Producing New Spaces of Violence: Libya and the Changing Style of NATO Interventions after the Global Financial Crisis

• Published in: Geopolitics Vol. 22; no. 4; pp. 911 - 933
• Main Author: Morgan, Matthew C.
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Abingdon Routledge 02.10.2017; Taylor & Francis Ltd
• Subjects: Economic crisis; Governance; International finance; International organizations; International security; Intervention; Military intervention; Peacekeeping; Transnationalism; Violence; Libya
• ISSN: 1465-0045; 1557-3028
• DOI: 10.1080/14650045.2017.1293044

This paper argues that the way NATO conducts its interventions has altered since the Global Financial Crisis. The pressures of the Global Financial Crisis have forced NATO to shift from the sustained peacekeeping operation in Afghanistan to what I refer to as the trans-scalar space of intervention in Libya. Trans-scalar spaces of intervention are spaces where violence is temporarily concentrated by a transnational military apparatus to eliminate a perceived threat as efficiently as possible. The threats targeted are contained within a particular national locale and are unable to manifest themselves transnationally; their capacity is therefore several orders of magnitude below the force projection abilities of the transnational military force seeking its destruction. I examine how NATO's creation of these new types of spaces has impacted global security and undermined territorial-based forms of governance. Despite the ensuing chaos which enveloped Libya after NATO departed, with their low cost and speed at which they can be organized this style of intervention will likely be replicated in the future.