International Relations and the Problem of Time

Hom, Andrew R.

doi:10.1093/oso/9780198850014.001.0001

Cited by 33 publications

(8 citation statements)

References 0 publications

Supporting

Mentioning

Contrasting

Unclassified

Order By: Relevance

“…17 It is, however, irreducibly relational, as time -at least our representation of time -is always already a concept that necessitates relational observations. 18 Articulating a past requires a future -knowing what time '2:15' is requires a notion of what '2:00' and '2:30' are. Likewise, for 'World War I' to be intelligible, we need to know that it was separate from and happened prior to 'World War II'.…”

Section: Temporality War and The War On Terrorismmentioning

confidence: 99%

A ‘continuing, imminent’ threat: the temporal frameworks enabling the US war on terrorism

McIntosh

2022

International Relations

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

For nearly two decades, the United States has chosen to narrate its response to terrorism through what Judith Butler refers to as the ‘frame of war’. Despite this, victory in that country’s longest war remains largely unimaginable. In some ways this is a problem of time – it is not that victory or an end to the conflict is literally unimaginable, it’s that from our political present, an end appears radically discontinuous. This article builds on recent work using temporality and the political present as a lens and conceptual framework to better understand how temporal assumptions and frames shape the practice of war and political violence. In this article, I show how time and timing play a significant role in justifying the violence of the war on terrorism and in making it intelligible as war. I examine the past three administrations and focus on three areas – the borders of wartime, temporal continuity, and the vision of a post-war future – to show important differences in administrative approaches. To more concretely understand the practice of political violence going forward, attention to the temporal dynamics of politics must be front and center, particularly one possessing ambivalent frames. Doing so reveals the implications these dynamics have for the conduct and permissibility of violence.

show abstract

Section: Temporality War and The War On Terrorismmentioning

confidence: 99%

A ‘continuing, imminent’ threat: the temporal frameworks enabling the US war on terrorism

McIntosh

2022

International Relations

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

show abstract

“…They may face resistance or contestation until a critical mass of actors accept them -either voluntarily or involuntarily. 24 If active timing succeeds and social agents adopt or adapt to a growing array of contexts, 25 these efforts grow increasingly passive, becoming habituated, routinized (e.g. standard operating procedures), institutionalized (e.g.…”

Section: From Wartime To Wartimingmentioning

confidence: 99%

The liturgy of triumph: victory culture, popular rituals, and the US way of wartiming

Hom

Campbell

2022

International Relations

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

Wartime is fundamentally important to the study of international politics but not especially well understood. In this paper, we use timing theory and the concept of liturgy to unpack the contemporary dynamics of US wartime. A theory of political timing posits that all temporalities derive from and symbolize underlying social processes, and that these timing efforts unfold according to a master organizing standard. Liturgy highlights the way that ritualized acts help participants commune with the sacred – whether this be God or the nation-state. Scrutinizing contemporary US culture practices, we combine these ideas to argue that the notion of victory, as enacted through a widespread set of performative routines, acts as an organizing standard that embeds and reifies wartime in US security policy and daily life. Prevalent ideals of winning wars gather together a stylized past, explicate present problems, and generate expectations about future problems and conflicts. We tabulate several highly influential examples of this liturgy of triumph from national calendars, commemorative sites and events, and cultural practices like spectator sports. In addition to normalizing a view of wartime as having clear beginnings and uniquely successful endings, the US liturgy of triumph highlights a growing gap in the country’s relationship to the use of force. Most of what performative war liturgies commemorate is ‘finished’; it has been seen, known, and ostensibly won. Yet, much of what defines 21st century conflict is anything but certain or victorious. Moreover, US victory culture has only grown more acute the longer the concrete victories fail to materialize, suggesting a tragic code at the heart of US security politics.

show abstract

“…29-55). And, in International Relations, considerable recent work has gone into unpacking the temporal dimensions of global politics, evidenced in recent edited collections (Hom et al 2016;Agathangelou and Killian 2016b); special issues (Bertrand et al 2018); monographs (Jarvis 2009;Hutchings 2013;Stevens 2016;Hom 2020), andarticle contributions (e.g. Hutchings 2007;Hom 2010Hom , 2018.…”

Section: The Politics Of (Narrative) Timementioning

confidence: 99%

Constructing the coronavirus crisis: narratives of time in British political discourse on COVID-19

Jarvis

2021

Br Polit

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

This article explores the importance of constructions of temporality within the UK government's discourse on the COVID-19 coronavirus crisis across the first six months of 2020. Drawing on over 120 official texts, it traces the emergence of discontinuous, linear, and cyclical conceptions of time in representations of the virus' pasts, presents, and futures. Three arguments are made. First, constructions of temporality were fundamental to the social, political, and historical positioning of the virus. Second, these constructions were constitutively important in producing, explaining, justifying and celebrating the UK government's response to the virus. And, third, tensions and inconsistencies between these constructions of temporality highlight the contingent, and constructed, character of official discourse, pulling into question the inevitability of the UK's response and opening opportunity for critical intervention.

show abstract

International Relations and the Problem of Time

Cited by 33 publications

References 0 publications

A ‘continuing, imminent’ threat: the temporal frameworks enabling the US war on terrorism

A ‘continuing, imminent’ threat: the temporal frameworks enabling the US war on terrorism

The liturgy of triumph: victory culture, popular rituals, and the US way of wartiming

Constructing the coronavirus crisis: narratives of time in British political discourse on COVID-19

Contact Info

Product

Resources

About