Samer Abboud | What Does Critical Security Studies Have To Offer The Arab World

The Arab World is currently undergoing rapid changes wrought by the ongoing Arab uprisings and the proliferation of violence and insecurity therein. For most researchers in/of the region, approaches in traditional security studies are insufficient and problematic in a context in which multiple and diverse forms of insecurity are present and expanding. This presentation will introduce a project that seeks to bring into conversation and productive dialogue the field of Critical Security Studies and researchers working in/on the Arab region. As such, it is premised on two assumptions that are of relevance to encouraging such dialogue: first, that the field of Critical Security Studies is missing important insights relevant to the field that could emanate from the region, and, second, that researchers working in/on the region are in need of frameworks, critical vocabularies, methodologies, and approaches that foster a critical appraisal of the security discourses and practices that have emerged in the Arab region. Samer Abboud is an Associate Professor of International Studies at Arcadia University, just outside of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania and a Senior non-resident Fellow at the Center for Syrian Studies at St. Andrew’s University. He is the co-author (with Benjamin Muller) of Rethinking Hizballah: Authority, Legitimacy, Violence (Ashgate, 2012) and the author of Syria (Polity, 2015), which explores the dynamics and evolution of the Syrian conflict.