| 1. |
- Fasakin, Akinbode, 1983-
(author)
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Subaltern Securitization : The Use of Protest and Violence in Postcolonial Nigeria
- 2022
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Doctoral thesis (other academic/artistic)abstract
- Securitization theory (ST) makes an insightful and significant contribution to security studies. Through the use of discursive speech act, ST provides an innovative strategy for understanding the application of security’s distinctive character and dynamics to any issue in order to make it a security issue. Valuable as the theory is to security studies, the subaltern appear missing in existing securitization analyses. Even when the subaltern are examined, for instance in critiques of classical ST, they are conceived and presented as passive, lacking agency, voice, and power, and suffering from security silence problem. ST’s reliance on discursive speech act and focus on state political elite prevent it from capturing the subaltern and subaltern securitization process. Furthermore, while existing ST and critiques of securitization studies offer some direction regarding how the subaltern actors may securitize threats to their security, these perspectives are incidental and grossly underdeveloped.In order to resolve this problem, the current study takes a novel approach to securitization studies by investigating how subaltern actors engage in securitizing discourses and practices. By combining the Fanonian decolonial theory of emancipatory violence, where the nature of the (post)colonial context becomes visible with the theoretical insights of ST, the study shows that the subaltern are able to securitize using protest and violence. The subaltern use protest and violence to show their perception and identification of security threats, mobilize the subaltern audience, and challenge and confront the threatening subject – often times, the subaltern’s significant audience – to ensure that action is taken on issues concerning subaltern security. In addition to discourse, therefore, protest and violence serve as the subaltern’s instruments of political communication used by the subaltern to move issues beyond normal to the point of extraordinary politics. Consequently, protest and violence can force audiences – including the common people and the political elite – to imagine threats to subaltern security, typically perceived but sometimes real, and accept subaltern securitization moves, and where possible take actions that may amount to an alteration or a change in the order of things. Such change may either be in favour of subaltern’s perception of security or not.To uncover the essential dynamics of subaltern securitization, this study synthesizes a version of decolonial theory with elements of existing ST and focuses on the subaltern actors from below the state in Nigeria, a non-Western, postcolonial context. The results reveal that subaltern securitization is possible when members of the subaltern successfully mobilize themselves to collectively identify (real or perceived) threat to their security and in so doing challenging and confronting the threat. This makes their security concerns an issue of priority. The study concludes that desirable as subaltern securitization may be, especially to the subaltern, there is a tendency for subaltern securitization to obfuscate the danger that may lurk around subaltern’s attempts to securitize certain issues.
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| 2. |
- Hjorth, Ronnie, Professor, 1964-, et al.
(author)
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Amerikansk strategisk återhållsamhet och europeisk strategisk respons – tre typer av strategisk respons mot bakgrund av Brexit
- 2021
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In: Internasjonal Politikk. - : Cappelen Damm AS - Cappelen Damm Akademisk. - 0020-577X .- 1891-1757. ; 79:2, s. 114-131
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Journal article (peer-reviewed)abstract
- Den här artikeln identifierar och analyserar tre olika reaktioner, i artikeln benämnda »strategisk respons», på amerikansk strategisk återhållsamhet sedan 2017 och mot bakgrund av Brexit: »Liberal övervintring», »Ett starkare Europa» och »En bredare koalition». Analysen kopplar strategisk respons, strategiskt aktörskap och strategisk autonomi och leder till två slutsatser: För det första att Brexit snararare har gynnat än hindrat det europeiska säkerhets- och försvarssamarbetet, såväl inom ramen för EU som mellan EU och stater som står utanför EU, däribland Storbritannien. För det andra att den framväxande säkerhetsordningen innebär nya och annorlunda förutsättningar för det säkerhets- och försvarspolitiska samarbetet i Europa, inte minst i Norden.
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| 3. |
- Hjorth, Ronnie, Professor, 1964-
(author)
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Civil Association Across Borders : Law, Morality and Responsibility in the Post-Brexit Era
- 2018
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In: Journal of International Political Theory. - : Sage Publications. - 1755-0882 .- 1755-1722. ; 14:3, s. 299-313
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Journal article (peer-reviewed)abstract
- Michael Oakeshott’s distinction between ‘civil association’ and ‘enterprise association’ has inspired international society theorists to conceive of international society as not just a ‘purposive association’ constructed by states to satisfy their interests but also as a ‘practical association’ providing formal and pragmatic rules that are not instrumental to particular goals of state policy. While this article is supportive of the Oakeshottian turn in international society theory, it suggests that somewhat different conclusions can be drawn from it. The article sketches out an alternative conception of international ‘civil association’, one that transcends the boundaries of communities. It is argued that such a notion of civil association is both possible and at the same time anchored in the experiences of the modern state. It is suggested that this notion of international civil association, when sustained by an adequate legal conception, promotes the enforcement of moral and political responsibility across borders. Finally, it is argued that European governments post-Brexit should strive to retain, as much as possible, the element of civil association present in European relations in order to preserve the civil condition, the rule of law, and in order to enhance political responsibility across borders.
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| 4. |
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| 5. |
- Hjorth, Ronnie, Professor, 1964-
(author)
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Kelsen's Legal Logic of International Pluralism
- 2022
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In: Österreichische Zeitschrift für Politikwissenschaft/Austrian Journal of Political Science. - 1615-5548. ; 51:3, s. 62-71
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Journal article (peer-reviewed)abstract
- This paper presents a Kelsenian perspective on international pluralism showing that international pluralism is not necessarilythe logical consequence of sovereignty but bestowed upon states by international law through the principle of equality. Thepaper argues that this leads to an improved concept of international pluralism as more than a by-product of sovereignty logic.Flowing from Kelsenian legal logic, international pluralism and legal cosmopolitanism share the same origin in theGrundnorm.Hence, this perspective on international relations appeases the perceived conflict between international pluralism andcosmopolitanism. Moreover, the paper suggests that the approach provides a different framework for analyzing internationalnorms and practices, their normative relationship and evolution
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| 6. |
- Hjorth, Ronnie, Professor, 1964-
(author)
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Political Decay and Political Arcadianism
- 2018
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In: De Ethica. - : Linkoping University Electronic Press. - 2001-8819. ; 5:1, s. 37-50
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Journal article (peer-reviewed)abstract
- An account of evil in classical political theory is the concept of evil government. The notion of political decay from good to evil government or to anarchy, the absence of government, among classical political theorists represents both a moral and a political problem. This essay argues that political decay remains a perennial problem because the political condition itself involves the seeds to its own destruction. Moreover, it is claimed that the nostalgic longing to a glorious past for nations or peoples risks turning into what is here labelled ‘political arcadianism’, fostering futile attempts to return to past conditions. The argument is that political arcadianism when focusing on the imagined past rather than the present is a possible cause of political decay.
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| 7. |
- Hjorth, Ronnie, Professor, 1964-
(author)
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Varieties of International Pluralism
- 2023
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In: Journal of International Political Theory. - : SAGE Publications. - 1755-0882 .- 1755-1722. ; 19:2, s. 183-199
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Journal article (peer-reviewed)abstract
- This paper shows that while there seems to be more or less a general acceptance for plurality as a condition of world politics and at least a vague commitment to a pluralist ideal, the challenge remains to formulate a fruitful account of international pluralism. While dominating approaches to international theory present international pluralism as essentially a by-product and instrumental, this paper suggest an alternative way to conceive of international pluralism when defending the ancient concept variety as a better guide to approach both the understanding of plurality as the human condition and the notion of international pluralism. The paper concludes that it is preferable to accept a variety of pluralist conceptions rather than go on searching for a theoretical conception standing above the controversy; accepting pluralism in a sense involves rejecting just one version of pluralism.
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| 8. |
- Kunz, Barbara, 1980-
(author)
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Kind words, cruise missiles and everything in between : A neoclassical realist study of the use of power resources in U.S. policies towards Poland, Ukraine and Belarus 1989–2008
- 2010
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Doctoral thesis (other academic/artistic)abstract
- This study intends to explain why the United States led entirely different policies towards Poland, Ukraine and Belarus under circumstances where realist theory would predict otherwise. Realism being an “environment based theory”, it would indeed predict a state to lead highly similar foreign policies under identical conditions. Yet, within the overall context of managing unipolarity, the US has clearly led different policies toward these three countries from the demise of the Soviet Union to the end of the second Bush Administration (i.e., in the years 1989 to 2008). In seeking to explain that puzzle, this study follows a path hitherto neglected by neoclassical realist scholarship: a strong emphasis on the bilateral dimension in all foreign policies. Poland, Ukraine and Belarus are friendly, undecided and non-friendly states, respectively, as seen from a Washington perspective. What type of power resources seems appropriate in addressing them is likely to depend on this status. The study subsequently shows that different types of power resources or “base values” underlie the various foreign policy tools employed with respect to the studied countries. For that reason, it argues that perceptions of states’ friend, non-friend or undecided statuses should be considered an element of the missing link neoclassical realists identified between states’ power resources and their foreign policy output.
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