Comment archive

Wednesday, 22 Jul 2026
Seeing 22 July through transitional justice: what have we learned?

The new book After 22 July: Transitional Justice and Terror focuses on forms of accountability, reconciliation, and remembrance that have emerged in the years since the 2011 terrorist attacks in Norway. Bringing together perspectives from multiple disciplines, the edited volume examines criminal trials, inquiry commissions, policing reforms, victim recognition, and memorialization after 22 July as interconnected processes of transitional justice.

Thursday, 19 Apr 2018
In the Sahel, militarism doesn’t give us a full picture

By Philippe M Frowd and Adam J Sandor International security interventions in Sahel are multiplying. Military actions such as France’s Operation Barkhane, a Chapter 7 United Nations stabilization mission – MINUSMA, and increasing American military involvement in the region give these actions in the Sahel a ‘hard’, militarised image. Yet ...

Tuesday, 27 Mar 2018
On Militarism and Security: a Special Issue Introduction

This blog post briefly introduces the Security DialogueSpecial IssueonMilitarism and Security: Dialogue, Possibilities and Limits, guest edited by Anna Stavrianakis and Maria Stern (Volume 49, Issue 1-2, February-April 2018). Here they talk about their own article for the special issue, which also serves as its introduction. By Anna Stavrianakis and ...

Monday, 12 Feb 2018
Postcolonial states and ‘excessive militarism’: The Indian story

By Swati Parashar Do all states embrace militarism as a natural condition of their existence? Can militarism in different states be differentiated in content and form? How do states engender security through militarism? How is civilian consent built around militarism, especially in postcolonial states? In an era when populist regimes ...

Monday, 5 Feb 2018
Taking "Militarism" Seriously in Critical Security Studies- Renaissance of a Concept?

By Bryan Mabee and Srdjan Vucitec The word “militarism” has seen better days. Judging by Google Books’ Ngram Viewer, it first entered into the vernacular in the nineteenth century, first in Spanish, then in French, Italian and Russian, then in English and German. The word reached its zenith in these ...

Wednesday, 3 Jan 2018
Agamben, Hobbes, and Rethinking Security in the Messianic Key

By Sergei Prozorov Contemporary critical security studies increasingly turns to the problematic of political theology. This interest and inquiry into the theological origins of today’s political concepts and categories enables more effective critical interventions in contemporary politics. “Messianism” is one of the less explored aspects of political theology in security ...

Wednesday, 13 Dec 2017
The Political Economic Logic of Liberal Exceptionalism

By Jacqueline Best These are interesting times for scholars interested in the concept of “exceptionalism” and emergency. As I have pointed to in my recent article in Security Dialogue, “Security, economy, population: The political economic logic of liberal exceptionalism,” prior to the recent wave of right-leaning election wins it seemed ...

Monday, 4 Dec 2017
"Dimming the Sun" and the Implications of a ‘Plan B’ to Prevent Global Warming

By Olaf Corry What security problems are likely to be involved in developing and using technology to deliberately modify the global climate ? Some argue that effective global action to prevent global warming is too difficult politically, and that ‘dimming the sun’ should be explored. The idea is that a ...