Terror and Consent: The Wars for the Twenty-First Century

by Philip Bobbitt

Book Overview

Terror and Consent argues that, like so many states and civilizations in the past that suffered defeat, we are fighting the last war, with weapons and concepts that were useful to us then but have now... This description may be from another edition of this product.

• Format: Hardcover
• Language: English
• ISBN: 1400042437
• ISBN13: 9781400042432
• Release Date: April 2008
• Publisher: Knopf Publishing Group
• Length: 672 Pages
• Weight: 2.25 lbs.
• Dimensions: 1.6" x 6.5" x 9.5"

Customer Reviews

The history and development of terrorism, and changes necessary to combat it

This dense text reminds me of political science books in college. It uses a historical context of governments, and compares how wars were fought as governments evolved. During this evolution, the methods of war have shifted, and those that adapt quickly fare much better. Although much of the book focuses on Al Qaeda, the principles apply to any broad terror organization - many of which are likely to form in the next century. In the same way that conventional forces became an ineffective tool against low-intensity conflict, the new war on terror requires a different tool-set than prior wars. The old doctrines of conflict do not work against an enemy that has no capital, no obvious center of center of mass, or sometimes not even a known identity. Surviving this foe requires new doctrine and philosophy. This enemy cannot be stopped by sending in bombers or divisions of infantry. Bobbitt proposes a myriad of changes to our legal system to fight internal threats and new international law to collectively oppose threats beyond our border. He also suggests that we need a new focus on our "war objectives", and must focus more on international diplomacy. One factor that made the book very persuasive was the ever-present focus on the rule of law, which is a manifestation of a government of consent. What is the difference between an oppressive government versus a government of consent? Abiding by the rule of law presents all sorts of challenges to governments, but is also the greatest identifier of legitimate governments. The focus on political philosophy and the legitimate means of winning future wars on terror made this book the most significant forward-looking book I have read in the last decade. Recent events have highlighted some other ideas of his. Some of the same tools that combat terrorism also provide relief from natural disasters. An earthquake in Haiti leaves millions homeless and without food or water. Rioting and lawlessness cause as much damage as the original earthquake. Hurricane Katrina had a similar pattern, and one might expect similar problems to a very successful attack. If a major city were hit by a nuclear weapon or biological infection, an inability to quickly restore order and aid the survivors makes the aftermath far worse than what was caused by the initial attack/natural disaster. I wish Bobbitt were a policy creator for the DoD and Homeland security - his analysis and "plague treatise" explaining what we must do is far more coherent and practical than anything I have seen issues by the U.S. government.

A book every politican/militaty leader should read and understand

Terror and Consent has opened my eyes and made me aware that warfare in the 21st century has changed drastrically. I picked up on this book when I heard Senator McCain claim he takes it everywhere. We no longer will be fighting nation states like China or Russia unless there is a huge miscalulation; rather we will be in conflict with market states; that is those states without borders where globalization has transformed war from nation states waging war against one another using conventional forces to "stateless forces" waging terror against civilans. Now I understand why double the military force in Iraq was needed. Not to win the battle but to win the peace and protect the populace from terror as we help them rebuild their society. This book is a hard, but necessary read for anyone who wants to understand where the world is headed.

Outstanding analysis of the relationship between the liberal state and jihadist terror

Philip Bobbitt's Terror and Consent is a big book, enormous in concept, ambition, and sweep, full of portent for transnational politics in the twenty-first century. Portentousness in a book can be a good thing, provided it delivers as promised. This brilliant, polymathic book delivers more intellectual punch on the fraught relationship between state and society, terrorism and terrorists, than any book I know. Let me simply adopt Niall Ferguson's judgment, on the front page of the New York Times Book Review, calling Terror and Consent the "most profound book on the subject of American foreign policy since the attacks of 9/11 - indeed, since the end of the cold war." Not everyone feels this way; one indicator of the book's intrinsic interest is the volatility of the reviews. The Economist was distinctly cool; Bobbitt's grand ambition, it said, "is confusing, hard to digest, and perhaps wrong." But a problem with much current analysis of terrorism, terrorists, and US responses is that it thinks small. No lack of windy tomes, true, but while much genuinely serious stuff is admirably analytic, breaking matters down into bits and pieces, it seemingly dares not synthesize the bits back into a whole again. Today's most serious efforts tend to avoid anything resembling grand strategy for winning a long-term struggle against terrorists and terrorist organizations, and the states that sponsor and shield them. Favored instead is the narrowing method of cost benefit analysis and (adopting one version of it) a tendency to favor defensive, protective, immediate measures that are most obviously cost effective. Talk of "victory" or "winning," meanwhile, might be thought to propose talk of "war" - but these days few dare call it war, at least if one wants to remain respectable among Western policy, academic, and political elites. Governments shrink back, in fear of precisely the Muslim backlash their timidity invites, and increasingly cannot even bring themselves to identify the terrorists as Islamist, let alone Islamic. Terror and Consent, for its part, is heterodox on a long list of things. Bobbitt thinks the struggle against terrorism is plainly a war, to be called a war, fought as a war, against religiously-driven Islamist ideologues who seek to establish, he says, their vision of the caliphate and which he flatly calls "states of terror" that must be defeated. Nonetheless, changing conditions of twenty-first century war, because of changing conditions of the twenty-first century state, mean that war is not as it has long been. Regnant approaches to terrorism are driven not just by narrow cost benefit analysis, but by a still narrower focus on something we might call "event-specific catastrophism": preventing the next attack. This is as true of the Bush administration as of its leading opponents. What has the Bush administration focused upon, in speech after speech to the public? The imminence of the next attack, and the need to prevent

New Laws for Counterterrorism ?

Since the time of the Treaty of Westphalia (1648), the nation state has been viewed as a "sovereign entity," designed to protect and promote the general welfare of its citizens. Now, according to Philip Bobbitt, in the age of globalization, this sovereign entity is becoming increasingly "porous." As nation states integrate into the global economy, the constitutional foundations dedicated to protecting their rights and liberties are no longer adequate. The new entity that is emerging is what Bobbitt calls the "market state," a term he borrows from a previous work, The Shield of Achilles, in which he traced the evolution of the nation state. This new market state Bobbitt describes is no longer confined to a sovereign territory, it is a decentralized and privatized network of relationships. It has all the characteristics of a multinational corporation and it treats its citizens much like a consumers. The market state has many upsides in that it presents its citizens with unprecedented freedoms and opportunities. This book, however, is about the downside of the market state and the opportunities it provides terrorists. Today's terrorist networks are a byproduct of the market state, indeed they are an opportunistic parasite of the market state. They harness its technology and networks to wage war against it. Bobbitt is not a neoconservative, he is a law professor who sees the need for a new constitutional order that reflects the needs of this new market state. Although he supported the war in Iraq, he now emphasizes the need for stronger international alliances and a "commitment to globalize the systems of human rights and government by consent." In other words, market states must collectively protect human rights and liberties. On the counterterrorism side, Bobbitt calls for more invasive intelligence gathering, not only domestically but across national borders. Something along the lines of the Total Information Awareness program. He also calls for "preclusive" actions on the part of governments. Containment and deterrence are no longer adequate since terrorists now have access to weapons of mass destruction; they must be neutralized before they act. In short, terrorism must be fought more aggressively without undermining fundamental human rights and within the framework of international alliances. This is a very well-researched and very well-argued work on how to fight terrorism in the 21st century. Bobbitt concludes that there is something in his proposals to offend everyone. Liberals will not like his call for preclusive actions by the governments and conservatives will not like his call to abide by some international standards. Achieving a so-called state of consent is already difficult in theory, it will be even more so in practice.

A seminal work on terror, the state, and the law

The work is sophisticated and explores, among other things, how strategy must align with the rule of law if our policies on terror are to succeed. This is a good read and well ahead of the proverbial curve. You will see the themes of this book, again and again, in the popular literature on terrorism. Enjoy! In the first page, Professor Bobbitt introduces a broad definition of terror which includes the socially debilitating effects of natural disasters, such as earthquakes, as well as man-made disasters, including terrorism and human rights violations. This is both an accurate and elegant definition - it encompasses things that diminish the human condition; and it is a practical definition in an age of transnational threats where multi-lateral action is a necessity. "We are fighting terror, not just terrorists." I like that. Yet how does a state effectively and legitimately pursue such policies and enact such cooperation? This question inevitably raises strategic and constitutional issues. Professor Bobbitt's approach compels a reexamination of strategy, which includes how we organize our resources and conceptualize intervention - peaceful or otherwise - in the highly complex and uncertain environment of the 21st century. And here he makes the case that the alignment of strategy with law is absolutely essential. Our response to terror must be from the legal high ground; which, one hopes, also corresponds to the moral high ground. I especially liked his detailed discussion of bio-terrorism and the detailed rebuttal to the International Institute for Strategic Studies Adelphi Paper - Nuclear Terrorism After 9/11. This, in conjunction with the background surrounding the A. H. Khan nuclear proliferation network, drives home the importance of a sound and multi-dimensional response to the proliferation of WMDs. Bobbitt draws on the likes of Brian Jenkins, Mary Kaldor, and Sir Michael Howard to both sustain his points and provoke argument. This is good stuff! I have touched on one element in this brief review. There are numerous theoretical forays in this book that is rich with historical detail and anecdote, as well as legal and policy theory...much more than can be adequately summarized in a few paragraphs. One should never judge a book by its cover; however, one can judge the credibility of the message and that of its author by looking at the citations in the back of the book. Professor Bobbitt is meticulous. There are over 100 pages of detailed footnotes; and in the text, there are often 5 or 6 citations per page! This detail is invaluable in providing a deeper and more contextually rich background to the text. Compare this level of professionalism with some of the popular literature on terrorism that, if the author is an especially generous mood, has 12 or so footnotes per Chapter. Professor Bobbitt is "the best of the best." His work demonstrates an intellectual tradition the hallmark of which is well reasoned argument supported b