ABSTRACT

This book explores the what, the why, and the how of the Taliban takeover of Afghanistan almost 20 years after their removal from power. It examines how the U.S. discourses on War on Terror and state-building in Afghanistan have taken shape, became dominant over the past two decades, and to delineate their consequences. Also, it highlights how both discourses are representative of wider depoliticization of the society and eventually paved the way for the illiberal, oppressive politics of confinement and necropolitics.

The volume will be of great interest to scholars and researchers of politics and international relations, U.S. foreign policy, peace and conflict studies, area studies, especially West Asian and South Asian studies.

chapter |39 pages

Prelude

The scene

chapter 1|48 pages

Four presidents, one discourse

chapter 2|58 pages

Post-2001 Afghanistan

From the politics of confinement to necropolitics

chapter 3|37 pages

The Taliban of the past and the present

Afghanistan under a new round of necropolitics

chapter 4|8 pages

Epilogue