A01=Christina Hellmich
Al Qaeda Detainees
Al Qaeda's Mission
Alan Cromartie
Ali Parchami
Anna M. Agathangelou
Author_Christina Hellmich
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Bin Laden
Category=JB
Category=JHB
Category=JPA
Category=JPWL
Clerical Regime
counterterrorism scholarship
critical perspectives on terrorist networks
El Aroud
epistemological frameworks
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Female Jihadis
Global Salafi Jihad
HSAS
Ibn Qayyim Al Jawziyah
Ibn Taymiyya
Ibn Taymiyyah
Islamic Republic
Islamic Republic's Foreign Policy
Islamic Republic’s Foreign Policy
Jamal Al Din Al Afghani
laden
Lars Berger
Malika El Aroud
Muslim World
Nadya Ali
National Security Strategy
political violence analysis
Present Al Qaeda
Puritanical Variant
Quantitative Engagements
Rashmi Singh
Salafi jihadism research
Sovereign Strategy
Study Al Qaeda
terrorism studies
Vice Versa
Western security discourse
WMD Proliferation
Young Men
Product details
- ISBN 9781409423669
- Weight: 476g
- Dimensions: 156 x 234mm
- Publication Date: 28 Jul 2012
- Publisher: Taylor & Francis Ltd
- Publication City/Country: GB
- Product Form: Hardback
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Despite a plethora of studies devoted to it, the current understanding of al-Qaeda and the threat it poses remains vague and ambiguous. Is al-Qaeda a rigidly structured organisation, a global network of semi-independent cells, a franchise, or simply an ideology? What role did Osama bin Laden play within the group and its terrorist campaign? What does it mean to talk about the "global Salafi-jihad" threat allegedly confronting the West? In addressing such questions many writers have sought to offer definitive answers, yet overall the truth about al-Qaeda remains elusive. This book moves beyond this traditional approach in order to investigate and critically assess how such answers reflect the particular epistemological frameworks within which they are produced. Its chapters explore the varied contexts within which the obscure entity labelled al-Qaeda is constituted as a comprehensible object of political, strategic, cultural, and scientific knowledge, and within which 'terrorism' is rendered an experience of quotidian life. This volume offers a much-needed critical reflection on Western ways of talking and of thinking about the frightening experience of global terrorism. In trying to know how we know al-Qaeda, it offers us an opportunity to try to know ourselves and our often hidden assumptions about legitimacy, violence, and political purpose.
Christina Hellmich is a lecturer in International Relations at the School of Politics and IR at the University of Reading. She is specialist in Middle East politics with a particular research interest in Political Islam, International Security and Global Health. Andreas Behnke is a lecturer in Political Theory at the School of Politics and IR at the University of Reading. His research interests include the Political Theory of International Relations, in particular Carl Schmitt, Critical Security and Terrorism Studies, and Critical Geopolitics.
