Contesting Security investigates to what extent the ‘logic of security’, which underpins securitization, can be contained, rolled back or dismantled.
Featuring legitimacy as a cement of security practices, this volume presents a detailed account of the "logic" which sustains security in order to develop a novel approach to the relation between security and the policies in which it is engraved. Understanding security as a normative practice, the contributors suggest a nuanced, and richer take on the conditions under which it is possible, advisable or fair to accept or roll back its policies.
The book comprises four sections, each investigating one specific modality of contesting security practices: resistance, desecuritization, emancipation, and resilience. These strategies are examined, compared and assessed in different political and cultural habitats.
This book will be of much interest to students of critical security studies, securitisation theory, social theory, and IR in general.
Table of Contents:
Preface 1. Legitimacy and the "Logic" of Security, Thierry Balzacq Part I: Resistance Editor’s Introduction 2. Security and Surveillance Contests: Resistance and Counter-Resistance, Gary T. Marx 3. Contesting and Resisting Security in Post-Mao China, Juha A. Vuori 4. Poking Holes and Spreading Cracks in the Wall: Resistance to National Security Policies Under Bush, Florent Blanc Part II: Desecuritization Editor’s Introduction 6. Security as Universality? The Roma Contesting Security in Europe, Claudia Aradau 7. The Political Limits of Desecuritization: Security, Arms Trade, and the EU’s Economic Target, Thierry Balzacq, Sara Depauw and Sarah Léonard 8. Just and Unjust Desecuritizations, Rita Floyd Part III: Emancipation Editor’s Introduction 9.Emancipation and the Reality of Security: A Reconstructive Agenda, João Nunes 10. Contesting Border Security: Emancipation and Asylum in the Australian Context, Matt McDonald Part IV: Resilience Editor’s Introduction 11. Resiliencism and Security Studies: Initiating a Dialogue, Philippe Bourbeau 12. Resilience as Standard: Risks, Hazards and Threats, Peter Rogers 13. Pandemics as Staging Grounds for Resilient World Order: SARS, Avian Flu, and the Evolving Forms of Secure Political Solidarity, Mika Aaltola Conclusion, Lene Hansen
About the Author :
Thierry Balzacq is the Scientific Director of the Institute of Strategic Research (IRSEM) at the French Ministry of Defense and Tocqueville Professor of International Politics at the University of Namur, Belgium. He is editor of Securitization Theory (Routledge, 2011) and The External Dimension of EU Justice and Home Affairs (2009).
