‘As a woman…’; ‘As a Muslim…’: Subjects, positions and counter-terrorism powers in the United Kingdom

• Published in: Critical social policy Vol. 37; no. 2; pp. 245 - 267
• Main Authors: Jarvis, Lee, Lister, Michael
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: London, England SAGE Publications 01.05.2017; Sage Publications Ltd
• Subjects: Attitudes; Citizenship; Counterterrorism; Ethnic identity; Ethnicity; Group research; Literature reviews; Resistance; Subjectivity; Terrorism; United Kingdom > UK; subjectivity; ethnicity; gender; terrorism; identity; counter-terrorism; religion
• ISSN: 0261-0183; 1461-703X
• DOI: 10.1177/0261018316684506

This article presents findings from original focus group research on the importance of identity claims within public understandings of counter-terrorism across the UK. Following a review of existing literature on the terrorism/counter-terrorism/identity nexus, the article introduces four prominent subject positions inhabited within public articulations of counter-terrorism powers: the ‘Muslim’, the ‘target’, the ‘woman’ and the ‘unaffected’. Positions such as these, we argue, both enable and inhibit particular normative, political and anecdotal claims about counter-terrorism frameworks and their impact upon the body politic. This, we suggest, is demonstrative of the co-constitutive role between counter-terrorism and identity claims. Thus, on the one hand, counter-terrorism initiatives work to position individuals socially, politically and culturally: (re)producing various religious, ethnic and other identities. Yet, at the same time, specific subject positions are integral to the articulation of people’s attitudes toward developments in counter-terrorism. The article concludes by thinking through some of the implications of this, including for resistance toward securitising moves and for citizenship more generally.