significant mode of remembering and recording experience and struggles.
Written texts are not produced in a vacuum. In fact, texts that document Third World
women's life histories owe their existence as much to the exigencies of the political and
commercial marketplace as to the knowledge, skills, motivation, and location of individual
writers.
Narratives Promote Cultural Understanding
Narratives are crucial to creating cross-cultural understandings without
claiming to completely “know” the experiences of others
Young 96 Professor of Political Science at the University of Chicago
(Iris Marion, “Communication and the Other: Beyond Deliberative Democracy,” Democracy and
Difference, Ed. Seyla Benhabib]
In a communicative democracy participants in discussion aim at reaching understandings about solutions to their collective problems. Although there is
hardly a speaking situation in which participants have no shared meanings, disagreements, divergent understandings, and varying perspectives are also
usually present. In situations of conflict that discussion aims to address, groups
often begin with misunderstandings or a
sense of complete lack of understanding of who their interlocutors are, and a sense that their own needs,
desires, and motives are not understood. This is especially so where class or culture separates the parties. Doing
justice under such circumstances of differences requires recognizing the particularity of individuals and
groups as much as seeking general interests. Narrative fosters understanding across such
difference without making those who are different symmetrical, in at least three ways. First, narrative
reveals the particular experiences of those in social locations, experiences that cannot be
shared by those situated differently but that they must understand in order to do justice to
the others. Imagine that wheelchair-bound people at a university make claims upon university resources to remove what they see as
impediments to their full participation, and to give them positive aid in ways they claim will equalize their ability to compete with able-bodied students
for academic status. A primary way they make their case will be through telling stories of their physical, temporal, social, and emotional obstacles. It
would be a mistake to say that once they hear these stories the others understand the situation of the wheelchair-bound to the extent that they can
adopt their point of view. On the contrary, the storytelling provides enough understanding of the situation of the wheelchair-bound by those who can
walk for them to understand that they cannot share the experience. Narrative
exhibits subjective experience to other
subjects. The narrative can evoke sympathy while maintaining distance because the narrative also
carries an inexhaustible latent shadow, the transcendence of the Other, that there is always more to be told. Second, narrative
reveals a source of values, culture, and meaning. When an argument proceeds from premise to conclusion, it is only as
persuasive as the acceptance of its premises among deliberators. Few institutions bring people together to face collective problems, moreover, where
the people affected, however divided and diverse, can share no premises. Pluralist polities, however, often face serious divergences in value premises,
cultural practices and meanings, and these disparities bring conflict, insensitivity, insult, and misunderstanding. Under these circumstances,
narrative can serve to explain to outsiders what practices, places, or symbols mean to the
people who hold them. Values, unlike norms, often cannot be justified through argument. But neither are they arbitrary. Their basis often
emerges from the situated history of a people. Through narrative the outsiders may come to understand why
the insiders value what they value and why they have the priorities they have. How do the Lakota
convey to others in South Dakota why the Black Hills mean so much to them, and why they believe they have special moral warrant o demand a stop to
forestry in the Black Hills? Through stories—myths in which the Black Hills figure as primary characters, stories of Lakota individuals and groups in
relation to those mountains values appear as a result of a history by which a group relate ‘where they are coming from.” Finally, narrative not
only exhibits experience and values from the point of stew of the subjects that have and hold them. It also reveals
a total social
knowledge from the point of view of that social position. Each social perspective has an account not only of its own
life and history but of every other position that affects its experience. Thus listeners can learn about how their own
position, actions, and values appear to others from the stories they tell. Narrative thus exhibits the situated
knowledge available of the collective from each perspective, and the combination of narratives from different
perspectives produces the collective social wisdom not available from any one position.
Narratives are key to relating experiences of injustice that otherwise cannot be
shared – they are crucial to cross-cultural communication
Young 2000, Professor of Political Science at the University of Chicago
[Iris Marion, Inclusion and Democracy, p.70-7]
Another mode of expression, narrative,
serves important functions in democratic communication, to foster understanding
among members of a polity with very different experience or assumptions about what is
important. In recent years a number of legal theorists have turned to narrative as a means of giving voice to kinds of experience which often go
unheard in legal discussions and courtroom settings, and as a means of challenging the idea that law expresses an impartial and neutral standpoint
above all particular perspectives. Some legal theorists discuss the way that storytelling in the legal context functions to challenge a hegemonic view and
express the particularity of experience to which the law ought to respond but often does not. Several scholars of Latin American literature offer
another variant of a theory of the political function of storytelling, in their reflections on testimonio. Some resistance movement leaders in Central and
South America narrate their life stories as a means of exposing to the wider literate world the oppression of their people and the repression they suffer
from their governments. Often such testimonios involve one person’s story standing or speaking for that of a whole group to a wider, sometimes
global, public, and making claims upon that public for the group. This raises important questions about how a particular person’s story can speak for
others,’ and whether speaking to the literate First World public changes the construction of the story.22 While these are important questions, here I
wish only to indicate a debt to both of these literatures, and analyse these insights with an account of some of the political functions of storytelling.
Suppose we in a public want to make arguments to justify proposals for how to solve our collective problems or resolve our conflicts justly. In order to
proceed, those of us engaged in meaningful political discussion and debate must share many things. We must share a description of the problem, share
an idiom in which to express alternative proposals, share rules of evidence and prediction, and share some normative principles which can serve as
premisses in our arguments about what ought to be done. When all these conditions exist, then we can engage in reasonable disagreement.
Fortunately, in most political disputes these conditions are met in some respect and to some degree, but for many political disputes they are not met in
other respects and degrees. When these conditions for meaningful argument do not obtain, does this mean that we must or should resort to a mere
power contest or to some other arbitrary decision procedure? I say not, Where
we lack shared understandings in crucial
respects, sometimes forms of communication other than argument can speak across our
differences to promote understanding. I take the use of narrative in political communication to be one important such mode.
Political narrative differs from other forms of narrative by its intent and its audience context. I tell the story not primarily to entertain or reveal myself,
but to make a point—to demonstrate, describe, explain, or justify something to others in an ongoing political discussion. Political narrative furthers
discussion across difference in several ways. Response to the ‘differend’. Chapter 1 discussed how a radical
injustice can occur when
those who suffer a wrongful harm or oppression lack the terms to express a claim of injustice
within the prevailing normative discourse. Those who suffer this wrong are excluded from the polity, at least with respect to that wrong. Lyotard calls
this situation the differend. How can a group that suffers a particular harm or oppression move from a situation of total silencing and exclusion with
respect to this suffering to its public expression? Storytelling
is often an important bridge in such cases between
the mute experience of being wronged and political arguments about justice. Those who
experience the wrong, and perhaps some others who sense it, may have no language for expressing the
suffering as an injustice, but nevertheless they can tell stories that relate a sense of wrong. As
people tell such stories publicly within and between groups, discursive reflection on them
then develops a normative language that names their injustice and can give a general account
of why this kind of suffering constitutes an injustice. A process something like this occurred in the United States and
elsewhere in the 1970s and 1980s, as injustice we now call sexual harassment gradually came into public discussion. Women had long experienced the
stress, fear, pain, and humiliation in their workplace that courts today name as a specific harm. Before the language and theory of sexual harassment
was invented, however, women usually suffered in silence, without a language or forum in which to make a reasonable complaint. As a result of
women telling stories to each other and to wider publics about their treatment by men on the job and the consequences of this treatment, however, a
problem that had no name was gradually identified and named, and a social moral and legal theory about the problem developed. Facilitation of local
publics and articulation of collective affinities. Political communication in mass democratic societies hardly ever consists in all the people affected by an
issue assembling together in a single forum to discuss it. Instead, political debate is widely dispersed in space and time, and takes place within and
between many smaller publics. By a ‘local public’ I mean a collective of persons allied within the wider polity with respect to particular interests,
opinions, and/or social positions.23 Storytelling is often an important means by which members of such collectives identify one another, and identify
the basis of their affinity. The
narrative exchanges give reflective, voice to situated experiences and help
affinity groupings give an account of their own individual identities in relation to their social
positioning and their affinities with others.24 Once in formation, people in local publics often use narrative
as means of politicizing their situation, by reflecting on the extent to which they experience
similar problems and what political remedy for them they might propose. Examples of such local publics
emerging from reflective stories include the processes of ‘consciousness-raising’ in which some people in the women’s movement engaged, and which
brought out problems of battering or sexual harassment where these were not yet recognized as problems. Understanding the experience of others
and countering preunderstandings. Storytelling
is often the only vehicle for understanding the particular
experiences of those in particular social situations, experiences not shared by those situated
differently, but which they must understand in order to do justice.25
Narrative Challenges Stereotypes
Narratives are necessary to correct for stereotypes and misconceptions about
other groups
Young 2000, Professor of Political Science at the University of Chicago
[Iris Marion, Inclusion and Democracy, p.70-7]
While it sometimes happens that people know they are ignorant about the lives of others in the polity, perhaps more often
people come
to a situation of political discussion with a stock of empty generalities, false assumptions, or
incomplete and biased pictures of the needs, aspirations, and histories of others with whom
or about whom they communicate. Such pre-understandings often depend on stereotypes or
overly narrow focus on a particular aspect of the lives of the people represented in them. People
with disabilities, to continue the example, too often must respond to assumptions of others that their lives are joyless, that they have truncated
capabilities to achieve excellence, or have little social and no sex lives. Narratives
often help target and correct such preunderstandings. Revealing the source of values, priorities, or cultural meanings. For an argument to get
off the ground, its auditors must accept its premises. Pluralist polities, however, often face serious divergences in value premises, cultural practices,
and meanings, and these disparities bring conflict, insensitivity, insult, and misunderstanding. Lacking shared premises, communicatively democratic
discussion, cannot proceed through reasoned argument under these circumstances, Under such circumstances, narrative
can serve to
explain to outsiders what practices, places, or symbols mean to the people who hold them
and why they are valuable. Values, unlike norms, often cannot be justified through argument. But neither are they arbitrary. Their basis
often emerges from the situated narrative of persons or groups, Through narrative the outsiders may come to
understand why the insiders value what they value and why they have the priorities they
have.
A2:
A2: Intersectionality (Perm)
Feminism is a good lens for analyzing Intersectional politics
Peterson 10 [V. Spike: You should know who this is… but. Professor of International Relations
at the School of Government and Public Policy. Former fellow at the Gender Institute and
London School of Economics. “Gendered Identities, Ideologies, and Practices in the Context of
War and Militarism” Gender, War, and Militarism: Feminist Perspectives edited by Laura Sjoberg
and Sandra Via. Praeger security international, Santa Barbara p. 17 – 18].
For a variety of reasons elaborated elsewhere (Peterson 2005), I find the theory/practice
emerging from feminist and critical race scholarship particularly fruitful for analyzing
intersectionality. On the one hand, feminisms have transdisciplinary and complex analytical
resources for investigating and theorizing about identity, difference, and structural
hierarchies. On the other hand, differences among women have forced feminists (too often
reluctantly and always uncomfortably) to reflect critically on the meaning of feminism,
operations of power among women, the politics of representation, and the dangers of
overgeneralizing. As one consequence, feminist scholarship has contributed to a richer
understanding of analytics and politics, or theory and practice, as interdependent. Key to this
development is understanding gender as both an empirical and an analytical category. The
former refers to the embodied and ostensibly biological binary of male–female sex difference.
Understood empirically, gender can be deployed as a variable to investigate, for example, how
women and men are differently affected by, and differently participate in, political and
economic practices. This is the more familiar use of gender in contemporary research, especially
in the social sciences. Analytical gender is less familiar; it refers to the signifying system of
masculine–feminine differentiations that constitutes a governing code. The claim here is that
gender pervades language and culture, systemically shaping not only who we are but also how
we think and what we do. As historically constituted, the dichotomy of gender codes
masculine qualities as oppositional to and more highly valued than feminine qualities.
Understanding gender analytically then generates a crucial and transformative feminist
insight: the (symbolic, discursive) cultural privileging of that which is identified with
masculinity is key to naturalizing the (symbolic, discursive, cultural, corporeal, material,
economic) power relations that constitute multiple forms of subjection. This knowledge
allows for more adequately theorizing, and hence politicizing, intersectionality.
A2: Women’s Inclusion in Politics/Society Solves
Gains for women haven’t solved the problem – women’s needs AS WOMEN are
not addressed and the gendered structures of government and economics
remain in tact
Sjoberg and Via 10 [Laura: professor at University of Florida, feminist scholar of international
relations and international security, PhD from USC, JD from Boston College and Sandra:
professor of Political Science at Ferrum College. Gender, War, and Militarism: Feminist
Perspectives Praeger security international, Santa Barbara p. 6]
It remains a puzzle to some scholars and policy makers why the situation of women around
the world is not improving exponentially with their integration into war fighting and the
proliferation of policies meant to protect them. Feminist scholars have argued that the
disconnect between woman-friendly policies and results in women’s lives is twofold. First,
although women are being included in different areas of global politics with greater
frequency, their needs as women often remain unconsidered and unaddressed. In other
words, women are being integrated into a world that remains defined and shaped by men’s
interests and needs. Second, attempts to better the situation of women often do not pay
attention to the gendered nature of the structures of government and economics that remain
in place even when women are formally included. In no area of global politics are these
problems more evident than in the realm of armed conflict. More than 20 years ago, Betty
Reardon (1985) identified the “war system,” a cycle of violence that at once relies on and
perpetuates the oppression of women. Many feminist scholars have observed the continuity of
gender subordination in the realm of war and conflict. Women’s needs as women are often not
understood in international conflict. For example, for the first years of the United Nations
sanctions regime on Iraq, Iraqi women had difficulty finding ways to buy prenatal vitamins and
baby milk on the black market because they were not seen as basic needs and exempted from
the embargo (Vickers 1993). The second point, the gendered nature of the structures that
remain in place from before women’s integration, is equally challenging. Cynthia Enloe pointed
out that women’s integration into state and other military groups does not change the gender
basis of those groups’ identities and expectations (2000). In other words, women who join war
fighting and peacemaking do not do so in armies or negotiations that are suddenly gender
neutral because they are willing to include women. Instead, they join groups whose terms,
premises, and behavioral norms are already defined in terms of the masculine values that they
have prized before the inclusion of women.
A2: We Can Reform / CPs
We’re not benevolent---logic of liberal empire allows political elite to hijack the
discussion of militarism
Andrew J. Bacevich 13 Jr. (born 1947) is an American political scientist specializing in
international relations, security studies, American foreign policy, and American diplomatic and
military history. He is currently Professor of International Relations and History at Boston
University.[1] He is also a retired career officer in the United States Army. He is a former director
of Boston University's Center for International Relations (from 1998 to 2005) and author of
several books, including American Empire: The Realities and Consequences of US Diplomacy
(2002), The New American Militarism: How Americans are Seduced by War (2005) and The
Limits of Power: The End of American Exceptionalism (2008). He has also appeared on television
shows such as The Colbert Report and the Bill Moyers Report and has written op-eds which have
appeared in papers such as The New York Times, Washington Post, Wall Street Journal, Boston
Globe, Los Angeles Times, and Financial Times. He is also a member of the Council on Foreign
Relations. “The new American militarism: how Americans are seduced by war,” 2013, Oxford
University Press, DOA: 8-1-13, y2k
Even among Left-liberal activists , the reflexive anti-militarism of the 1960 s has given way to
a more nuanced view . Although hard-pressed to match self-aggrandizing conservative claims
of being one with the troops, progressives have come to appreciate the potential for using the
armed services to advance their own agenda . Do-gooders want to harness military power to their
efforts to do good. Thus, the most persistent calls for U.S. intervention abroad to relieve the
plight of the abused and persecuted come from the militant Left. In the present moment,
writes Michael Ignatieff, empire has become a precondition for democracy. Ignatieff, a
prominent human rights advocate, summons the United States to use imperial power to
strengthen respect for self-determination [and] to give states back to abused, oppressed
people who deserve to rule them for themselves. 41 Likewise, liberals have grown
comfortable with seeing the military establishment itself not as an obstacle to social change
but as a venue in which to promote it, pointing the way for the rest of society on matters such
as race, gender, and sexual orientation. Advanced thinking on the Left calls not for bashing
Colonel Blimp or General Halftrack as a retrograde warmonger but for enlisting his assistance
(willing or not) on behalf of progressive causes. The imperative of political leaders always and
in every case offering unconditional and unequivocal support for the troops gives rise to a
corollaryone that illustrates militarization’s impact on the calculus governing elite political
behavior on questions of war and peace.
A2: RAND / Think Tank Ev
Reject evidence from RAND and other defense institutions
Andrew J. Bacevich 13 Jr. (born 1947) is an Americ2an political scientist specializing in
international relations, security studies, American foreign policy, and American diplomatic and
military history. He is currently Professor of International Relations and History at Boston
University.[1] He is also a retired career officer in the United States Army. He is a former director
of Boston University's Center for International Relations (from 1998 to 2005) and author of
several books, including American Empire: The Realities and Consequences of US Diplomacy
(2002), The New American Militarism: How Americans are Seduced by War (2005) and The
Limits of Power: The End of American Exceptionalism (2008). He has also appeared on television
shows such as The Colbert Report and the Bill Moyers Report and has written op-eds which have
appeared in papers such as The New York Times, Washington Post, Wall Street Journal, Boston
Globe, Los Angeles Times, and Financial Times. He is also a member of the Council on Foreign
Relations. “The new American militarism: how Americans are seduced by war,” 2013, Oxford
University Press, DOA: 8-1-13, y2k
With others joining Brodie, that calling formed the basis of a new profession, its members known as
defense intellectuals . It gave birth to new institutions such as the RAND Corporation , the federally funded
research facility founded in Santa Monica, California, in 1946 , with Brodie as one of its first hires. RAND assembled a circle of
mathematicians, economists, and political scientists that in addition to Brodie included such
luminaries as Charles Hitch, Herman Kahn, and John von Neumann. The defense intellectuals produced a vast
literature, most of it highly classified and bristling with jargon “not incredible counterforce first-strike” and
“Doomsday Machine,” “overkill” and “mutual annihilation,” “MAD,” and “N+ 1.” Although ostensibly of enormous
importance to the survival of humankind, these arcane writings were accessible only to a
few . As charter members of the new postwar national security elite , Brodie and the other high priests of
nuclear strategy came to wield great influence, without the burden of actual responsibility .
Members of this priesthood remained largely hidden from public view and thus unaccountable. By
comparison, the curia of the Roman Catholic Church seemed a model of openness and transparency. There
was, however, a
problem. Brodie’s Dictum, the text from which the priesthood drew its raison dtre rested on
an utterly false premise . Hiroshima had not, in fact, robbed violence of its political utility. It had
certainly not made war obsolete . The events of August 1945 had at most blocked up the
channel through which military history had coursed during the previous several decades.toward
the Somme, Sedan, and Stalingrad. and diverted it in the direction of Inchon, Dien Bien Phu, and the Sinai. Moreover, even before the battlefields of the
1950 s and 1960 s made the point self-evident, members of the priesthood already grasped that Brodie Moreover, even before the battlefields of the
1950 s and 1960 s made the point self-evident, members of the priesthood already grasped that Brodie’sDictum was in error. But
they
persisted in pretending otherwise, for the Dictum provided useful camouflage, concealing the
priesthoodactual purpose. The Pentagon was not, in fact, funding the research undertaken by
Brodie and his colleagues in a high-minded search for ways to prevent the recurrence of
Hiroshima. From the outset, the object of the exercise was entirely pragmatic: to perpetuate the
advantages that had accrued to the United States as a consequence of Hiroshima and to use those
advantages to advance vital American interests, without triggering World War III. This was the
challenge that imbued nuclear strategy with excitement and allure. In that regard, the really interesting
arguments were not with the hopelessly naive One Worlders or the hopelessly simple-minded
generals but with the economists, mathematicians, and political scientists across the corridor
or down the hall, whether at RAND or any of the other institutions such as Harvard, MIT, and the University
of Chicago where
members of the priesthood congregated . To inhabit the world that Brodie and
his compatriots created was to engage daily in the cut and thrust of high-level intellectual
combat, where the issue at hand was not truth
as such.the nuclear strategistworld contained few fixed truths.but the
honing of alternatives, trade-offs, and risks, conceived and evaluated in a context of political uncertainty and rapid technological change.
A2: “We can just read the stories”
Divorcing narratives from the alternative simply casts them as exotic stories to
be consumed
Mohanty 2004 Professor of Women’s Studies at Hamilton College,
(Chandra Talpade, Feminism without Borders p 77-78)
For example, critics have pointed to the proliferation of experientially oriented texts by Third
World women as evidence of "diversity" in U.S. feminist circles. Such texts now accompany
"novels" by black and Third World women in women's studies curricula. However, in spite of the
fact that the growing demand among publishers for culturally diverse life (hi)stories indicates
a recognition of plural realities and experiences as well as a diversification of inherited
Eurocentric canons, often this demand takes the form of the search for more "exotic" and
"different" stories in which individual women write as truth-tellers and authenticate "their
own oppression," in the tradition of Euro-American women's autobiography. In other words,
the mere proliferation of Third World women's texts, in the West at least, owes as much to
the relations of the marketplace as to the conviction to "testify" or "bear witness." Thus, the
existence of Third World women's narratives in itself is not evidence of decentering
hegemonic histories and subjectivities. It is the way in which they are read, understood, and
located institutionally that is of paramount importance. After all, the point is not just to
record one's history of struggle, or consciousness, but how they are recorded; the way we
read, receive, and disseminate such imaginative records is immensely significant. It is this very
question of reading, theorizing, and locating these writings that I touch on in the examples
below. The consolidation and legitimation of testimonials as a form of Latin American oral
history (history from below) owes as much to the political imperatives of such events as the
Cuban revolution as to the motivations and desires of the intellectuals and revolutionaries who
were/are the agents of these testimonials. The significance of representing "the people" as
subjects of struggle is thus encapsulated in the genre of testimonials, a genre that is, unlike
traditional autobiography, constitutively public, and collective (for and of the people).
Ks
A2: Capitalism
Identity based politics are necessary to challenge capitalist modernity –
critiques of capitalism that do not start from a politics of place only devalue all
forms of localized action
Escobar, 2004 Professor of Anthropology [Arturo, “Beyond the Third World: Imperial
Globality, Global Coloniality and Anti-globalization Social Movements,” Third World Quarterly,
25.1, p.220-1]0
The goal of many (not all) of the anti-globalisation struggles can be seen as the defence of particular, placebased historical conceptions of the world and practices of world-making—more precisely, as a
defence of particular constructions of place, including the reorganisations of place that might
be deemed necessary according to the power struggles within place. These struggles are
place-based, yet transnationalised.^" The politics of place is an emergent form of politics, a
novel political imaginary in that it asserts a logic of difference and possibility that builds on
the multiplicity of actors and actions operating at the level of everyday life. In this view, places are
the site of live cultures, economies and environments rather than nodes in a global and allembracing capitalist system. In Gibson-Graham's conceptualisation, this politics of place—often favoured by
women, environmentalist and those struggling for alternative forms of livelihood—is a lucid response to the type of
'politics of empire' which is also common on the Left and which requires that empire be
confronted at the same level of totality, thereby devaluing all forms of localised action, reducing
it to accommodation or reformism. As Gibson-Graham does not cease to remind us, 'places always fail to be fully
capitalist, and herein lie their potential to become something other'.^' Or, in the language of the MC
project, there is an exteriority to imperial globality—a result of both global coloniality and placebased cultural dynamics, which are irreducible to the terms of capitalist modernity.8
A2: Biopolitics
The strategic reversibility of power opens up space for overturning biopolitics
through making claims on the state
Campbell 98 [David, Prof of International Politics, Writing Security: United States Foreign
Policy and the Politics of Identity, p. 204-5]
The political possibilities enabled by this permanent provocation of power and freedom can be specified in more detail by thinking in terms of the
predominance of the "bio-power" discussed above. In this sense, because
the governmental practices of biopolitics in
Western nations have been increasingly directed toward modes of being and forms of life—such that sexual conduct
has become an object of concern, individual health has been figured as a domain of discipline, and the family has been transformed into an instrument
of government— the
ongoing agonism between those practices and the freedom they seek to
contain means that individuals have articulated a series of counter-demands drawn from those new
fields of concern. For example, as the state continues to prosecute people according to sexual orientation, human rights activists have proclaimed the
right of gays to enter into formal marriages, adopt children, and receive the same health and insurance benefits granted to their straight counterparts.
These claims are a consequence of the permanent provocation of power and freedom in
biopolitics, and stand as testament to the "strategic reversibility" of power relations: if the
terms of governmental practices can be made into focal points for resistances, then the
"history of government as the 'conduct of conduct' is interwoven with the history of
dissenting 'counter-conducts.' "39 Indeed, the emergence of the state as the major articulation of
"the political" has involved an unceasing agonism between those in office and those they rule.
State intervention in everyday life has long incited popular collective action, the result of
which has been both resistance to the state and new claims upon the state. In particular, "the core
of what we now call 'citizenship'... consists of multiple bargains hammered out by rulers and ruled in
the course of their struggles over the means of state action, especially the making of war."40 In more recent times,
constituencies associated with women's, youth, ecological, and peace movements (among others) have also issued claims on society.41 These
resistances are evidence that the break with the discursive/ nondiscursive dichotomy central to the logic of interpretation undergirding this analysis is
(to put it in conventional terms) not only theoretically licensed; it is empirically warranted. Indeed, expanding the interpretive imagination so as to
enlarge the categories through which we understand the constitution of "the political" has been a necessary precondition for making sense of Foreign
Policy's concern for the ethical borders of identity in America. Accordingly, there are manifest political implications that flow from theorizing identity.
As Judith Butler concluded: "The deconstruction of identity is not the deconstruction of politics; rather, it establishes as political the very terms through
which identity is articulated.
A2: Reject Alts
The notion of “individual rejection” is based on a view of subjectivity that has
its roots in Enlightenment Romanticism – it deifies the heroic individual
Bleiker 2000 [Roland, Prof of International Relations, Popular Dissent, Human Agency, and
Global Politics, p. 81-6]
There are various ways through which one could observe how, during the second half of the nineteenth century, ideas
about popular dissent gradually turned into political practices that became highly significant in ever-more parts of the world. An illustrative example
must suffice. The American romantic Henry David Thoreau is one of the authors who popularised the notion of radical resistance to government. Some
have argued that his ideas were directly influenced by la Boe´tie.16 This claim is at best speculative. Thoreau’s close friend, the poet Ralph Waldo
Emerson, was certainly aware of la Boe´tie. The title of a poem and a notebook entry from early 1843 suggest that Emerson knew him, at least via a
reading of Montaigne’s Essais.17 Thoreau’s writings, however, are silent about the Anti-One, and so are most of his biographers. 18 But this is, in some
sense, secondary to the fact that the idea of popular dissent, initially articulated by la Boe´tie, came to shape a variety of
discursive practices. Genealogies do not attempt to trace ideas back to an authentic starting point. They observe how sets of common values, norms
and behaviours have emerged from a multitude of sources and directions. With or without drawing directly on the Anti-One, Thoreau almost literally
re-articulated many of its key claims and then embedded them into a romantic world-view. His writings imply, like la Boe´tie’s, that
any form
of government rests upon popular consent, and if this consent is withdrawn, even the most
authoritarian regime will crumble like a house of cards. Passive withdrawal, so-called civil disobedience, is enough to
trigger this process. Writing in protest against slavery and the war with Mexico, Thoreau argues in 1848: [I]f one thousand, if one hundred, if ten men
whom I could name, – if ten honest men only, – aye, if one HONEST man, in this State of Massachusetts, ceasing to hold slaves, were actually to
withdraw from this copartnership, and be locked up in the county jail therefor, it would be the abolition of slavery in America. . . A minority is
powerless while it conforms to the majority; it is not even a minority then; but it is irresistible when it clogs by its whole weight. If the alternative is to
keep all just men in prison, or give up war and slavery, the State will not hesitate which to choose.19 Thoreau’s concept of withdrawing
consent is embedded in a theory of power that could literally have been lifted out of the Anti-One. His main focus, however, does not lie with the
masses and their ability to overthrow a ruler. It is almost exclusively geared towards fighting for and protecting the
autonomy of the individual. Thoreau exemplifies the crux of political Romanticism, a Self that is
autonomous and has priority over everything else. This tendency to deify the individual has
been interpreted in various ways. Carl Schmitt called it subjectified occasionalism, a situation in which the romantic ego, embedding the final authority,
relegates the world and everything else into a mere occasion.20 Rene´ Girard talks of ‘romantic lies’ – illusions
that consider the
subject as the centre of everything. The romantic, he says, ‘wants to be persuaded that his desire is inscribed into the nature of
things or, which amounts to the same, that he is the emanation of a serene subjectivity, the creation ex nihilo of a quasi-divine Self’.21 While
Enlightenment thought had employed science and reason to restore certainty in the world, Romanticism
anchored its worldview in a sovereign subject and an unbounded trust in the power of human agency. The overall quest,
however, remained the same: to fill the vacuum that had opened up after the death of God. Thoreau argues that the state may have superior physical
strength, but it can never interfere with an individual’s intellectual or moral senses. The state, ‘timid’ and ‘half-witted’, can inflict punishment upon
one’s body, but this strategy is of no match to a Thoreau who proclaims that ‘I will breathe after my own fashion. Let us see who is the strongest’.22
While reconstructing the night he spent in jail for refusing to pay taxes, Thoreau stresses that the thick walls of solid stone, the iron door and grating,
indeed, the entire power of the state’s repressive apparatus could not reach him – a great waste of stone and mortar they were, he says.23 For
romantics, nothing can touch the autonomous Self, not the prison, not the repressive state, not
even the subtle power of societal customs. Awoke the romantic hero: the individual who rises to the occasion
and challenges the repressive forces around ‘him’, the one who ‘stands resolutely and
incorruptly against decadence, evil and deceit, until they are exposed for what they are’.24 It is,
however, important to remember that the speculative idealism and the strong notion of human agency that is entailed in this deification of the Self was
an important but not uncontested position within romantic thought. Other forms of Romanticism flourished at the same time. Consider, for example,
the feminist Romanticism that evolved parallel to the canonical masculine one. This body of literature shared some of the above-mentioned themes,
such as the hostility towards authority, a sense of identification with the victim, or a focus on emotions and the construction of subjectivities.25 But
feminine forms of Romanticism also differed in various crucial aspects. Most women writers, such as Mary Shelley, Jane Austen, Mary Wollstonecraft or
Dorothy Wordsworth did not pursue the search for a visionary freedom beyond the confines of the state. Instead, they were concerned with the social
constraints that had been imposed upon them. They employed the novel as a site of contestation, expressing the manner in which their female
subjectivity was intertwined with and confined by concrete daily concerns, linked to such issues as family, community or female bodies.26 This contrast
is well reflected in the work of Margaret Fuller, Thoreau’s contemporary and fellow Bostonian. Fuller clearly rejects the sense of autonomy and
unboundedness that prevails in Thoreau’s Romanticism. For her, the discursive prison walls are much thicker than they are for Thoreau. It is,
consequently, the social construction of femininity and masculinity that is the subject of her inquiries.27 Later parts of this book will return in detail to
the themes opened up by Fuller and others. For the moment, however, the attention rests primarily with the dominant, masculine and activist heritage
of Romanticism. This is not to suggest that this strain is more insightful or authentic than others, but to recognise that through its hegemonic status it
has played a crucial role in shaping the formation of our contemporary consciousness. The
right to refuse allegiance to a government
that engages in acts of tyranny is a theme that resonates not just in romantic, but also in liberal discourses. Nancy
Rosenblum, for example, interprets Thoreau’s Romanticism as a combination of heroic individualism and liberal democracy. She argues that Thoreau
advances a libertarian agenda that constantly oscillates between a liberal concern for the public sphere and a radical romantic detachment from it.28
There are indeed parallels between liberalism and the la Boe´tiean tradition. The importance of the individual and a deep distrust towards government
provides both of these strains of thought with an inherent antiauthoritarian core, at least in theory. But Thoreau also displays very strong anarchist
traits. Disgusted with a state that endorses slavery and war, he wants to disengage altogether from this repressive institution, ‘withdraw and stand
aloof from it effectually’.29 His two year stay at Walden Pond is, of course, the embodiment of this withdrawal, the classical Rousseauean return to
nature. Implied in this withdrawal, and at times explicitly articulated, is a much deeper distrust towards the state, indeed, towards every societal
organisation that controls the individual and ‘his’ mind. For
Thoreau injustice is a necessary product of the
machinery of government. An individual cannot be free as long as ‘he’ operates within the
confines of the state. In some of his more combative moments, Thoreau assumes a passionate anarchist stance,
declares war against the state and portrays government as a demonic force, a monster, ‘a semi-human
tiger or ox, stalking over the earth with its heart taken out and the top of its brain shot away’.30 It is this anarchist element that sucks Thoreau right
into the vortex of la Boetie’s legacy. But there are still several missing links between an individualistic anarchist revival of la Boe´tie and a theory of
collective resistance. Romantic dissent focuses on the primacy of the perceiver and the poetisation of political practice. This pushes romantics, at least
according to the influential opinion of Carl Schmitt, towards a situation in which conflicts are not addressed, but deferred, subjectified, transplanted
into a higher realm of aesthetic imagination.31 Some even claim that romantic thought contains, by definition, a conservative core.32 One can argue
with such an interpretations, and I shall do so later.
A2: Withdraw Alts
Withdrawal undermines possibilities for agency – transversal dissent always
operates on the terrain of power exploiting the cracks within it
Bleiker 2000 [Roland, Prof of International Relations, Popular Dissent, Human Agency, and
Global Politics, p. 213-4]
A tactic does not have the possibility of perceiving its adversary in a space that is distinct,
visible and objectifiable. The space of tactic is always the space of the Other.7 This is to say that a
tactical form of dissent, like shopping, cannot keep its distance from the object of the action. It always
operates in the terrain of the opponent. Tactical actions leave their assigned places, enter a world that is too big to be their
own but also too tightly woven to escape from. Because tactic does not have a specific target and cannot separate between the I and the Other, it can
never conquer something, it can never keep what it wins. Tactic
must always seize the moment and explore cracks
that open up within existing discursive orders. It must constantly manipulate its environment
in order to create opportunities for social change.8 It is through the concept of temporality that we can appreciate the
ways in which tactical actions unleash their transformative and transversal potential. The causality entailed in a discursive understanding of human
agency, as far as one can speak of causality in this diffused context, is always mediated through time. But temporality is a slippery concept, an
experience that is, according to Gaston Bachelard, never pure.9 Tactical actions, de Certeau stresses, operate along ‘indeterminate trajectories’. This
means, in a first instance, that tactic works discursively, that it transforms values and becomes visible and effective only through maturation over time.
In a second instance, the indeterminacy of the trajectory refers to the fact that tactical
actions defy the spatial logic
established by the organising procedures of a particular political or economic system. Expressed in
de Certeau’s somewhat idiosyncratic language, tactical actions cannot be perceived as a conventional succession of events in space. They evoke a
temporal movement, one that focuses on the diachronic succession of points, rather than the figure that these points establish on a supposedly
synchronic and achronic space. The latter view, de Certeau stresses, would make the mistake of reducing a ‘temporal articulation of places into a spatial
sequence of points’.10 Tactical action contains transversal potential. The above mentioned refusal to buy milk bottled in non-reusable containers
illustrates how tactical manifestations of human agency are not bound by the spatial logic of national sovereignty. The consumer who changes his/her
shopping habits engages in an action that escapes the spatial controlling mechanisms of established political and economic boundaries. The effect of
such a tactical action is not limited to a localised target, say, the supermarket. Over an extended period of time, and in conjunction with similar actions,
such tactical
dissent may influence globalised practices of production, trade, investment,
advertisement and the like. The transversal manifestations that issue from such actions operate along an
indeterminate trajectory insofar as they promote a slow transformation of values whose
effects transgress places and become visible and effective only by maturation over time. Having
introduced, through notions of discourse, tactic and temporality, the conceptual tools for a discursive understanding of human agency, the analysis
now proceeds to examine how a specific everyday form of resistance may exert human agency in a cross-territorial manner. Language, and the
dissident potential contained within it, will be the main focal point. Once more, the inquiry moves back and forth between domination and resistance,
abstraction and dailiness, theory and practice, epistemology and ontology. While navigating through these circular mechanisms of revealing and
concealing it is crucial to resist the temptation of endowing human agency with specific attributes. Rather, the task must revolve around theorising
dissent in a way that recognises how the nature of human agency cannot be separated from how we perceive human action and its ability to shape
global politics.
Withdrawal is absurd – there is no easy way out of discourses of domination.
One has to challenge them from within
Bleiker 2000 [Roland, Prof of International Relations, Popular Dissent, Human Agency, and
Global Politics, p. 269-70]
No political system, no matter how authoritarian, is ever able to dominate all aspects of a society. And no
form of dissent, no matter how radical, is ever entirely autonomous from the political
practices it seeks to engage or distance itself from. There is no easy way out of an existing web
of power and knowledge. Poetic resistance, even if it contains transversal dimensions, cannot achieve success overnight. Indeed, a mere
decade, which is the rough life span of the Prenzlauer Berg scene, can hardly be expected to do more than highlight the difficulties and contradictions
entailed in breaking though a linguistically entrenched political order. It
would have been naive, even absurd, to think that a
group of disillusioned underground poets could escape the claws of power and lift themselves
and their society into a state of perpetual emancipatory triumph. Linguistic dissent works
slowly, by changing the way we speak and think about ourselves and the world we live in. The
young poets of the 1980s were part of this constant process of reframing meaning. They may not have been the heroic freedom fighters they were
sometimes taken to be, but their works and lives can shed light on the complexities that make up the increasingly cross-territorial interaction between
domination and resistance. Some of their poetic engagements with daily life in East Germany will remain important, if only because they captured a
certain zeitgeist, the spirit of a decaying regime. And, for better or for worse, the Prenzlauer Berg writers have triggered a series of controversies that
led to considerable public debate. The best we can hope for, in a sense, is that the ensuing issues, difficult as they are, remain debated in a serious and
sustained manner. It is through the creation of such a debate that the Prenzlauer Berg writers have transcended their immediate sphere of activity. By
embarking on a self-conscious exploration of form, the poets of the 1980s have opened up opportunities to rethink the crucial relationship between
language and politics in spaces that lie far beyond the gradually fading memory of East German wastelands.
Disads
Extinction
The obsession with survival is the root cause of war – it undermines the love of
life
Oliver 2007 Associate Professor of Philosophy at the University of Texas at Austin
[Kelly, Women as Weapons of War, p. 149]
In Kristeva's discussion of the so-called amorous disasters of women suicide bombers and two
versions of freedom, she returns again to the Enlightenment philosopher Immanuel Kant,
specifically to the two pillars of peace from his essay on "Perpetual Peace." Like she did with the
two notions of freedom, Kristeva describes what she takes to be Kant's two pillars of peace:
"first, that of universality-all men are equal and all must be saved. Second is the principle of
protection of human life, sustained by the love of the life of each. "60 She insists that although
we are far from achieving economic justice for all, it is the second pillar and not the first that is
in the most danger today: "Yet whatever the weaknesses, the efforts for realizing social,
economic, and political justice have never in the history of humanity been as considerable and
widespread. But it is the second pillar of the imaginary of peace that seems to me today to
suffer most gravely: The love of life eludes us; there is no longer a discourse for it."61 It is not
just economic, racial, and religious inequalities that prevent peace-although these are
immense-but also the lack of a discourse of the love of life. The culture of death fosters war
over peace because we are losing the ability to imagine the meaning of life beyond mere
survival or profit-margins and; therefore we can no longer imagine ways to embrace life.
Economic justice and the distribution of wealth, however, cannot be separated from questions
of meaning. Increasingly the resources and wealth of the earth are owned by fewer individuals
while most of the world's population lives in poverty. While the majority of the citizens of the
planet struggle to survive, privileged middle-class and rich individuals increasingly feel their
lifestyles threatened by poor people. They guard their possessions with gated communities,
security systems, and high-tech prisons. At the same time they complain of feeling depressed
and exhausted from spending all of their time accumulating wealth, which ultimately leaves
them with feelings of meaninglessness. They have sacrificed the quality of life-the good life-for
goods and services. The distribution of resources is thus related to questions of meaning in
complex ways that affect the "haves" differently from the "have-nots." As we have seen, within
patriarchal cultures and institutions both the distribution of resources and the . djstribution of
meaning affect women differently than men.
Invoking the threat of apocalypse legitimates any use of force not short of
annihilation
Coviello 2000 [PhD in English From Cornell, Queer Frontiers, p. 40-41]
Perhaps. But to claim that American culture is at present decisively postnuclear is not to say that the world we inhabit is in any way post-apocalyptic.
Apocalypse, as I began by saying, changed-it did not go away. And here I want to hazard my second assertion: if, in the nuclear age of yesteryear,
apocalypse signified an event threatening everyone and everything with (in Jacques Derrida's suitably menacing
phrase) `remainderless and a-symbolic destruction,"6 then in the postnuclear world apocalypse is an affair
whose parameters are definitively local. In shape and in substance, apocalypse is defined now by the
affliction it brings somewhere else, always to an "other" people whose very presence might
then be written as a kind of dangerous contagion, threatening the safety and prosperity of a
cherished "general population:' This fact seems to me to stand behind Susan Sontag's incisive observation, from 1989, that,
"Apocalypse is now a long-running serial: not `Apocalypse Now' but 'Apocalypse from Now On."" The decisive point here in the perpetuation of the
threat of apocalypse (the point Sontag goes on, at length, to miss) is that apocalypse
is ever present because, as an element in a
is ever useful. That is, through the perpetual threat of destruction-through the constant
reproduction of the figure of apocalypse-agencies of power ensure their authority to act on and through the
bodies of a particular population. No one turns this point more persuasively than Michel Foucault, who in the final chapter of his
vast economy of power, it
first volume of The History o f Sexuality addresses himself to the problem of a power that is less repressive than pro-ductive, less life-threatening than,
in his words, "life-administering:' Power, he contends, "exerts a positive influence on life . . . [and] endeavors to administer, optimize, and multiply it,
subjecting it to pre-cise controls and comprehensive regulations:' In his brief comments on what he calls "the atomic situation;' however, Foucault
insists as well that the productiveness of modern power must not be mistaken for a uniform repudiation of violent or even lethal means. For
as
"managers of life and survival, of bodies and the race," agencies of modern power presume to
act "on the behalf of the existence of everyone:' Whatsoever might be construed as a threat
to life and survival in this way serves to authorize any expression of force, no matter how
invasive or, indeed, potentially annihilating. "If genocide is indeed the dream of modern power;' Foucault writes, "this is not
because of a recent return to the ancient right to kill; it is because power is situated and exercised at the level of life, the species, the race, and the
large-scale phenomena of population:'8 For
a state that would arm itself not with the power to kill its
population, but with a more comprehensive power over the patterns and functioning of its
collective life, the threat of an apocalyptic demise, nuclear or otherwise, seems a civic
initiative that can scarcely be done without
A2: Realism
Faulty View of Agency
Realism has a faulty view of human agency – it has imposed a static image on
the fluidity of world events
Bleiker 2000 [Roland, Prof of International Relations, Popular Dissent, Human Agency, and
Global Politics, p. 16-7]
Human agency is not something that exists in an a priori manner and can be measured
scientifically in reference to external realities. Strictly speaking, there is no such thing as human agency, for its nature and its function are, at
least in part, determined by how we think about human action and its potential to shape political and social practices. The mutually constituted and
constantly shifting relationship between agents and discourses thus undermines the possibility
of observing social dynamics in a value-free way. To embark on such an endeavour nevertheless is
to superimpose a static image upon a series of events that can only be understood in their fluidity.
It is to objectivise a very particular and necessarily subjective understanding of agency and its corresponding political practices. The dangers of such an
approach have been debated extensively. Authors such as Richard Ashley, Jim George and Steve Smith have shown how positivist
epistemologies have transformed one specific interpretation of world political realities, the
dominant realist one, into reality per se.41 Realist perceptions of the international have gradually
become accepted as common sense, to the point that any critique against them has to be evaluated in terms of an already
existing and objectivised world-view. There are powerful mechanisms of control precisely in this ability to determine meaning and rationality.
‘Defining common sense’, Smith thus argues, is ‘the ultimate act of political power’.42 It separates the
possible from the impossible and directs the theory and practice of international relations on a particular path. Dissent in
global politics is precisely about redirecting this path. It is about interfering with the very manner in
which international relations have been constituted, perceived and entrenched. The point, then, is not
to ‘rescue the exploration of identity from postmodernists’, 43 but to explore questions of agency and identity in the context of an understanding of
social dynamics that takes into account how ideas and practices mutually influence each other. This is to accept and deal with the recognition ‘that our
rationalisation of the international is itself constitutive of that practice’.44 The purpose and potential of such an approach are well recognised at least
since Robert Cox introduced a distinction between critical and problem-solving approaches to world politics. The latter, exemplified by realist
and positivist perceptions of the international, take the prevailing structures of the world as
the given framework for action. They study various aspects of the international system and address the problems that they create.
The problem with such approaches, according to Cox, is that they not only accept, explicitly or implicitly, the
existing order as given, but also, intentionally or not, sustain it.45 Critical theories, by contrast,
problematise the existing power relations and try to understand how they have emerged and
how they are undergoing transformation. They engage, rather than circumvent, the multi-layered dynamics that make up
transversal struggles. The notion of discourse, I shall demonstrate, is the most viable conceptual tool for such a task. It facilitates an exploration of the
close linkages that exist between theory and practice. It opens up possibilities to locate and explore terrains of transversal dissent whose
manifestations of agency are largely obscured, but nevertheless highly significant in shaping the course of contemporary global politics.
States are not the primary actors in global politics – agency must be theorized
transversally
Bleiker 2000 [Roland, Prof of International Relations, Popular Dissent, Human Agency, and
Global Politics, p. 273-4]
A series of fundamental transformations in global politics calls for an equally fundamental rethinking of how we have come to understand this central
aspect of contemporary life. Processes
of globalisation have led to various cross-territorial interactions
that render the political and mental boundaries of the existing international system
increasingly anachronistic. Nation-states no longer play the only role in a world where
financial, productive and informational dynamics have come to disobey, transgress and
challenge the deeply entrenched political principle of state sovereignty. This book is to be read in the
context of recently undertaken efforts to understand these and other changing dimensions of global politics. Its prime task has been to scrutinise the
role that dissent plays at a time when the transgression of boundaries has become a common feature of life. A
conceptual break with
existing understandings of global politics is necessary to recognise trans-territorial dissident
practices and to comprehend the processes through which they exert human agency. A long
tradition of conceptualising global politics
in state-centric ways has entrenched spatial and mental
boundaries between domestic and international spheres such that various forms of agency
have become virtually unrecognised, or at least untheorised. The centrality of dissent can thus be appreciated
only once we view global politics, at least for a moment, not as interactions between sovereign states,
but as ‘a transversal site of contestation’.2 This is to say that one’s investigative gaze must be channelled less on national
boundaries and the discursive practices that legitimise and objectivise them, but more on various forms of connections, resistances, identity formations
and other political flows that transgress the spatial givenness of global politics. With such a conceptual reorientation in mind, the present book has
embarked on a disruptive reading of the agency problematique in international theory. This is to say that it has tried to understand transversal dissent
and its influences on global politics by employing epistemological and methodological strategies that one would not necessarily expect in an
investigation of an international relations theme. Cross-territorial manifestations of human agency have thus been scrutinised, for instance, not by
engaging the well-developed structure– agency debate in international theory, but by employing a form of inquiry that illuminates the issues in
question from a novel set of theoretical and practical perspectives. The following concluding remarks now reflect on the benefits that such a disruptive
reading engenders for an understanding of contemporary global politics.
Imposes Western Categories on Non-West
Realism imposes Western categories on the non-West, masking sub-state
insecurity and promoting Western interests
Bilgin 2008 associate professor of international relations at Bilkent University
[Pinar, “Thinking Past ‘Western’ IR?” Third World Quarterly 29.1]
IR (especially its neo-realist variant) has not always been interested in the world beyond the great powers. ‘Denmark does not matter’ quipped Kenneth
Waltz, underlining the marginality of smaller states to system theorising.32 This is not only because those who are in the peripheries of world politics
are also relegated to the peripheries of one’s thinking. It is also because neo-realism
teaches students of International Relations to
focus on great powers and think of them as like units, the internal dynamics of which are of
little consequence for world politics. The choices made in favour of conducting stateand great power-centric analyses
have had implications for ‘Western’ IR. Throughout the years critical scholars have been documenting the implications of such methodological and
epistemological choices,33 thereby preparing the groundwork for the project of thinking past ‘Western’ IR. Whereas students of the ‘Third World’ have
long warned about what Baghat Korany referred to as the ‘increasing irrelevance’ of ‘standard’ concepts and theories in explaining the dynamics of
non-Western locale,34 ‘Western’ approaches, even as they focused on the ‘non-West’, have
failed to be fully relevant to the
concerns of people, states and societies in the ‘nonWest’. This is because analyses of ‘sage bush wars’, ‘low intensity
conflicts’ and ‘guerrilla wars’ focused on and thus were able to capture only the threat perceptions and interest calculations of the ‘West’. Put
differently, the ‘nonWest’, even when it was made the focal point of IR, was not treated as the referent object (what/who needs protection).35 In
those instances when they became the focal point of analyses, ‘nonWestern’
states (and non-state actors) were slotted
into one of the two roles that were available. Either they were considered as part of the ‘established paradigm, and
assigned the role of junior-partners in the power game’ or they were labelled ‘trouble-makers’, thriving on ‘nuisance power’,
fit for the exercise of counter-insurgency techniques discussed in the literature.36 Although this has begun to change in
recent years, with more attention being paid to the insecurities of individuals, social groups and states in the developing world (as with the emergence
of concerns about and the literature on ‘human security’), the inordinate amount of attention paid to ‘state failure’ should serve as a reminder of the
persistence of the aforementioned dynamics (of putting ‘Western’ insecurities first when studying ostensibly ‘non-Western’ dynamics). For, although
the shift in mainstream security analyses from purely military to broader ‘human security’ concerns may be considered a ‘good thing’, state
‘weakness’ is still portrayed as a problem by virtue of ‘weak’ states’ inability to prevent their
territories from being used as a safe harbour by terrorists—not because those states fail to
deliver the necessary goods and services to their citizens. So-called ‘strong’ states of the ‘non-West’,
in turn, even when they fail to prioritise their citizens’ concerns, are not considered to be a problem as long as they
remain attentive to ‘Western’ security interests.37 To recapitulate, one explanation as to why ‘Western’ IR has produced
relatively little about ‘non-Western’ ways of thinking about and doing world politics has to do with the disciplinary straitjacket imposed by IR as a social
science, in that students
of world politics have not been socialised into being curious about the
‘non-West’ but have been encouraged to explain away ‘non-Western’ dynamics by
superimposing ‘Western’ categories.
Faulty Inside/Outside Assumption
The principle of international anarchy is based on faulty assumptions about
subjectivity and sovereignty – this inside/outside divide is incoherent
Bilgin 2005 associate professor of international relations at Bilkent University
[Pinar, Prof of International Relations, Regional Security in the Middle East, p.34]
Buzan’s first move could be criticised first, for its depiction of the international system as anarchical (and therefore the realm of insecurity) and second,
for identifying individuals’ security with citizenship and the state (the realm of security). This (neo-realist) stance adopted by Buzan has been criticised
forcefully by Alexander Wendt (1992) among others (see, for example, Tickner 1995; Wyn Jones 1995b; Krause and Williams 1997b) and will not be
dealt with here in detail. Suffice it to note that the
anarchical conception of the international system derives
from assumptions made by neo-realists about subjectivity and sovereignty, and the reasoning that the
absence from the international arena of what makes order possible at the domestic arena (i.e., a central
government) is what renders the latter anarchical (Krause and Williams 1997b: 41). There is indeed no
world government; but it does not necessarily follow that this makes international security
impossible. Furthermore, the anarchy/order, inside/outside divides introduced by this argument
are problematic for, as Keith Krause and Michael Williams (1997b: 43) maintained, both are built upon the assumption
that ‘security comes from being a citizen, and insecurity from citizens of other states’ and that
‘threats are directed towards individuals qua citizens (that is, toward their states)’. However, although states are
there, in theory, to provide security for their citizens, there remain the practices of many states, which are constant reminders of the
fact that some are worse than others in fulfilling their side of the bargain. Added to this is the case of ‘gangster’ states that constitute a
major threat to the security of their own citizens (see Wheeler 1996). Moreover, as Ann Tickner (1992: 57) reminds us,
the international arena is not the only realm characterised by the absence of mechanisms of
order and there may be construed yet another anarchy/order divide – that of the ‘boundary between a public
domestic space protected, at least theoretically, by the rule of law and the private space of the family’ which is not always as well protected,
particularly concerning the case of domestic violence. In sum, the first move Buzan makes to justify the privileged position of the security of states is
contested in both theory and practice.
Causes Middle Eastern Violence
Realist approaches to the Middle East become self-fulfilling, creating a vicious
cycle of violence that’s impossible to break
Bilgin 2001 associate professor of international relations at Bilkent University
[Pinar, “Alternative Futures for the Middle East,” Futures 33]
However, although the Middle East remained chronically insecure for most of the twentieth century,
the question that should be
asked is whether recent history justifies one author’s observation that the Middle East is a region that
‘best fits the realist view of international politics’ [2] and is therefore destined to relive the past. This is a question that
should be asked because when such stereotypical representations of the Middle East are coupled with a
cyclical view of history that is part and parcel of the realist approach, the future of the region looks bleak. The
significance of such pessimistic presentations of the future of the Middle East is that they are used to justify heavily
militarised security policies that do not enable this vicious circle to be broken. Furthermore, such
pessimistic conjectures and prognoses have the potential to become self-fulfilling, thereby making it difficult if
not impossible to invent a new tomorrow for the Middle East.
Applying realist principles to the Middle East causes domestic suppression of
local populations
Bilgin 2004 associate professor of international relations at Bilkent University
[Pinar, “Whose Middle East?” International Relations 18.1]
What I call the ‘Middle East’ perspective is usually associated with the United States and its regional allies. It derives from a
‘western’
conception of security which could be summed up as the unhindered flow of oil at reasonable prices, the cessation of the Arab–Israeli
conflict, the prevention of the emergence of any regional hegemon while holding Islamism in check, and the maintenance of ‘friendly’ regimes that are
sensitive to these concerns. This was (and still is)
a top-down conception of security that privileged the security
of states and military stability. It is top-down because threats to security have been defined largely from the perspective of external
powers rather than regional states or peoples. In the eyes of British and US defence planners, Communist infiltration and Soviet intervention
constituted the greatest threat to security in the ‘Middle East’ during the Cold War. The way to enhance regional security, they argued, was for regional
states to enter into alliances with the West. Two security umbrella schemes, the ill-born Middle East Defence Organisation (1951) and the Baghdad Pact
(1955), were designed for this purpose. Although there were regional states such as Iraq (until the 1958 coup), Iran (until the 1978–9 revolution) and
Turkey that shared this perception of security to a certain extent, many Arab policy-makers begged to differ.22 Traces of this top-down thinking were
prevalent in the US approach to security in the ‘Middle East’ during the 1990s. In following a policy of dual containment,23 US policy-makers presented
Iran and Iraq as the main threats to regional security largely due to their military capabilities and the revisionist character of their regimes that are not
subservient to US interests. However, these
top-down perspectives, while revealing certain aspects of
regional insecurity, at the same time hinder others. For example the lives of women in Kuwait and Saudi Arabia are
made insecure not only by the threat caused by their Gulf neighbours’ military capabilities, but also because of the conservative character of their own
regimes that restrict women’s rights under the cloak of religious tradition.24 For it is women who suffer disproportionately as a result of militarism and
the channeling of valuable resources into defence budgets instead of education and health. Their concerns rarely make it into security analyses. This
top-down approach to regional security in the ‘Middle East’ was compounded by a conception of security that was directed outwards – that is
threats to security were assumed to stem from outside the state whereas inside is viewed as a
realm of peace. Although it could be argued – following R.B.J. Walker – that what makes it possible for ‘inside’ to remain peaceful is the
presentation of ‘outside’ as a realm of danger,25 the practices of Middle Eastern states indicate that this does not always work as prescribed in theory.
For many
regional policy-makers justify certain domestic security measures by way of
presenting the international arena as anarchical and stressing the need to strengthen the
state to cope with external threats. While doing this, however, they at the same time cause
insecurity for some individuals and social groups at home – the very peoples whose security they purport to
maintain. The practices of regional actors that do not match up to the theoretical prescriptions include the Baath regime in Iraq that infringed their own
citizens’ rights often for the purposes of state security. Those
who dare to challenge their states’ security practices
may be marginalized at best, and accused of treachery and imprisoned at worst.
Realist approaches perpetuate economic, political and societal violence in the
Middle East
Bilgin 2005 associate professor of international relations at Bilkent University
[Pinar, Regional Security in the Middle East, p.195-6]
This book set out to present a framework for thinking differently about regional security in the Middle East. This was attempted by adopting a critical
security approach that seeks to reconceptualise security in theory and practice by broadening and deepening; looking below and beyond the state for
other referents and agents; and suggesting emancipatory practices toward shaping alternative futures. Contesting
those accounts
that present the Middle East as only amenable to realist readings, it was argued that critical
approaches present a fuller account of regional security in the Middle East. This is not to suggest that the
items of the traditional agenda have lost their pertinence. As the US-led war on Iraq has shown, military concerns retain their place on regional security
agendas, and military instruments remain useful in meeting certain kinds of threats. Rather, the point is that such traditional
concerns
should be addressed within a comprehensive framework cognisant of the dynamic
relationships between multiple dimensions of security (including basic needs such as subsistence, health and
education, and issues such as religious and cultural identity, democratisation and human rights). Although US policy-makers’ view
– that military instability in the Middle East threatens global security – retains its validity,
focusing on military issues to the neglect of others risks further exacerbating those
structurally-based (economic, political, societal) security concerns. Dealing with the militarysecurity agenda is a
must; yet, a military-focused and determined approach to security (in theory and practice) results in a diversion of
already scarce resources into military build-up. The militarisation of the region during the Cold War not only made it more
difficult to meet the traditional agenda, but also undermined regional states’ capacity to provide welfare to their citizens thereby exacerbating nonmilitary threats and rendering intractable regional conflicts
Misc
Tech Warfare  Conflict
New technological warfare lowers the threshold for conflicts
Andrew J. Bacevich 13 Jr. (born 1947) is an American political scientist specializing in
international relations, security studies, American foreign policy, and American diplomatic and
military history. He is currently Professor of International Relations and History at Boston
University.[1] He is also a retired career officer in the United States Army. He is a former director
of Boston University's Center for International Relations (from 1998 to 2005) and author of
several books, including American Empire: The Realities and Consequences of US Diplomacy
(2002), The New American Militarism: How Americans are Seduced by War (2005) and The
Limits of Power: The End of American Exceptionalism (2008). He has also appeared on television
shows such as The Colbert Report and the Bill Moyers Report and has written op-eds which have
appeared in papers such as The New York Times, Washington Post, Wall Street Journal, Boston
Globe, Los Angeles Times, and Financial Times. He is also a member of the Council on Foreign
Relations. “The new American militarism: how Americans are seduced by war,” 2013, Oxford
University Press, DOA: 8-1-13, y2k
In short, by the dawn of the twenty-first century the reigning postulates of technology-as-panacea
had knocked away much of the accumulated blood-rust sullying war’s reputation. Thus
reimagined and amidst widespread assurances that the U nited S tates could be expected to retain a
monopoly on this
new way of
war , armed conflict regained an aesthetic respectability , even palatability, that
the literary and artistic interpreters of twentieth-century military cataclysms were thought to have
demolished
once and for all. In the right circumstances, for the right cause,
it now turned out, war could actually offer an
attractive option .cost-effective, humane, even thrilling. Indeed, as the Anglo-American race to Baghdad conclusively demonstrated in the spring of 2003 , in the
eyes of many, war has once again become a grand pageant, performance art, or a perhaps temporary diversion from the ennui and boring routine of everyday life. As one
Reinforcing this
enthusiasm was the expectation that the great majority of Americans could count on being
able to enjoy this new type of war from a safe distance . The old-fashioned style of warfare,
emphasizing mass and the sustained application of force on a colossal scale, had been a
participatory activity. From 1914 to 1918 and again from 1939 to 1945 , it had consumed whole generations, with even liberal democracies conscripting willing
observer noted with approval, public enthusiasm for the whiz-bang technology of the U.S. military had become almost boyish. 31
and unwilling alike to provide the generals with the requisite steady flow of cannon fodder. But in the new style of technowar, mass became an impediment; large formations
simply offered easily identifiable, slow-mov-ing, and highly vulnerable targets. Postindustrial warfare emphasized compact formations consisting of highly skilled and highly
This new aesthetic has
to an appreciable boost in the status of military institutions and soldiers
motivated volunteers.thereby encouraging the average citizen to see war as something to be experienced vicariously.
contributed, in turn,
themselves, a fourth manifestation of the new American militarism .