The dronification of state violence

Shaw, I. and Akhter, M. (2014) The dronification of state violence. Critical Asian Studies, 46(2), pp. 211-234. (doi: 10.1080/14672715.2014.898452)

Abstract

This article explores the shifting methods of U.S. state violence. Building on their earlier work, the authors focus on the use of drones for targeted killings in Pakistan, but here they tease out the wider implications for the future of “warfare”—particularly the meaning and extent of sovereignty and territory. The authors argue that drone strikes both emerge from and feed back into a series of evolutions in the nature of state violence centered on the intensely bureaucratic and automated delivery of death. This technopolitical transformation, they contend, is underwritten by the abandonment of “thought” and the ascendance of what Hannah Arendt calls an unaccountable “rule by nobody.” To build this argument, the authors investigate the institutional conditions of modern-day drone strikes, moving historically and geographically to the birth of the Predator drone and the rise of the CIA in 1980s Afghanistan. By studying nonhuman sources of power, the authors argue that today’s planetary manhunt exceeds any direct human control. They conclude by exploring the “individualization” of targeting and its likely consequences for war and law enforcement.

• Item Type: Articles
• Status: Published
• Refereed: Yes
• Glasgow Author(s) Enlighten ID: Shaw, Dr Ian
• Authors: Shaw, I., and Akhter, M.
• Subjects: E History America > E151 United States (General); G Geography. Anthropology. Recreation > G Geography (General)
• College/School: College of Science and Engineering > School of Geographical and Earth Sciences
• Journal Name: Critical Asian Studies
• Publisher: Taylor and Francis
• ISSN: 1467-2715
• ISSN (Online): 1472-6033