This book offers the first comprehensive and critical investigation of the specific modes of risk calculation that are emerging in the so-called War on Terror. Risk and the War on Terror offers an interdisciplinary set of contributions which debate and analyze both the empirical manifestations of risk in the War on Terror and their theoretical implications. From border controls and biometrics to financial targeting and policing practice, the imperative to deploy public and private data in order to ‘connect the dots’ of terrorism risk raises important questions for social scientists and practitioners alike. How are risk technologies redeployed from commercial, environmental and policing domains to the domain of the War on Terror? How can the invocation of risk in the War on Terror be understood conceptually? Do these moves embody transformations from sovereignty to governmentality; from discipline to risk; from geopolitics to biopolitics? What are the implications of such moves for the populations that come to be designated as ‘risky’ or ‘at risk’? Where are the gaps, ambiguities and potential resistances to these practices? In contrast with previous historical moments of risk measurement, governing by risk in the War on Terror has taken on a distinctive orientation to an uncertain future. This book will be of strong interest to students and researchers of international studies, political science, geography, legal studies, criminology and sociology.

This book applies risk society theory to the 'War on Terror', steering the discussion away from the militaristic discourse of the Bush era towards an emphasis on global cooperation and a new cosmopolitan agenda. The literature and rhetoric of the 'War on Terror' has been dominated by dramatic high-profile military campaigns and division in the international community. This overlooks the various multilateral practices and cooperative processes that are emerging to combat global terrorism. President Bush himself had initially been at pains to stress that his 'war' on terror would be like no other; it would involve not just military tools but financial, intelligence, police and diplomatic measures too. More than eight years later, the time is right for an in-depth evaluation of this 'other' war on terror. Yet these relatively mundane regulatory dimensions have received much less attention than the 'hot' wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, where ongoing difficulties suggest that military force alone is inadequate in controlling globalised terrorism. This book aims to redress this imbalance, by foregrounding these initiatives, tracing their implementation and reflecting on the implications for International Relations. Adopting an analytical approach that seeks to incorporate theories of risk, global governance and security, this book aims to explore the overlapping multi-level and multi-lateral dynamics of the emerging global security architecture which have remained neglected and unmapped thus far in the war on terror. This book will be of interest to students of risk politics, security studies, global governance and IR in general. Yee-Kuang Heng is Lecturer in International Relations, University of St Andrews, UK. Kenneth McDonagh is Lecturer in International Relations in the School of Law and Government, Dublin City University.

A decade after 9/11, it is increasingly difficult to deny that terror has prevailed - not as a specific enemy, but as a way of life. This book examines the social, cultural, and political drivers of the war on terror through the framework of a 'political moral panic'.

This book is about the reconfiguration of war as risk management in the post-Cold War, post-September 11 era. Confronted with ill-defined ‘wars’ against complex security risks such as terrorism and WMD proliferation, the main aim is to suggest and critically analyse an innovative inter-disciplinary approach to the ‘transformation of war’ debate.

Terrorism kills far fewer Americans annually than automobile accidents, firearms, or even lightning strikes. Given this minimal risk, why does the U.S. continue expending lives and treasure to fight the global war on terror? In Monsters to Destroy, Navin A. Bapat argues that the war on terror provides the U.S. a cover for its efforts to expand and preserve American control over global energy markets. To gain dominance over these markets, the U.S. offered protection to states critical in the extraction, sale, and transportation of energy from their "terrorist" internal and external enemies. However, since the U.S. was willing to protect these states in perpetuity, the leaders of these regimes had no incentive to disarm their terrorists. This inaction allowed terrorists to transition into more powerful and virulent insurgencies, leading the protected states to chart their own courses and ultimately break with U.S. foreign policy objectives. Bapat provides a sweeping look at how the loss of influence over these states has accelerated the decline of U.S. economic and military power, locking it into a permanent war for its own economic security.

Pt. 1. Risk, precaution, governance -- pt. 2. Crime, deviance, exception -- pt. 3. Biopolitics, biometrics, borders -- pt. 4. Risks, tactics, resistances.

This book reviews the war on terror since 9/11 from a human rights perspective.

At home and abroad, the U.S. Government has cut corners on the rule of law in the name of preventing future terror attacks - from 'waterboarding' detainees, to disappearing suspects into CIA prisons, to attacking Iraq against the wishes of the U.N. security council. The authors of this book argue that the great irony is that these sacrifices have made us more susceptible to future terrorist attacks. They conclusively debunk the claim that the U.S. is winning the 'war on terror', and offer another strategy to keep us both safe and free.

Over the last fifteen years there has been a significant growth in literature dealing with terrorism. Nevertheless, scholars within mainstream criminology have only recently begun to grapple with the problem of terrorism in a sustained fashion. In this provocative book the authors provide both an exposition of the contradictions that have emerged around the regulation of terrorism and an incisive analysis of the questions that the management of terrorism poses for the discipline. Focusing primarily on the processes and practices that have emerged in the United States and the United Kingdom, the book provides a critical account of the political construction, mediation and regulation of terrorist threat since the events of 9/11. The authors explore the ways in which new institutional modes of risk assessment based on the principle of pre-emption have impacted on individuals targeted by them. Noting the dilemmas produced by the pre-emptive turn, the authors also elucidate more recent moves to develop the idea of resilience in counter-terrorism and security policy. This book will be suitable for academics and students interested in political violence, terrorism, geopolitics and risk, as well as for practitioners and experts working in the security industries.

Though U.S. leaders try to convince the world of their success in fighting al Qaeda, one anonymous member of the U.S. intelligence community would like to inform the public that we are, in fact, losing the war on terror. Further, until U.S. leaders recognize the errant path they have irresponsibly chosen, he says, our enemies will only grow stronger. According to the author, the greatest danger for Americans confronting the Islamist threat is to believe-at the urging of U.S. leaders-that Muslims attack us for what we are and what we think rather than for what we do. Blustering political rhetor.