Challenging war traditions: humanitarian discourse and the nuclear prohibition treaty

Abstract

Abstract This article interrogates the humanitarian discourse and the emergence of the new Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons (TPNW). Often acknowledged as decisive for adopting the TPNW, the humanitarian discourse is considered vital to stigmatizing nuclear weapons and their purported deterrence value. However, the literature has not thoroughly examined the mechanisms through which speaking in humanitarian terms enabled proponents of the TPNW to exercise agency, failing to appreciate the complex discursive practices sustaining power relations in nuclear politics. This article introduces a theoretical framework that can help us make sense of these complexities, while illuminating additional ways through which the humanitarian discourse contributed to the TPNW. Using a feminist post-structuralist lens, I argue that the humanitarian discourse enabled small and middle-power states to challenge war traditions that sustain dominant configurations of power in nuclear politics. Upon speaking in humanitarian terms, these states destabilized the ongoing reiteration of the protector/protected dichotomy that has placed non-nuclear states in a position of subordination. The article draws attention to how dominant assumptions of the masculine and feminine shape global politics, while advancing theoretical tools to help us grasp and seize possibilities for policy innovation and change.