Contemporary Violence

Contemporary violence: Postmodern war in Kosovo and Chechnya draws on several years of field research, as well as interpretive IR theory and analysis of empirical source material so as to shed light on contemporary violence. It is now available in paperback for the first time.

Drawing on interpretive approaches to international relations, the book argues that founding events and multiple contexts informed the narratives deployed by different members of each movement, illustrating why elements within the Kosovo Liberation Army and the armed forces of the Chechen republic of Ichkeria favoured regional and local strategies of war in the Balkans and the North Caucasus. The book draws on post-positivist analysis and empirical research so as unravel the relationship between narratives, stories and hermeneutic accounts of international relations; regional politics and trans-local identity; globalisation and visual aspects of contemporary security; criminality and emotionality; which together illustrate the dynamics within the armed resistance movements in Kosovo and the North Caucasus and the road to war in 1999.

The book is a major addition to a small field of genuinely readable studies of IR theory. The book will be of interest to academics, researchers, students, area studies experts and policy-makers seeking to understand the formation of the armed resistance movements in Kosovo and Chechnya. Amongst other things, the book will be of interest to students and scholars of international relations, political studies, area studies, as well as those within cultural and historical and sociological studies.

Introduction: alternative approaches to violence in international relations
1. Narrative identity and the challenge of literary global politics: towards interpretive Pluralism
2. Kosovo and Chechnya/Kosova and Ichkeria
3. Regional politics, trans-local identity and history
4. Globalisation and conflict: screening war in Kosovo and Chechnya
5. Stories of war in the Balkans and Caucasus
6. Criminality and war
7. The politics of emotionality
8. Networks and narratives: the road to war in the Balkans and Caucasus
Conclusion
Index