MACMILLAN NATO, Civilisation and Individuals: The Unconscious Dimension of International Security (New Security Challenges)

This book critically engages with NATO’s two main referent objects of security: civilisation and individuals. By rethinking the seemingly natural assumption of these two referent objects, it suggests the epistemological importance of an unconscious dimension to understand meaning formation and behaviour change in international security. The book provides a historicised and genealogical approach of the idea of civilisation that is at the core of the Alliance, in which human needs, narratives, and security arrangements are interconnected. It suggests that there is a Civilised Subject of Security at the core of modern Western security that has constantly produced civilised and secure subjects around the world, which explains NATO’s emergence around a civilisational referent. The book then proceeds by considering the Individualisation of Security after the Cold War as another stage of the civilising process, based on NATO’s military operations in Bosnia-Herzegovina, Kosovo and Afghanistan. Review “This book represents one of the few works to examine the fundamental purposes and goals of NATO from a critical theoretical perspective. By examining the unconscious connections between civilisation and security, it shows how NATO has sought to forge the development of an Atlantic Community whose roots are deeper even than the necessity for common defence. And in the process of constructing and imposing its own conceptions of a civilisational identity, NATO has made it even more difficult to effectively manage its defence and security inter-actions with non-NATO states and societies that do not necessarily fit into its preconceived civilisational values and norms.” (Hall Gardner, author of Crimea, Global Rivalry, and the Vengeance of History and NATO Expansion and US Strategy in Asia) From the Back Cover This book critically engages with NATO’s two main referent objects of security: civilisation and individuals. By rethinking the seemingly natural assumption of these two referent objects, it suggests the epistemological importance of an unconscious dimension to understand meaning formation and behaviour change in international security. The book provides a historicised and genealogical approach of the idea of civilisation that is at the core of the Alliance, in which human needs, narratives, and security arrangements are interconnected. It suggests that there is a Civilised Subject of Security at the core of modern Western security that has constantly produced civilised and secure subjects around the world, which explains NATO’s emergence around a civilisational referent. The book then proceeds by considering the Individualisation of Security after the Cold War as another stage of the civilising process, based on NATO’s military operations in Bosnia-Herzegovina, Kosovo and Afghanistan.Sarah da Mota is currently researching astropolitics and the impact of space exploration for IR, peace and security. She has co-authored Drones and the uninsurable security subjects (Third World Quarterly) and Visibility and Politics: an Arendtian reading of US drone policy (Nação e Defesa).  About the Author Sarah da Mota is currently researching astropolitics and the impact of space exploration for IR, peace and security. She has co-authored Drones and the uninsurable security subjects (Third World Quarterly) and Visibility and Politics: an Arendtian reading of US drone policy (Nação e Defesa).