War, ‘strategic communication’ and the violence of non-recognition

Abstract

Contemporary Western war-fighting is animated by the fictitious imagination of a war free from antagonism. In this logic, winning wars is about winning the 'hearts and minds' of local populations, about persuasion rather than confrontation. In recent years, the concept of 'strategic communication' (SC) has been elevated to the top echelons of strategic thinking in United States military circles, focusing attention on how to communicate 'effectively' with local populations. Via an analysis of the concept of SC, this article examines the ethico-political dimensions of contemporary Western-led 'population centric' war. Through a reading inspired by Judith Butler's recent work in Precarious life (London: Verso 2006) and Frames of war (London: Verso 2009), and an analysis that turns on the link between ethics and ontology, I reflect on the significance of the 'communications turn' in warfare for our study of war in ontological terms.

How people respond to military crisis: Exploring the role of military affiliation, gender and political ideology

“…According to previous research, the military has been somewhat successful in communication on war‐related issues (e.g. Cioppa, ; Holmqvist, ). However, in a recent empirical study, Jenni, Peterson, Jameson, and Cubbage () found that the military was practising one‐way communication when it deals with issues other than wars, such as environmental issues.…”

The Dynamics of Mediatized Conflicts

“…(MoD, 2002: 2--3) Influence Activity does not preclude military logic then but, rather, subsumes it into the rhetoric of persuasion. This of course is problematic --as will become evident throughout this chapter - because within military logic consent becomes conflated with coercion, choice with force, which, in turn, obscures that wider contradictions apparent in the strategization of war as persuasion (Rose 2001;Holmqvist, 2013). This is perhaps best articulated through the second logic: marketing logic.…”

“…Although positioned as the antithesis of hard power and coercive force, the ascendancy of influence in defence doctrine (and indeed political thinking) is based on the recognized principle that military force remains a relevant and important leverage of power. Compelling others to 'our will' is still, as Clausewitz (2007) states 'an act of force', and coercion and confrontation integral to what 'war is' (Holmqvist, 2013).…”

Embodying militarism: exploring the spaces and bodies in-between

“…Likewise in IR, which has, only relatively recently begun to explore how 'the international' is also an embodied and emotional space (Crawford, 2000;Edkins, 2003;Shinko, 2010;Holmqvist, 2013;Åhall and Gregory, 2015). Within sociology, attention has predominantly been on the quantitative, with military sociology a side-lined sub-field.…”