Fear

THOUGH HISTORY TEACHES US TO AVOID THE SNAP JUDGMENTS OF pundits and politicians, virtually everything we read and hear about the aftermath of the American and British invasion of Iraq appears to indicate that it will likely stand as one of the most costly self-inflicted injuries ever to befall a democratic nation. That it was done on the basis of transparently dishonest arguments about Iraq's capabilities both before and after the war merely adds insult and injury to American democracy and its good name among the peoples of the world. It is imperative that as intellectuals, social scientists, and responsible citizens we ask ourselves how this happened. How did President George W. Bush take what was a generally popular cause and globally agreedupon goal of protecting the United States and the West against future incidents of Islamic terrorism on the model of the AI Qaeda attacks of September 11, 2001, and manipulate the entirely legitimate fear and uncertainty this threat inspired into an imperialistic war that not only failed to make the nation any safer but clearly threatened to inspire the very threats against which it alleged to protect and defend? Just how elastic are the uses of fear in a democracy in which the ruling elites fall prey to exotic ideologies combined with hubristic (and ahistorical) notions of the capabilities of military force to rule and reorder the world

Criminology · Democracy · Ideology · Law and economics · Political economy · Political science · Politics · Sociology · Terrorism · Law · Military History and Strategy · Politics and Conflicts in Afghanistan, Pakistan, and Middle East

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