“Who is the enemy other?” asked Jeffrey Murer in an openSecurity agenda-setting article. Identifying the ‘enemy’ lies at the heart of security policies and practices, and despite numerous indications that these constructions are generally stereotypical and misguided, this tendency seems impossible to overcome.

Over the past year openSecurity has explored these issues in the collection below.

The politics of interpreting Toulouse

Brigitte Beauzamy 30 April 2012
The use of anti-Semitism as the main narrative for “Toulouse” led to an internationalising step in the depiction of these events, as commentators increasingly linked the attacks to the Israel/Palestine conflict. Comments then focused on the alleged responsibility of “Israel” or “Muslims” in Merah’s killings.

The game gets serious

Soheil Asefi 30 April 2012
Iran and the 5 +1 group (the five permanent members of the UN Security Council, plus Germany) began talks on 15 April in Istanbul with a plenary session of all parties. The White House has welcomed Iran-5+1 group talks as a ‘positive first step’.

Bicycle bombs to Bollywood - immigration and identity

Kaushik Barua 28 April 2012

One breach of the law cancels out another.

Time to reframe the debate on the Iranian nuclear programme

Paul Ingram 23 April 2012
Debates on the Iranian nuclear programme tend to adopt a Manichean view depicting it as a major security threat. If we want to properly address the issue of nuclear proliferation, it is time to switch to a different framework for negotiations.

Purposeful inquiry: detoxing the poisoned chalice

Eamonn Baker 23 April 2012

Derry/Londonderry is the UK City of Culture in 2013. In a place where names can be rigid markers of enmity, what tools can we use to dismantle the unseeing ways ‘the enemy’ is passed between generations?

Will diplomacy solve the Iran-US imbroglio?

Wajahat Qazi 19 April 2012
Ayatollah Khamenei's recent declarations concerning the future of the Iranian nuclear dispute may sound belligerent, but they indeed reveal levers to be used for diplomacy. Acknowledging Iran’s role as a regional leader is a first step.

The enemy always gets a vote

Riccardo Dugulin 19 April 2012
Current tensions between Iran and the US /Israel alliance may lead to military intervention from either side. The outcome of such initiative is very uncertain as both sides are caught up in security dilemmas.

A plague on both your populisms

Catherine Fieschi 19 April 2012

Populist movements can bear a strong, but misleading, resemblance to more respectable cousins: movements for democratic accountability. It has now become fashionable even to argue that ‘some populism is good’ - because populism is seen as ‘speaking truth to power’. It’s important therefore for democrats to be able to tell the good guys from the bad guys. If populists can play this game, don’t the rest of us need our own enemy images?

The far right takes root in Europe

Mariano Aguirre 18 April 2012

Anders Behring Breivik’s attacks are part of a worrying trend in Europe of the far right’s rise within mainstream politics. From the Netherlands and Germany to Britain and France, immigrant communities are on the defensive.

Who is the enemy Other?

Jeffrey Stevenson Murer 16 April 2012
In ganging up on housing estates, in racist attacks or inter-state brinkmanship, how does the enemy become the Other? This peculiar purification process requires a narrative and a chance to 'perform a boundary'. For local and national communities, leaders and politicians alike, it is one way to reinforce our own sense of group identity. Is there another way of feeling secure?

The Toulouse killings and the radical right - part I

Nicolas Lebourg 5 April 2012
There were some good reasons to suspect the French extreme right of theToulouse killings. In this first article, Nicolas Lebourg shows how, once the identity of the killer was known, Marine Le Pen could switch her discourse to Islamophobia, a terrain on which she feels most comfortable.

Muslim radicalism: the power of friendship

Hasnet Lais 1 April 2012
Why do some Muslims join radical groups? Theories abound but their analytic capacity remains low as they tend to focus on only a single aspect of this complex issue. Something they miss is why new recruits consider joining these groups a positive thing: they find good friends there.

Global political Islam in Bangladesh: past, present and future

Mubashar Hasan 1 April 2012
As global public attention is turned to Bangladesh and the International Crime Tribunal, the country's complex political situation comes under scrutiny. Both main parties face a growing opposition from militant Islamism which thrives on local discontent as well as on appeals to global jihadism.

The debate France urgently needs after the Toulouse attacks

Elena Georgantzis 30 March 2012

In 'sensitive urban zones' where a third of residents live below the poverty line and unemployment among young people is over 40%, it is difficult to see how people like Mohammed Merah can become part of France’s social fabric. 

The blame game, and then Toulouse...

Wasseem El Sarraj 22 March 2012

If Israel wants to keep Palestine off the map, so to speak, and exaggerate existential threats: what is the end game? There are days, viewed from Gaza, when one must feel an even graver concern for an already bleak future. And then news comes in from France...

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