Hostname: page-component-84b7d79bbc-dwq4g Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-07-28T10:20:55.405Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false

Anxiety, time, and ontological security's third-image potential

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  21 July 2020

Andrew R. Hom*
Affiliation:
University of Edinburgh, School of Social and Political Sciences, Edinburgh, Scotland, United Kingdom
Brent J. Steele
Affiliation:
University of Utah, Department of Political Science, Salt Lake City, UT, United States of America
*
*Corresponding author. E-mail: Andrew.Hom@ed.ac.uk

Abstract

In this article, we begin to extend ontological security to third-image theorizing. We argue that the autobiographical conceptions of international agents, along with other stories told about international politics, constitute ‘the international’ as a system, society, community, or inhabitable realm beyond and between first- and second-image relations. To develop this point, we focus on the relationship between narrative, anxiety, and time. We contend that ontological security issues resound in the third image once we shift from treating the international realm as social agents' external environment to treating it as a collective project in its own right. Doing so highlights the promise of ontological security studies for further differentiating international fear and anxiety, for enabling novel explanations of international phenomena, and for elaborating third-image identity formation as a wide-ranging timing effort to surmount a dynamic, processual environment full of interconnected coordination challenges.

Type
Symposium: Anxiety, Fear, and Ontological Security in World Politics: Edited by Catarina Kinnvall and Jennifer Mitzen
Copyright
Copyright © The Author(s), 2020. Published by Cambridge University Press

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Ackerman, Spencer. 2014. “Obama: Murder of James Foley ‘Shocks the Conscience of the Entire World’.” The Guardian. Guardian News and Media, 20 August 2014. http://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/aug/20/james-foley-isis-video-authenticated-us-government.Google Scholar
Agathangelou, Anna M., and Ling, L. H. M.. 2009. Transforming World Politics: From Empire to Multiple Worlds. Abingdon, New York: Routledge.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Arfi, Badredine. 2020. “Existential Security qua Surviving (while Always Becoming Otherwise) through Performative Leaps of Faith.” International Theory 12 (2): 291305.Google Scholar
Berenskoetter, Felix. 2020. “Anxiety, Time, and Agency.” International Theory 12 (2): 273–90.Google Scholar
Bull, Hedley. 2002. The Anarchical Society: A Study of Order in World Politics, 3rd ed. New York: Columbia University Press.Google Scholar
Carr, David. 1986. Time, Narrative, and History. Bloomington, IN: Indiana University Press.Google Scholar
Cash, John. 2020. “Psychoanalysis, Cultures of Anarchy and Ontological Insecurity.” International Theory 12 (2): 306–21.Google Scholar
Friis, Simone Molin. 2017. “Behead, Burn, Crucify, Crush: Theorizing the Islamic State's Public Displays of Violence.” European Journal of International Relations 24 (2): 243–67.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hom, Andrew R. 2018. “Timing Is Everything: Toward a Better Understanding of Time and International Politics.” International Studies Quarterly 62 (1): 6979.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hom, Andrew R. 2020. International Relations and the Problem of Time. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Hom, Andrew R., and Steele, Brent J.. 2016. “Child's Play: Temporal Discourse, Counterpower, and Environmental Politics.” In Time and Violence in IR: (De)Fatalizing the Present, Forging Radical Alternatives, edited by Agathangelou, Anna M. and Killian, Kyle, 189204. Abingdon: Routledge.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hutchings, Kimberly. 2008. Time and World Politics: Thinking the Present. Manchester: Manchester University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Kinnvall, Catarina. 2004. “Globalization and Religious Nationalism: Self, Identity, and the Search for Ontological Security.” Political Psychology 25 (5): 741–67.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Lister, Charles. 2019. “Trump Says ISIS Is Defeated. Reality Says Otherwise.” POLITICO Magazine, March 18, 2019. https://politi.co/2HuCEkn.Google Scholar
Mendelsohn, Barak. 2005. “Sovereignty Under Attack: The International Society Meets the Al Qaeda Network.” Review of International Studies 31 (1): 4568.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Mitzen, Jennifer. 2006. “Ontological Security in World Politics: State Identity and the Security Dilemma.” European Journal of International Relations 12 (3): 341–70.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Mitzen, Jennifer. 2018. “Anxious Community: EU as (in)Security Community.” European Security 27 (3): 393413.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Obama, Barack. 2007. “Renewing American Leadership.” Foreign Affairs. Foreign Affairs Magazine, September 14, 2015. https://www.foreignaffairs.com/articles/2007-07-01/renewing-american-leadership.Google Scholar
Onuf, Nicholas G. 2012. World of Our Making: Rules and Rule in Social Theory and International Relations. Reissue. Abingdon: Routledge.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Ricoeur, Paul. 1984. Time and Narrative, Volume 1. Edited by David Pellauer. Chicago: The University of Chicago Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Roberts, Adam. 2016. The History of Science Fiction. London: Palgrave Macmillan.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Rumelili, Bahar. 2015. “Ontological (In)Security and Peace Anxieties: A Framework for Conflict Resolution.” In Conflict Resolution and Ontological Security: Peace Anxieties, PRIO New Security Studies, edited by Rumelili, Bahar, 1029. Abingdon: Routledge.Google Scholar
Rumelili, Bahar. 2020. “Integrating Anxiety into International Relations Theory: Hobbes, Existentialism, and Ontological Security.” International Theory 12 (2): 257–72.Google Scholar
Solomon, Ty. 2014. “Time and Subjectivity in World Politics.” International Studies Quarterly 58 (4): 671–81.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Steele, Brent J. 2008. Ontological Security in International Relations: Self-Identity and the IR State. Abingdon: Routledge.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Steele, Brent J. 2010. Defacing Power: The Aesthetics of Insecurity in Global Politics. Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Suganami, Hidemi. 1999. “Agents, Structures, Narratives.” European Journal of International Relations 5 (3): 365–86.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
The Tragically Hip. 2002. “The Dire Wolf.” Track 10 on In Violet Light. Zoe Records, compact disc.Google Scholar
Usborne, David. 2016. “Donald Trump Vows to Crush Isis during First Foreign Policy Speech.” The Independent. Independent Digital News and Media, 28 April 2016. http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/us-elections/donald-trump-isis-foreign-policy-speech-us-election-2016-a7004371.html.Google Scholar
Waltz, Kenneth N. 1979. Theory of International Politics. Reading, MA: Addison-Wesley.Google Scholar
Weber, Cynthia. 1995. Simulating Sovereignty: Intervention, the State and Symbolic Exchange. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Weldes, Jutta. 1999. Constructing National Interests: The United States and the Cuban Missile Crisis. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press.Google Scholar
Zarakol, Ayşe. 2010. “Ontological Insecurity and State Denial of Historical Crimes: Turkey and Japan.” International Relations 24 (1): 323.CrossRefGoogle Scholar