Re-presenting the West : NATO’s Security Discourse after the End of the Cold War

Abstract: The purpose of this thesis is a critical investigation into the discursive processes through which the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation (NATO) has re-produced a geopolitical order, or nomos, after the end of the Cold War and the demise of its constitutive enemy, the Soviet Union. The thesis examines both the ontological as well as the epistemological aspects of these processes. It seeks to understand what new security relevant identities and spaces are defined in NATO’s discourse, as well as from what epistemic vantage point this new security political order is mapped and inscribed. More specifically, this thesis is based on the assumption that the continued existence and political relevance of the Alliance rests on its ability to re-produce ‘the West’ as a geo-cultural space that serves as its security referent object.The thesis concludes with a critical evaluation of NATO’s post-Cold War geopolitical order and the meta-theoretical commitments underlying its conception of security.