The critical terrorism researcher: identity, positionality, and (de)coloniality

Abstract

ABSTRACT Over the last two decades, Critical Terrorism Studies (CTS) has been crucial in contributing to critical research on terrorism that challenges the troublesome assumptions about “terrorism” developed in the field of Terrorism Studies, and which investigates the complexities that shape (counter-)terrorism in various socio-political contexts, especially so in the “post-9/11 era”. This has, however, also enabled the production of the identity of a uniquely critical terrorism researcher which, I argue in this article, is acutely underwritten by colonial epistemologies and assumptions that underpin “terrorism”. By drawing upon relevant insights from decolonial scholarship on the link between identity and knowledge production, especially through my engagement with Sylvia Wynter’s discourse on “Man and the coloniality of being”, this article aims to problematise the CTS researcher as a specific idea of Man (usually Western/white/bourgeoise/heterosexual) shaped by various descriptive statements including those about emancipation and inclusion that seeks to legitimise researchers in this sub-field as progenitors of genuine discourses about “terrorism”. By de-centring the CTS researcher through reflecting on my own research practices, choices and priorities, the article contributes to CTS debates on methodology as well as to the debate on “terrorism expertise”. It concludes by offering some reflections on the future of CTS.