In the most recent issue of Security Dialogue, I have an article that explores the cultural ambivalence of assassination in liberal regimes.
I start by presenting the security case that is made to justify assassination and targeted killing. I show that the publicly articulated rationales for assassination lack evidential support for their claims and combine contradictory security logics that are unsustainable. My argument is that to understand how assassination and targeted killing become possible in liberal regimes, it necessary to explore how forms of political violence are understood and made meaningful. This requires that the analyst move beyond the administrative frameworks and technical rationalizations of security.
My framework for analysis combines Alan Feldman’s (1991) argument that political violence is an ‘emplotted action’--i.e.,'[an action of narration that organizes] events into a configurational system,a mode of historical explanation, and a normative intervention' --alongside William Connolly’s
(2005) notion of resonance and the 'will to revenge' --a prominent sentiment in contemporary politics. I use this framework to provide an account of how forms of assassination have been positioned within Western cultural understandings of political violence.
The focal point of examination is the biblical heroine Judith. I show how her story has been used as the narrative structure for understanding and (de)legitimating acts of assassination among Western publics across several historical contexts. Drawing upon the work of historians and biblical scholars, my reading of the book of Judith highlights how ambivalence has been a central aspect of how assassination was understood as a form of political violence during these time periods. Primarily, I illustrate that the story of Judith caused controversy over how to weigh the righteousness of her deed and her own virtues with the deceitful means that she used to kill Holofernes.
The legacy of Judith's moral problematique is then illustrated in relation to US President Barak
Obama’s May 2011 speech announcing the killing of Osama Bin Laden. Through a discursive analysis of the forms of subject positioning and descriptions used by President Obama, I show the presence of an underlying anxiety regarding the assassination that he tries to manage.
The article provides two main conclusions. First, the cultural resonance of the ‘will to revenge’ and ambivalence over its legitimacy are important for the recognition of assassination and targeted killing as instances of political violence intended to achieve security objectives. It is therefore important to examine how the emplotted actions of political violence are produced and circulated through cultural practices Second, I suggest that although the story of Judith may underpin contemporary assassination practices, it also offers a means of critically engaging with them.
The full article can be found here. Regrettably it is behind a pay-wall. If you do not have access but would like a copy, please email me at my institutional email address (just google me).
References
Connolly WE (2005) The evangelical-capitalist resonance machine. Political Theory 33(6): 869–886.
Feldman A (1991) Formations of Violence: The Narrative of the Body and Political Terror in Northern Ireland. Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press.
Obama B (2011) Remarks by the president on Osama bin Laden, 2 May. Available at: http://www.whitehouse.gov/blog/2011/05/02/osama-bin-laden-dead (accessed 10 June 2011).
If you are interested in reading more about the history of assassination, I would recommend Franklin Ford's Political Murder: From Tyrannicide to Terrorism
For a comprehensive account of the cultural resonance of Judith, I would recommend Margarita Stocker's Judith: Sexual Warrior: Women and Power in Western Culture.
Images: Top is Judith and Holofernes by Klimt (1900) and bottom is Judith Beheading Holofernes by Caravaggio (1598-1599)
