The securitization audience in theologico-political perspective: Giorgio Agamben,doxological acclamations,and paraconsistent logic

Abstract

Over the past two decades, securitization theory has developed into a robust literature of cases and critiques. The vast majority of the attention paid to securitization has been to the securitizing actor and the referent object, leaving the audience – the body that determines the fate of a securitizing move by accepting or rejecting the securitizing actor’s request – undertheorized. The audience is presented as a problematic contradiction, because as a collectivity called by the securitizing actor it appears to be a passive body, critiqued thereby as potentially irrelevant. On the other hand, both the original Copenhagen school formulation of securitization theory and many of its current theorists reaffirm the agency of the audience to actively determine the success or failure of the securitizing move. This article turns to political theology for guidance, and explains the contradiction of the passive/active audience through homology to the ekklesia and the acclamation of ‘amen’ in liturgical doxology. The fact that the congregation is passive recipient of a call does not negate the essential and substantial role that it must actively play, just as the contradiction of the passive/active description of the securitization audience is not a problem of illogic, but a paraconsistent truth.