Politics of Anxiety

Review Anxiety is arguably more fundamental to the human condition than any other emotion or affect. Yet we know comparatively little about its specificities. This book theorizes anxiety beyond the limits of 20th century psychoanalysis, and offers a novel approach to the politics of anxiety, demonstrating not just the dangers but potentials of anxiety for political subjects of the present. -- Julian Reid, Professor of International Relations, University of LaplandFrom media discourses about economic crises to insecurity traumas about terrorism, or from exacerbated fears of political extremism in Western democracies to daily suspicions or neuroses about “others” who do not look or act “like us,” our contemporary condition is often seen or felt by many to be stress-inducing, highly uncertain, and indeed anxiety-creating. This important volume tackles the political dimensions and implications of today’s “logic of anxiety.” Focusing not just on what, transnationally, this politics of anxiety looks like but also on what it does and produces—and on what subjects and subjectivities it both enables and undermines—Politics of Anxiety deftly combines rich theoretical analyses with prescient empirical studies. The result is a text that is sure to be an essential reading for students and scholars eager to understand and challenge contemporary practices, policies, and ideologies of fear, terror, and anxiety. -- François Debrix, Professor, Virginia Tech, USAThis much needed collection will put the politics of anxiety (and the anxiety of politics) squarely on the critical agenda. The editors are to be congratulated for curating such a stimulating set of interventions drawing out the distinctive immanent logics of anxiety in contraposition to the transcendent and linear logics of calculative risk. The collection bristles with an excitement and positivity which is as necessary as it is refreshing. -- David Chandler, Professor of International Relations, University of WestminsterThis book is a must read. While there are many accounts that have the ambition to explain today’s political uncertainty, the authors of this book convincingly show that anxiety is the main driving force. Economic inequalities may play an important role but the power of affect and emotions is even more important. -- Jan Willem Duyvendak, Distinguished Research Professor of Sociology,University of AmsterdamThis insightful volume analyses the politics of anxiety and its connection to security and resistance. By focusing on what different logics of anxiety can tell us about the present and the opening up of new political spaces, this excellent book grasps wholeheartedly the changing nature of anxiety and subjectivity in an era riddled with uncertainty. A true joy to read! -- Catarina Kinnvall, Professor of Politics, Lund UniversityThe contributors to this volume convincingly argue that we are firmly in an age of anxiety in which security threats are not specified and fear is of the unknown. Yet, while anxiety—as an affect and practice of security—enables the articulation of a never-ending and trauma-inflected list of threats that rob us of a temporality of the future, it also creates openings for a politics of resistance. This volume capably pinpoints how anxiety is central for understanding security practices in a variety of events and by drawing on several theorists often overlooked in the field of International Relations. Most importantly, it contributes to the difficult work of rechanneling anxiety toward an imaginary of change in the face of practices of security and sovereignty that fail to justify themselves or allay our fears. -- Jack Amoureux, Visiting Assistant Professor, Wake Forest UniversityWhile the collection provides no definitive answers, nor can or should it, the volume’s contributions collectively highlight the complexity of anxiety regardless of the context in which anxiety seems bound to prevail. Regardless of whether one is specifically interested