Securitization Outside the West

Abstract

This book analyses securitization processes outside of the West, with a focus on Africa.The aim of the volume is to develop an original analytical framework to explain the securitization-neo-patrimonialism dynamics in West Africa, drawing upon insights from securitization theory, sociology and psychology. Among critical voices, securitization has become the gold standard for analysing emerging challenges, such as migration, terrorism and human security. Yet, despite its broadening agenda, the framework has also been accused of bias, with a Western political context and democratic governance structure at its heart. This book aims to re-conceptualise the framework in a way that suits non-Western contexts better, notably by re-conceptualising the securitization-neopatrimonialism nexus in Africa, which gives us significant new insights into non-Western political contexts. It analyses the securitization processes among the political elites under neo-patrimonial statehood, and further stretches the conceptualisation of securitization into African statehood, which is characterised by a blurred line between the leader and the state. The volume explores the processes of securitizing threats in Liberia, Sierra Leone and wider West Africa, as well as the neo-patrimonial regimes of these states. In doing so, it explores the influence these states' neo-patrimonial regimes have on the processes of threat securitization. This book will be of much interest to students of critical security studies, African politics and International Relations.

Securitising Decolonisation

“…34 Six months after the New Regions Referendum, on 5 May 2019, that is, again just before the symbolic 9 May anniversary of the 1956 British Togoland referendum, the HSGF protested with T-shirts reading "Independence for Western Togoland -No Division of Volta." 35 Again, eight members, including Kudzordzi, were arrested by the Ghanaian security forces. Once more, the scale of the swoop was a national statement by the Ghanaian state that provided some bizarre imagery: described as a "Rambo-style" operation, 36 26 armed police officers, 20 armed military personnel and some Bureau of National Investigation operatives whisked the eight arrested HSGF members to the 66 Artillery Regiment in Ho, where a waiting helicopter airlifted them to Accra.…”

“…In the slipstream of the 'failed states' and 'human security' debate, many scholarly proposals had emerged that either the Trusteeship Council, other UN bodies, or regional organizations should be partially or even fully entrusted with the administration of the affairs and supervisory functions of complex UN missions. 35 Inactive since 1994, when Palau (the last remaining trusteeship territory) was released into independence, the Trusteeship Council has been regularly described as a success story in the history of the United Nations. 36 In 2004, Secretary-General Kofi Anan's Director of Communications, Edward Mortimer, suggested to "revive and reform the Trusteeship Council, using it as a mechanism through which the community of nations could effectively exercise its tutelage and responsibility for the interests of those unfortunate peoples who may from time to time find themselves in need of international protection."…”

“…213 Conceptualizing a securitisation-neo-patrimonialism nexus in Africa, Ezeokafor and Kaunert attempt to make the securitisation framework fruitful for the African context, however, by stating that "patrimonialism in Africa has been practiced in an extreme form, thereby undermining the benefits of the system" they also can't pull it off without a relapse into the discourse that draws on the shortcomings of the continent. 214 Sarah Bertrand took the critique of securitisation's under-theorisation of the audience as an impetus to subject it to a postcolonial reading, shifting the focus from the muteness of the speaker to the power of the audience to silence and exclude. 215 By combining Fanonian decolonial theory of emancipatory violence with securitisation, Akinbode Fasakin argues that the subaltern is indeed able to securitise, when resorting to protest and violence.…”

“…34 As Ezeokafor and Kaunert put it, the securitising actor must find a "line of argument that will effectively resonate with or swing the audience in full of support of the intended line of action." 35 The analytical focus must therefore be directed towards the intersubjective negotiation process.…”

“…Skinner holds that "oral history was critical to the de-centring of 'western' political-scientific theories and the re-centring of the ideas and experiences of African protagonists in political mobilizations and events." 35 Thus, many historians of contemporary Africa find that their methodological inclination towards oral tradition is challenged by the passage of time. 36 What is not written down now is subject to the vagaries of oral tradition or, in the worst case, lost forever and thus subject to speculation.…”