Book Review: Holger Stritzel, Security in Translation: Securitization Theory and the Localization of Threat
| Published date | 01 February 2017 |
| Author | Courteney J O’Connor |
| Date | 01 February 2017 |
| DOI | 10.1177/1478929916676930 |
| Subject Matter | Book ReviewsPolitical Theory |
Book Reviews 95
Security in Translation: Securitization
Theory and the Localization of Threat by
Holger Stritzel. Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan,
2014. 223pp., £65.00 (h/b), ISBN 9781137307569
While Holger Stritzel uses the Copenhagen
School of securitisation theory as an intellectual
starting point for his conception of securitisa-
tion theory, he makes a point early in this book
to aver its instability as a workable political
theory. According to Stritzel, the Copenhagen
School suffers from being ‘heavily under-
theorized, theoretically insufficient and flawed’
and lacking in ability to be consistently and
empirically applied (p. 181).
This book focuses on developing securitisa-
tion theory post-Copenhagen School, as per-
tains to the translation and localisation of threat
images through reiterative speech acts by
actors other than political or military leaders. It
is the considered opinion of Stritzel that this
second-generation securitisation theory offers
a framework of analysis whereby, through a
transformative process of discursive localisa-
tion, threat images become locally and gener-
ally accepted and convergent. An essential
element of second-generation securitisation
theory concerns the application of the term
‘security’ to a valued referent object within the
discursive locale which must be contextualised
in terms of the local political and security
history in order for a securitising speech act to
be considered successful. Stritzel utilises two
threat images as case studies: organised crime
and so-called ‘rogue states’. He analyses the
securitisation of the threat image through secu-
ritising speech acts and examines the relative
success of the translation and localisation of the
threat images from the American discursive
locale to the German discursive locale. It is par-
ticularly an academic work, although its utility
as a sociolinguistic study as well as an informed
analysis of threat images broadens the fields
within which its conclusions can be applied.
While Stritzel occasionally writes in an
overly complicated manner, the book is well-
structured and clearly rigorously researched. In
terms of theoretical innovation, Security in
Translation not only identifies the philosophi-
cal weaknesses of the Copenhagen School in
empirical application but produces a theory of
securitisation that is then successfully applied
to two case studies. By employing both suc-
cessful and unsuccessful cases of the transla-
tion and localisation of a securitised threat
image, Stritzel is also able to identify where
further research is required and thus has
produced a significant addition to the existing
literature.
Courteney J O’Connor
(National Security College, Australian
National University)
© The Author(s) 2016
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DOI: 10.1177/1478929916676930
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Epistemic Liberalism: A Defence by Adam
James Tebble. Abingdon: Routledge, 2016.
298pp., £90.00 (h/b), ISBN 9780415591997
Philosophers have usually defended liberalism
on moral grounds and its moral superiority
over other ideologies. Despite all the differ-
ences among them, liberal thinkers have argued
that the freedom for individuals to choose their
own ends in life and the ways to achieve those
goals is an essential part for individual flour-
ishing and happiness. This normative view of
liberalism has been (and still is) the dominant
view in the last couple of centuries. Although
Adam Tebble doesn’t ignore this aspect of lib-
eralism, in Epistemic Liberalism: A Defence,
he tries to illustrate a different account of liber-
alism which can provide better answers to our
current challenges.
Tebble explains the aim of the book as
being to ‘construct[s] and defend[s] an epis-
temic account of liberalism as the most appro-
priate response to the challenges that the
cultural turn presents to the theory of justice’
(p. 1). By epistemic liberalism, Tebble means
an approach that focuses on ‘the question of
preconditions for the effective utilisation of
knowledge in large scale and complex socie-
ties’ (p. 3). The book traces back this tradition
to the writings of Hume and Mill in the eight-
eenth and nineteenth centuries. The most
important advocates of this tradition in the
twentieth century are Karl Popper, Michael
Polanyi and Friedrich Hayek.
Although Tebble provides a rich account of
epistemic liberalism, it is Hayek who plays the
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