‘We Want Them Alive!’: The Politics and Culture of Human Rights

Fregoso, R. L. (2006) ‘‘We Want Them Alive!’: The Politics and Culture of Human Rights’, Social Identities, 12(2), pp. 109–138. doi: 10.1080/13504630600583296. Abstract: In this essay I argue that a new order of power is emerging on the US-Mexico borderlands. This order of power is necropolitical. I then analyse feminicides on the borderlands in relation to this emerging order of power. Drawing upon theories of sovereignty, I argue that the consolidation of a necropolitical order in the region is a result of the convergence and intersection of multiple forces and processes, including militarization, denationalization, neoliberalism and ingovernability. Secondly, I examine the countervailing forces to this emerging order of power, especially the turn to a politics of human rights by grassroots and transnational collectivities. Finally, my essay probes the role of culture in shaping new understandings of human rights and re-imagining new democratic possibilities and subjectivities. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit necropolitics.substack.com