Martin Coward

Network-Centric Violence, Critical Infrastructure and the Urbanization of Security

This article addresses the question of whether contemporary global urbanization is characterized by a distinctive relationship between the city and warfare. In particular, it examines the specific way in which two particular forms of warfare — so-called Al-Qaeda terrorism and US tactics in Iraq — target urban infrastructure. I argue that infrastructure is targeted because it is a constitutive feature of contemporary urban life. Metropolitan life is marked by its constitutive relation to urban infrastructure. The article thus suggests that this targeting of infrastructure provides a lens through which to investigate some of the central questions posed by the contemporary urbanization of security.

Between us in the city: materiality, subjectivity, and community in the era of global urbanization

In this paper I consider the conceptual challenges for subjectivity and community in an era of global urbanisation. The urban environment comprises a complex assemblage of human and nonhuman entities. Urban political subjectivity is thus constituted by a distinctive relation with materiality. This reconceptualisation of the subject comprises a challenge to the classical morphology that has underpinned conceptions of citizenship and community. This morphology has rested on notions of autonomy that are predicated on a separability of the agent from context and community. Global urbanisation challenges the traditional conception of the urban subject as an autonomous citizen. In contrast to classical political morphologies I contend, via Nancys account of the reticulated multiplicity of being singular plural, that urban political subjectivity is constituted by an ineluctable exposure to alterity that arises through our sharing of that which is ‘between us’ in the city: the material fabric of the urban environment.

The globalisation of enclosure: interrogating the geopolitics of empire

This article examines the question of global order in the contemporary historical conjuncture. I argue that Hardt and Negris Empire provides a response to such a question. This response is necessary given the manner in which globalisation theorys explanation of global order has been contested by the George W Bush regime. An exegesis of the manner in which Empire delineates global order in the contemporary era provides, moreover, a fruitful encounter between elements of post-structuralist International Relations theory and the subject matter of International Political Economy. The article sketches out the principal characteristics of empire followed by an exegesis of the empirical manifestation of imperial characteristics in the contemporary global order. I argue that the present global order is characterised by the drawing of boundaries or the constitution of thresholds that define what is to be regarded as included and excluded from the imperial realm. Empire vigorously polices these thresholds in order to defer encounters with others that might question its self-asserted timeless pacific civility. Finally, I conclude by noting that the centrality of such boundary constitution to imperial forms suggests that a logic of security underlies contemporary global order. Thus investigations into the political economy of Empire will always already comprise an investigation of imperial logics of security.

Against network thinking: A critique of pathological sovereignty

This article advances a critique of network thinking and the pathological sovereignty that it gives rise to. The network is ubiquitous as a metaphor for understanding the social, economic and political dynamics of the contemporary era. Implicitly drawing on an analogy with communications infrastructures such as the telegraph or internet, the network metaphor represents global politics in terms of nodes related to one another through conduit-like links. I begin by demonstrating the widespread nature of network thinking and outline the way in which conventional metaphors structure both thinking and action. I then recreate an episodic history of network thinking in order to demonstrate the key entailments of the network metaphor. I argue that there are four entailments of network thinking: the prioritisation of connectivity; the identification of novel actors; de-territorialisation; and a lack of concern for contiguity and context. The article then outlines the corresponding political and ethical consequences that follow from these entailments, specifically: fantasies of precision; new threat imaginaries; unboundedness; and a failure to attend to culture and community. I contend that network thinking gives rise to a pathological sovereignty whose dual faces can be seen in drone strikes and invasive surveillance. Finally, I argue that thinking beyond the network requires us to foreground the importance of contiguity and context in understanding global politics. This article contributes both a novel theoretical framework for challenging the hegemony of network thinking and an ethical call for greater recognition of the harm caused by pathological sovereignty.

Journal for Cultural Research: Editor's introduction

Jean-Luc Nancy represents an important voice in contemporary continental thought whose work offers the possibility for rethinking the ontological, ethical, and political after the deconstruction of the metaphysics of subjectivity. The coexistential analytic that Nancy elaborates throughout his work comprises a distinctive politico-philosophical gesture that poses the question of the multiplicity of existence and offers conceptual resources for a resistance of the totalitarian foundational gesture that marks so much modern thought. However, despite the translation of a number of his major works, Nancy’s work has not been addressed in the English speaking world with the same vigour as that of other thinkers that share similar intellectual trajectories (not least of which is a continual return to, and re-examination of, a number of Heideggerian themes) such as Foucault, Derrida, Deleuze and Lyotard.1 Given that Nancy’s work addresses an interdisciplinary nexus of philosophy, cultural studies, political theory, international relations and literary studies (thus having relevance for a wide variety of scholarship), it is surprising that it is not more widely known. It was in light of both the relative unfamiliarity of English-speaking audiences with Nancy’s work and the important politico-philosophical resources it offers that a workshop in February 2004 at the University of Sussex took as its primary theme the question of community raised by Nancy’s co-existential analytic of “being-with”. The papers in this special issue of the Journal for Cultural Research develop this consideration of the notion of being-with in a number of directions. Central to all, however, are the concerns with finitude, singularity and co-existence that could be said to define Nancy’s “question of community”. The question of community comprises Nancy’s distinctive contribution to the strand of Continental philosophy concerned with elaborating the potentialities of philosophy after the death of the metaphysics of subjectivity. Nancy reorients the concept of “community”, from the name of either a substantial union or an

Reflecting On Our Strengths and Strategy

In our 2016 Editorial (Politics 36(1): 3–4. DOI: 10.1177/0263395715616015) we noted that reaching the mid-way point of our editorial term and the transition to SAGE offered the opportunity to reflect upon and reframe our ongoing editorial aims. This exercise should be seen in the context of the significant development of Politics over the past 4 years in particular: ISI ranking; a new 8000 word-limit for articles; an increase in frequency of publication and total annual page count; and a substantial focus on social media presence and online dissemination of articles. Politics is a flagship journal of the Political Studies Association and exists to publish timely, original research of interest both to the Association’s members and wider academic and non-academic audiences. Generalist journals such as Politics exist to publish the full range of research in the field and are thus inclusive of a diverse array of methods, theoretical frameworks, and empirical focuses. The question thus arises what our particular editorial strengths and strategy are and how these distinguish our journal from other journals in the field. We hope the aims outlined below will serve as an ambitious set of guiding principles that will both show the unique strengths of Politics and identify our future editorial strategy. We hope this will attract authors to publishing in Politics as well as clarify the editorial decisions we make.

Resurrecting IR theory: Editors’ introduction to a special section:

As a discipline, international relations (IR) has become increasingly circumspect about the role and explanatory power of theories of international politics (e.g. Mearsheimer and Walt, 2013; Zambernardi, 2015). Research has exposed the particularity of once predominant theories of IR, the processes through which these theories were produced, the practices through which they became accepted, and what was ignored as a result. In so doing, scholars have raised vitally important questions about ‘theory for whom and for what purpose’ (e.g. Cox, 1981; Odoom and Andrews, 2016; Oren, 2003; Shilliam, 2010; Turton, 2015; Vitalis, 2015)? This research has substantively challenged long-held concepts such as meta-theory, grand theory, hypothesis testing, paradigms, great debates, and even modernity. As a consequence, it has been asked whether we are witnessing ‘the end of International Relations theory’ (Dunne et al., 2013)? While the new reflexive impulse in the field of IR theory is to be welcomed, it would seem alarmist to claim that this development marks its end. Rather, it speaks of new possibilities and new directions of inquiry for IR theories that are more mature and nuanced. These will be theories that are clear about the limitations of their knowledge claims and aware of their contextual particularism. And these will be theories that are attuned to the way in which theorising as a practice necessarily engages with relations of power, not as a neutral observer, but as an active participant within the socio-political dynamics under investigation. It is with these issues in mind that Politics has assembled this Special Section. We have curated four articles that we think are indicative of some of the possible directions contemporary IR theory is taking and the key questions they pose. They cover a diverse area of topics: global sexuality politics, the role of affective values and emotion, what can

Editorial 2015 – Diversity in Politics

Politics is a generalist journal that is pluralist in its approach to the perspective, methodology and subject matter of its articles. The principle requirement we have of authors is that their work should effectively communicate an original argument with generalizable insights to a broad audience. As such we hope that our articles address a broad range of perspectives, methods and cases across the disciplines of politics and international studies. With this in mind the editorial team is concerned to ensure that its editorial board, reviewers, authors, and content reflects, and where possible enhances, the diversity of politics and international studies.

Editorial: Politics in 2013 – The Changing Landscape of Academic Publishing

Over the course of our first year editing Politics academic publishing has faced increased scrutiny from both inside and outside the academy. The so-called ‘Academic Spring’ singled out access to, and management of, academic journals for particular attention. We believe responding to both challenges is important for Politics and wanted to take the opportunity of this annual editorial statement to reflect on the journal’s strategy with regard to both.

Editorial: Future Challenges and Strategies for Politics

This issue of Politics is the first edited by the new editorial team at Newcastle University. The new editors are grateful for all the work done over the past six years by the Glasgow editorial team of Jane Duckett, Paul Graham and Alasdair Young. Under their leadership, Politics has consolidated its position as one of the Political Studies Association’s flagship journals. They continued the journal’s tradition of publishing concise, timely and state of the art articles that cover key developments in political and international studies research. Moreover, with an eye to the future standing of the journal, they successfully secured a listing for Politics on the Thomson-Reuters ISI Journal Ranking Index.