Re-Defining Terrorism - by Itoiz Rodrigo Jusué (Hardcover)

About the Book

Offering original insights into counter-radicalisation's extensive effects, Itoiz Rodrigo Jusué offers a complete and innovative examination of the development of counter-radicalisation discourses and policies.

Book Synopsis

Re-Defining Terrorism examines the emergence of the counter-radicalisation agenda in the UK and internationally. Offering original insights into counter-radicalisation's extensive effects, Itoiz Rodrigo Jusué offers a complete and innovative examination of the development of counter-radicalisation discourses and policies.

Outlining (counter)radicalisation as a new technology of governance embedded in the production and promotion of particular mentalities, conducts, identities, and subjectivities, the chapters investigate the transformations that the figure of the terrorist has gone through since the early 2000s and stresses the role of the media in the (re)production of new imaginaries of terror. Based on a large amount of rich qualitative data, the author shows how vocabularies and narratives of (counter)radicalisation are disseminated in popular culture establishing new lens through which terrorism and political violence are comprehended and acted upon in the UK and beyond.

Breaking fresh ground where the counter-radicalisation (and counter-extremism) agenda is still a relatively new and developing phenomenon in the UK and globally, this is compelling reading for policymakers, practitioners, undergraduate and post-graduate students and scholars across disciplines including critical studies on terrorism; criminology; media and communication studies; cultural studies; gender studies; social policy; and peace and conflict studies.

Review Quotes

Re-Defining Terrorism argues, persuasively, that the contemporary focus on counter-radicalisation policies and practices has transformed the social imaginaries of political violence. Rodrigo Jusué contributes to a now substantial and established critique of counterterrorism policy and practice that points to the counterproductivity of incursions into human rights and freedom of thought and expression by the wide variety of measures aimed at countering radicalisation. Her critique is relevant not only to scholars of political violence and terror and states' responses in the form of counterterrorism, but also to policy makers and those charged with responsibility for the security of our communities. In a world where there are strong popular tendencies towards demonisation of difference, this book is part of a crucial reminder of the dangers of over-reaction in the form of invasive and restrictive measures.

--Professor Marie Breen-Smyth, Senior Fellow, Center for Peace, Democracy and Development, University of Massachusetts, Boston, USA

Re-Defining Terrorism delivers an elegant, penetrating and highly illuminating deconstruction of the dominant social imaginaries of terrorism and counterterrorism in our society today. In a trenchant analysis of the contemporary terrorism dispositif, the author expertly uncovers the ways in which the evolving security discourse is profoundly reshaping knowledge, power and subjectivity in our world. Powerfully argued, wide-ranging, knowledgeable and prescient, I can't recommend this book highly enough.

--Professor Richard Jackson, Leading Thinker Chair in Peace Studies at the National Centre for Peace and Conflict Studies, University of Otago, Dunedin, New Zealand

A required reading for anyone concerned about how terrorism became the dominant political discourse of our times. What is the thing itself, who are its true subjects and practitioners, how did it get constituted into the paradigmatic dispositif of current counterterrorism? Re-Defining Terrorism provides unique perspectives on such critical issues.

--Professor Emeritus Joseba Zulaika, Center for Basque Studies, University of Nevada, Reno, USA

Dr Rodrigo Jusué has written a unique and intriguing study of the radicalisation paradigm - exploring how it has permeated British culture, the media, and enrolled citizens to report others as potential terrorist threats. No longer just a component within terrorism laws, the author shows us how 'radicalisation' affects our daily movements and judgements, through its replacement of previous dispositifs about political violence. As the first book-length study of radicalisation from a Cultural Studies perspective, this book will benefit all students of British Culture, Politics, and Sociology.

--Professor Charlotte Heath-Kelly, Politics and International Studies (PAIS), University of Warwick, Coventry, UK

About the Author

Itoiz Rodrigo Jusué is a Vice-Chancellor Independent Research Fellow at the Centre for Research in Communication and Culture at Loughborough University (UK).