Global Matrix: Nationalism, Globalism and Terrorism (2005)

Social Science Research Network, 2014

2006

The first set of volumes in the 'Central Currents in Globalization' series takes a particularly pressing manifestation of human relations-violence-and explores its changing nature in relation to the various processes of globalization. It is organized across the four volumes beginning with the historically-deep practice of empire-building Volume 1, Globalizing Empires: old and New. Imperial extension contributed to the processes of globalization to the extent that states sought to claim military and political control over extended reaches of territories-other places and peoples-that they imagined in terms of a 'world-space'. This was the case whether we talk of the Roman Empire in the first century or the British Empire in the nineteenth century, even though they are very different polities. The first volume covers the theme of empire right through to contemporary debates about globalization and Pax Americana. Volume 2, Colonial and Postcolonial Globalizations, takes up that same story, but examines the process from the perspective of the periphery rather than from the centre. It begins with Second Expansion of Europe and colonization in the mid-nineteenth century. It takes in the violence of decolonization across the world in the period through to the 1960s, and it considers the question of contemporary postcolonial violence-not just military, but broader questions of structural violence today. Volume 3, Globalizing War and Intervention, examines the changing nature of military intervention, including the remarkable shift in the form of violence across the globe from interstate violence to intrastate conflict in the late twentieth and early twentyfirst centuries. This volume includes a section on one of the most dramatic instances of global violence in our time-terrorism and the War on Terror. The emphasis here is on 'violence from above', as it were-violence that is in some way institutionalized or directed with the power of sovereign body. Finally, Volume 4, Transnational Conflict, complements the third volume by examining the different forms of transnational and intra-state violence in the world today, what might be called 'violence from below'. In all of the volumes we are concerned to understand both the globalizing processes and the more general effects of empire in world history.

In this paper I will draw some observations from recent world and Arab regional developments, with special focus on the Riyadh Summit of May 2017, as well as from anthropological insights on the role of kinship in the contemporary forms of Arabian governance and new perspectives on the origins of state formation and global trade. Considering these sights of knowledge I challenge the usefulness of the overly reified duality globalism-nationalism, the theme of this conference which poses a choice to us between a borderless world without nation-states or a world partitioned into bordered states, keeping in mind of course that the partitioning into the present nations states was imposed by European world strategists. The conference puts forth this question: " Are we all going to live in a globalized, borderless world in which nation states have been abolished, or continue with a world that remains partitioned into separate states? Will it be Globalism or will it be Nationalism? Time has come to choose a side " (International Conference Abstract: Globalism vs Nationalism, 2016. As it turns out, the situation is not that simple. First, I question the validity of the oppositional quality posing globalism against nationalism as two discrete categories, and second, I contend that integrating other factors, such as tribe and kinship, can enhance our understanding. Perhaps if we de-abstract and re-configure the paradigm we would be spared needing to choose between them. Recent Events and the Political Landscape Balkanizing the Arab region first then trying to remap it along different borders, terrorizing and displacing populations, violating sovereignty of nations, produced a landscape of fear and terror since the 1990s. Bush's " war on terror " was an unprovoked invasion of Iraq bringing about destabilization, and fragmentation, reducing this advanced civilizational country to a fragile, divided, dependent shadow

This chapter begins by tracing a parallel: the advent of modernity lies at the very heart of nationalism, while both modernity and nationalism are related to the expansion of warfare. A similar relationship can be said to apply to globalization and its close links with ethnic conflict, civil strife, and militarism. The case studies which follow illustrate the direct and indirect consequences of both modernization and globalization in instigating the explosion of nationalism. More substantially, the overlap between globalization and Americanization is addressed as a recurrent phenomenon in the explosion of ethnic conflict.

2010

The War on Terror and the Rise of Neo-Orientalism in the 21st Century Written by Ayla Göl This PDF is auto-generated for reference only. As such, it may contain some conversion errors and/or missing information. For all formal use please refer to the official version on the website, as linked below. The War on Terror and the Rise of Neo-Orientalism in the 21st Century https://www.e-ir.info/2010/03/18/the-war-on-terror-and-the-rise-of-neo-orientalism-in-the-21st-century/ AYLA GöL, MAR 18 2010 [1]An imminent critique of the hegemonic discourse on the 'War on Terror' (WOT) is growing rapidly against the grain of an overwhelming silence about the impacts of the global WOT on the non-Western and particularly the Muslim world. The new trend is based on three basic epistemological and ontological assumptions of critical terrorism studies (CTS) that challenge orthodox studies on terrorism (Jackson et al. 2009): the dominance of 'statecentric' perspectives; the pre-eminence of 'problem-solving' approaches; and largely ahistorical accounts of terrorism. The value of CTS is embedded in the idea of multi-causality and the complexity of political violence and terrorism from a broad historical and sociological perspective. The new critical approach calls into question asymmetrical power structures of the 21st century by highlighting the 'uneven' distribution of economic, political, and social power between the West and the non-Western countries with the 'combined development' of globalisation.

This article examines how globalisation processes provide new incentives and opportunities for non-state political entrepreneurs to build transnational political movements. Drawing on the literatures on non-violent social movements and transnational networks, the article examines terrorism and political violence as components of the 'repertoires of contention' used by radical transnational groups seeking political change. Examples from both the pre-and post-9/11 periods are provided, and the implications for traditional models of state security are discussed. The article concludes by contending that the combination of increased levels of globalisation and the emergence of new networks of violence is creating a fundamental shift in the international security environment, in which the distinction between internal and external security threats is increasingly blurred. While state security strategies are reflecting these changes, less attention has been paid to the political implications of these changes. New security responses need to also be matched by new sets of political strategies at the global level.

2006

In C. E. Stout (Ed.), The psychology of terrorism: Vol. 3. Theoretical understandings and perspectives (pp. 29-54). Westport, CT: Greenwood., 2002

Although mainstream psychological theories provide a canonical framework for understanding terrorists' psychological history and functioning and for explaining how small-group processes facilitate the identity development and socialization of terrorists, they offer incomplete, decontextualized accounts of terrorism. I argue that globalization produces sociocultural dislocation and psychosocial dysfunction which engender terrorism. I outline three perspectives that serve to frame terrorism as resistance to globalization: social identity theory, social reducton theory, and Vygotsky's sociocultural theory. I apply these theories to cases of domestic, foreign, and international terrorism. I conclude by calling for the merger of positivistic and constitutive paradigms in order to achieve a more complete account of terrorism.

2009

"Rethinking Insecurity, War and Violence: Beyond savage globalization? is a collection of essays by scholars intent on rethinking the mainstream security paradigms. Overall, this collection is intended to provide a broad and systematic analysis of the long-term sources of political, military and cultural insecurity from the local to the global. The book provides a stronger basis for under-standing the causes of conflict and violence in the world today, one that adds adifferent dimension to the dominant focus on finding proximate causes and making quick responses. Too often the arenas of violence have been represented as if they have been triggered by reassertions of traditional and tribal forms of identity, primordial and irrational assertions of politics. Such ideas about the sources of insecurity have become entrenched in a wide variety of media sources, and have framed both government policies and academic arguments. Rather than treating the sources of insecurity as a retreat from modernity, this book complicates the patterns of global insecurity to a degree that takes the debates simply beyond assumptions that we are witnessing a savage return to a bloody and tribalized world."

2009