Agents without agency: Assessing the role of the audience in securitization theory

Abstract

This article assesses the role of the audience in securitization theory. The main argument is that in order to accurately capture the role of the securitization audience, it must be theorized as an active agent, capable of having a meaningful effect on the intersubjective construction of security values. Through a meta-synthesis of 32 empirical studies of securitization, this article focuses on two central questions: (1) Who is the audience? (2) How does the audience engage in the construction of security? When assessed against the theoretical works on securitization, this analysis reveals that the manner in which the audience is defined and characterized within securitization theory differs with the empirical literature that investigates securitization processes. Where the empirical literature suggests securitization is a highly intersubjective process involving active audiences, securitization theory characterizes audiences as agents without agency, thereby marginalizing the theory’s intersubjective nature. This article sketches a new characterization of the securitization audience and outlines a framework for securitizing actor–audience interaction that better accounts for securitization theory’s linguistic and intersubjective character, addresses this theoretical/empirical conflict, and improves our understanding of how groups select and justify security priorities and costly security policies.

Failed Securitisation Moves during the 2015 ‘Migration Crisis’

“…To use a maritime metaphor, that: “securitising agents cannot navigate freely toward successful securitization” (Bourbeau, : 190), since audiences are also constituted by how securitising discourses create boundaries between ‘us’ and ‘them’, or whatever is claimed to pose an existential threat to whatever is to be protected (Bourbeau, ; Côté, ). To become legitimated, a call to action needs to connect with personal “feelings, needs and interests” of various audiences, experts and the general public (Balzacq, : 185; Floyd, ).…”

“…The concern in this article was mainly to account for failed securitization moves during the EU migration crisis, when audiences, far from passively consenting to the reframing of security threats by those in dominant positions, did not participate in co‐constructing the named security threats as framed. These examples contradict: “…a perception of securitization as a linear, straightforward event, in which securitizing actors speak at (or act towards) the audience”, implying that securitising actors have to: “…engage with the audience”, or audiences, who in turn help co‐determine what form securitization takes, or whether it takes place at all (Côté, : 551).…”

“…This is in line with the Copenhagen School (CS) definition (Buzan et al., ; Wæver, ). The term ‘trigger’, which implies an automatic audience response, has been challenged in recent scholarship (see for example, Côté, ). As can be noted:

…the audience is a distinct and unique component of the securitization process and is distinguished from other units such as aggressors (the addressee of security actions), referent objects (the entity to be protected), or functional actors (key security influencers that do not have the capacity to legitimize new security meanings alone, but can affect the dynamics of actor–audience interaction) (Côté, : 544).

…”

“…Following Buzan et al., this study considers “(t)he key issue is for whom security becomes a consideration in relation to whom” (Buzan et al., : 18). Since various audiences represent: “those the securitizing act attempts to convince” (Wæver, , ; Buzan et al., : 41), the question of audience legitimation and institutional support, should be viewed as an “intersubjective” process (Côté, ). Once a specific securitization move is legitimated, and becomes institutionalised, it can be hard to de‐securitize that issue later on, or remove it from the sphere of “crisis” management (Jutila, ; Hansen, ).…”

Securitización como supervivencia, securitización como actos del habla: crítica a la Escuela de Copenhague/ Securitization as Survival, Securitization as a Speech Act: A Critic to the Copenhagen School

“…Waever (2007) ha sido enfático en que la securitización no puede ser llevada a cabo sola por el agente securitizador, porque este se encuentra inmerso en medio de una realidad intersubjetiva y socialmente construida. En este sentido, no se puede negar que la TS busca resaltar cómo las interacciones sociales crean significados sobre el mundo social por medio del diseño de normas, valores e identidades que facilitan la interpretación de la realidad (Coté 2016). Sin embargo, como se enfatizó en la sección anterior, el objeto de análisis de la TS se concentra en la articulación -lo qué se hace al decir seguridad, el acto ilocucionario-y no lo qué resulta por haber dicho seguridad -el acto perlocucionario; ergo, para esta la reacción de la audiencia es irrelevante y su rol dentro del proceso intersubjetivo termina siendo fútil.…”