Securitisation, Appropriation, Transformation? The adaptability of international counterterrorism discourse and practices in Kenya

Abstract: The thesis analyses the changing character of Western interventions in the global South against the background of merging Western security and development policies. Taking the example of international counterterrorism engagement in Kenya, the thesis analyses how ‘weak’ or ‘undergoverned’ social spaces in the South are rendered potentially dangerous to international security and therefore represented as in urgent need of intervention. Furthermore, it examines how this ‘knowledge’ is translated into policies and practices and how these are experienced and challenged by agents on the ground. On an analytical level, the thesis aims at advancing the concept of governmentality, understood as both a historically distinct mode of power as well as an analytical perspective for the study of ‘arts of government’. In the thesis, the concept is engaged critically. The thesis proposes a widening of the governmentality perspective that pays closer attention to how discourses and practices are appropriated and potentially transformed by the actors involved. It is argued that local mobilisation against controversial counterterrorism practices in Kenya contributed to a shift of donor policies towards a counterterrorism engagement in which ‘care’ for the population and development are accentuated. However, while it is demonstrated that local agents have certain autonomy to influence hegemonic security agendas and practices, a limited analytical focus on local agency draws off attention from analysing agency as a technology of liberal rule. Mobilising concepts, such as empowerment, capacity-building or ownership in security-related projects, underline liberalism’s capacity to adapt to situational changes. Despite the deployment of ‘benign’ commonsensical concepts, the use of direct and coercive means of power remains an important tool of power. Practices of care and control, of development and security, need therefore to be seen as overlapping key modalities of liberal government.