The Psychosocial Effects of Drone Violence: Social Isolation, Self‐Objectification, and Depoliticization

Abstract

The U.S.-led drone program has severe and wide-ranging psychosocial and political effects on people in targeted areas. This article draws upon the author's interviews with people living under drones in Afghanistan to argue that drone surveillance and bombardment causes social isolation and self-objectification. Interviewees reported that social gatherings, and any activities that involve nighttime travel, are shortened or avoided out of fear that drone surveillance will spot so-called "nefarious activity" and bombardment will follow. Drawing upon feminist and postcolonial scholarship, the article contends that drone surveillance constitutes a form of psychological colonization. Civilians are frequently made to think of how they look to drone operators and change their behaviors accordingly-therein "self-objectifying." Narratives of "precision" warfare allow citizens of Western liberal democracies leading/supporting the drone program to avoid psychologically confronting these effects, while people living under drones face relentless psychological insecurities.

Making Human Rights Emotional: A Research Agenda to Recover Shame in “Naming and Shaming”

“…For instance, Hall () defines emotional diplomacy as “coordinated state ‐level behavior that explicitly and officially projects the image of a particular emotional response toward other states ” (p. 2, our emphasis). Even this special issue, with its eclectic and wide range of topics, retains a primarily state‐ and leadership‐centric focus while extending to examining collective emotions at the communal level (Edney‐Browne, ; Hall & Ross, ).…”

Studying Emotions in Security and Diplomacy: Where We Are Now and Challenges Ahead

“…The potential consequences of diplomats/political decision‐makers' emotional bonds extend beyond the state level onto the level of citizens on the receiving side of these decisions. This is clearly exemplified by Alex Edney‐Browne's () contribution who focused on the severe and wide‐ranging psycho‐social and political effects of the U.S.‐led drone program on people in targeted areas. Drawing upon her extensive interviews with people living under drones in Afghanistan, she argued that drone surveillance and bombardment disrupt people's daily life routines and cause social isolation and self‐objectification: by the latter meaning that civilians are frequently made to think of how they look to drone operators and change their behavior accordingly.…”

“…Emotions play an important role in the success or otherwise of security discourses and diplomatic practices. They can lead to a redirection of foreign policies (as exemplified by the contributions of Baker, ; Eberle & Daniel, ; Keys & Yorke, ), investments in morally questionable practices conducted in the name of security such as torture or drone warfare (Edney‐Browne, ; Houck et al, ), and conflicts and wars (see Adisonmez, ; Ariely, ). The boundary drawn between the assumed self and the imagined other is so embedded in emotional labor and so engrained in politics and social and economic relations that even challenging these narratives becomes politically unimaginable (Bilgic et al, ).…”

“…In the politics of security and diplomacy, such agency can be instrumental to stimulate new ways of thinking and practicing diplomacy and security. Moreover, studying and understanding security affectively reveals harm that goes unnoticed in dominant security narratives, including those presented as “ethical” (Adisonmez, ; Bilgic et al, ; Edney‐Browne, ). These contributions bring the overlooked and emotional dimension of harm into both analytical and political view and explore how harm deeply suspends even banal, daily practices.…”

“…The contributors of this special issue have dealt with emotions in at least one of the three ways in which we conceptualized emotions namely, as (1) frames that shape interpersonal diplomatic relations (Baker, ; van Hoef & O'Connor, ; Keys & Yorke, ), (2) as key tools that are used as part of the statecraft's toolbox (Bilgic et al, ; Eberle & Daniel, ; Hall & Ross, ; Houck et al, ; Ilgit & Prakash, ), and (3) as formative/productive dynamics with real effects on human beings (Adisonmez, ; Ariely, ; Edney‐Browne, ; Hall & Ross, )—that, in turn, often construct and maintain conflicts.…”