Imagining Terrorism, Imagining War and the Paradox of Violence

• In Event: Transgressive Criminology

Abstract

Violence presents itself as a paradox in our society: everybody abhors it yet it is the mainstay of the entertainment industry and (especially in the US) the backbone of the economy. The military industrial complex warned about by Eisenhower manifests itself as a form of military Keynesianism with the production of everything from guns to fighter aircraft becoming an extraordinary large part of the manufacturing sector with consequences both in terms of crime and a seemingly endless state of war and terrorism. This paper is concerned with definitions of war and terrorism, the dualism of violence and differing cultural discourses, ‘othering’ and dehumanization, the social characteristics of the main actors and the problems we face in differentiating 'good' violence and 'bad' violence. It includes a focus on the terrorist attacks that took place in London in July 2005 and the more recent atrocities in Paris.

Author

• Jayne Mooney, John Jay College of Criminal Justice