Secur(itiz)ing the West. The Transformation of Western Order

The goal of the project is to reconstruct transformation dynamics within the Western order. Especially since 9-11, the state and future of the transatlantic relationship has been discussed passionately in both political and academic circles.

The cohesiveness of the transatlantic community is apparently becoming problematic. While the “the West” as the underlying transnational order is usually taken for granted the focus of this project rests on a conceptualization of “the West” as a semantic category, a resource for the legitimation of policies that actors can draw on in contingent processes of signification. Referring to “the West” as the common ground for political action allows for the integration of very different positions by actors in Europe and North America. Precisely because its content is so unspecific, the concrete meaning of the West has to be actualised and re-produced continuously.

 

The directive research question follows from these considerations: What kind of contemporary processes of inclusion and exclusion are at stake when societies refer to themselves as Western and what are the broader implications of such processes for “Western order”? We assume that changing ascriptions of threat – for example the transformation from a bipolar system with nuclear threats to a multipolar system with asymmetric threats by terrorists – may trigger gradual transformations in the institutional structure of Western order.

Therefore, the empirical point of departure for this project is the interplay between transatlantic descriptions of problem solving and institutional consequences in three research areas: (1) inner-Western struggles about how to deal with China and Russia, (2) the transformation of NATO as a security institution, and (3) the question of how North America and Europe deal with the challenges of Islamic fundamentalism. The reconstruction of problem-oriented shifts of routines of action in these deliberately contrasting research areas opens up an empirically rich and theoretically informed perspective on transformations within the West as a political order.

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Working Papers:

Gabi Schlag, Benjamin Herborth und Gunther Hellmann: "Secur(itz)ing the West - The Transformation of Western Order", conference paper for the joint conference of the British International Studies Association (BISA) and the German Political Science Association (DVPW), Arnoldshain/Germany, May 2008.
Download: click here (pdf)

Events:

International Conference “Uses of the West – Security, Democracy, Order”, Forschungskolleg Humanwissenschaften, Bad Homburg, 8-10 October 2009
Programme: click here (pdf)

International Conference "Secur(itiz)ing the West - The Transformation of Western Order", Johns Hopkins University SAIS Bologna Center, Italien, 21 - 23 November 2008
Programme: click here (pdf)
Protocol: click here (pdf)

Workshop "Securitization Theory and the Formation of Normative Orders - Theoretical Problems and Methodological Challenges", Goethe-Universität Frankfurt a.M., 6 - 8 September 2008
Programme: click here (pdf)

 

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People in this project:

  • Project director / contact
    • Hellmann, Gunther, Prof. Dr. | Profile
  • Project members
    • Herborth, Benjamin (former member) | Profile
    • Schlag, Gabi (former member) | Profile
    • Weber, Christian (former member) | Profile

Publications of this project:

  • Hellmann, Gunther (2009): Beliefs as Rules for Action. Pragmatism as a Theory of Thought and Action, in: International Studies Review 11: 3 (2009), 638-641
    Details
  • Hellmann, Gunther; Herborth, Benjamin (2008): Fishing in the Mild West. Democratic Peace and Militarized Interstate Disputes in the Transatlantic Community, in: Review of International Studies, 34: 3 (2008), 481-506.
    Details | Link to full text
  • Hellmann, Gunther (2008): Inevitable Decline versus Predestined Stability: Disciplinary Explanations of the Evolving Transatlantic Order, in: Anderson, Jeffrey/Ikenberry G. John/Risse, Thomas (Hrsg.), The End of the West? Crisis and Chance in the Atlantic Order, Ithaca: Cornell University Press 2008, 28-52.
    Details
  • Herborth, Benjamin (2009): Political Community Formation beyond the Nation-State, in: Jens Bartelson, Gideon Baker (eds.), The Future of Political Community, London: Routledge, 2009, 175-203.
    Details

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