ABSTRACT
This chapter begins by restoring something of the event-ness to the events of 9/11 prior to their insertion within culturally intelligible frameworks of meaning – recalling, in Tony Blair’s words, the day “the kaleidoscope was shaken.” The events of 9/11 and the ‘War on Terror’ to follow destabilized the boundaries between fantasy and reality. Moreover, the ‘War on Terror’ was not simply waged as a response to ‘known’ and ‘calculable’ threats and risks, nor would it make sense in these terms. Indeed, the widely predicted second wave of sleeper cell attacks by the US never materialized, nor did weapons of mass destruction in Iraq. In Laura Ann Stoler’s words, “the fact that political scientists can posit the obsession with the anticipatory future tense in contemporary security regimes as a hallmark of our current political moment belies more than a historical myopia.” The chapter also presents an overview of the key concepts discussed in this book.
