Introduction

Objects have a social life that expands beyond their material existence. In Bennett’s (2010) words, objects have thing-power. They are central to our identities; we practise and perform our identities through objects. Soldiers use weapons; air traffic controllers rely on their radar; cab drivers have cars; programmers use computers. Objects play a central role in these repetitive performativities; they define and mediate our relationships with our core identities and practices. The material turn, as an emerging research agenda, looks at the co-productive relationship between the origins and everyday functioning of objects while tracing the transformation of their purpose and justification. In particular, we look at the agency of actants in three instances of security practices: emergence, continuity, and transformation. Some of the driving questions of the approach challenge the constructive and destructive power of objects, their centrality to socio-political life of human societies, and the ecology of these objects as actants in security economies.