Russia's Securitization of Chechnya

<p>This book provides an in-depth analysis of how mobilization and legitimation for war are made possible with a focus on Russia's conflict with Chechnya.</p><p>Through which processes do leaders and their publics come to define and accept certain conflicts as difficult to engage in and others as logical even necessary? Drawing on a detailed study of changes in Russia’s approach to Chechnya this book argues that ‘re-phrasing’ Chechnya as a terrorist threat in 1999 was essential to making the use of violence acceptable to the Russian public. The book refutes popular explanations that see Russian war-making as determined and grounded in a sole authoritarian leader. Close study of the statements and texts of Duma representatives experts and journalists before and during the war demonstrates how the Second Chechen War was made a ‘legitimate’ undertaking through the efforts of many. A post-structuralist reinterpretation of securitization theory guides and structures the book with discourse theory and method employed as a means to uncover the social processes that make war acceptable. More generally the book provides a framework for understanding the broad social processes that underpin legitimized war-making.</p><p>This book will be of much interest to students of Russian politics critical terrorism studies security studies and international relations. </p>