National Security and Society

As the deadline for this project has quickly approached, I want to summarize a few things that have been discussed in the blog since the beginning of October.

National security is not just a term used to protect the integrity of a country and its borders. Rather, the idea of national security can be wielded in certain ways. As a tool, national security can be used in a variety of ways and the State Security and Dissent class discussion on September 9, 2008 alluded to many of the ways in which national security could be used, including, being used as a tool to by those in power to create trust, protect citizens, protect majority interests, create fear, eliminate fear, protect security and national sovereignty, maintain peace and order, and how it is used as an instrument to shape behaviour.

While each blog entry covered a different event or topic, they all related back to this concept of national security. In addition, if you have been critically reading every entry, you will also find that in every discussion there is some element of national security being utilized as a tool by those in power to ultimately shape behaviour. In this light, national security is an imposed framework of rules where these rules are not necessarily intrinsic to social order. Thus, national security is very much an ideology, which is able to affect norms, and these norms are able to affect the legitimacy of the state. As this blog has illustrated, these norms come to operationalize themselves in several ways, such as the War on “The Other.”

Another part of this blog has been to demonstrate what the media’s role has been in manufacturing consent amongst the general population. The media is not just an unbiased conduit in which we receive information from. In many cases, as the post on Manufacturing Consent discussed, the media is part of the state institution, which also looks to consolidate its power and legitimize the action of those in power.

The overall message that I wanted to convey in these past few weeks has simply been to question the nature of national security as it operates in our society. As a former Border Services Officer with the Canada Border Services Agency, this has been an especially unique and pertinent project for myself as I critically reflected upon my role as a law enforcement officer and an agent of the state, who was responsible for the protection of “national security.”

This video is a couple of months old (September 2, 2008), but I still thought it was a very fascinating video to watch.

Rage Against the Machine, for those that don't know, is a rap rock band that has always been highly critical of the U.S. government's foreign and domestic policy. Back in September, the band was supposed to perform at an event called the Ripple Effect Festival, which promoted non-partisan politics. The festival was to take place near the the Republican convention at the Minnesota State Capitol. According the Ripple Effect staff, state law enforcement and capitol staff prevented Rage Against the Machine from taking the stage stating that they arrived 30 minutes passed the 7pm event curfew.

State officials likely knew about the nature of Rage Against the Machine's music and the band's history of political activism, so they used a curfew regulation in an attempt to muzzle the band's freedom of speech. However, as the video below will illustrate, what the state did could possibly have served to magnify the impact of the message that the band was trying to get across. What may have been just another concert in Minnesota, has generated nearly half a million views of the event that took place afterwards as Rage Against the Machine took to the streets and performed A cappella over the megaphone to thousands of fans.

Perhaps it is because it was the state attempting the curtail the rights of a famous band that drew the attention of hundreds of thousands, but it does shows how quickly a political movement can unfold.

More information about the event can be found here:
Powers, A., "Rage Against the Machine in Minnesota and the state of political pop" L.A. Times Music Blog, (3 September 2008).

One element that is necessary in the ideological exercise of national security is often a fear of an unknown. An earlier post discussed how the threat to national security is defined. However, it is often the case that a lack of distinction in terms of who or what is the threat serves to strengthen the government’s ability to wield its power under the framework of national security. Rather than having a specific threat, where citizens perhaps know where the danger is coming from, a threat from an unknown creates an atmosphere of fear and unrest. In this sense, the threat must be ideological in nature in much of the same way as national security is ideological in nature. If the threat to national security is defined in an open-ended manner, then the definition of who can be deemed a threat can be expanded or contracted in order to fit the needs of the state.

To that end, this blog entry is based on the following news item:
AFP, “Terrorist 'tweets'? US Army warns of Twitter dangers” Breitbart.com (2008) < http://www.breitbart.com/article.php?id=081025182242.js2g2op8&show_article=1 >

There are many other news articles that discuss the same topic. Just Google the following key terms to find other news articles relating to the same topic: U.S. Army and Twitter

Before I get into the substantive part of my commentary, I want to give a brief backgrounder on Twitter for those who are unfamiliar with it. Twitter is essentially part of the Web 2.0 developments in the World Wide Web. That is, the new Internet developments of the past couple of years that look to enhance interactivity and networking between users. In essence, Twitter can be seen in the same category as other web developments like Facebook, Youtube, MySpace, and Flickr. In this case, Twitter is a micro-blogging service. Thus, it is much like my blog, except Twitter entries are very short in nature, usually a sentence or a phrase that an individual will post via cell phone or on the Twitter website. Like the RSS feed from my blog, Twitter users can “follow” other Twitter users and get instant updates via cell phone when someone who they are following posts a micro-blog update, called a “tweet.” Thus, the US Army’s intelligence report states a fear that a potential terrorist could send out a tweet to mobilize thousands of followers to carry out a terrorist act.

The U.S. Army’s intelligence report on how Twitter can be used as a tool of subversion is very telling of how a state institution is able to define threats to national security in such a way that it is very much all encompassing of all groups that are looking to change the status quo.

As quoted in the article, “Twitter has also become a social activism tool for socialists, human rights groups, communists, vegetarians, anarchists, religious communities, atheists, political enthusiasts, hacktivists and others to communicate with each other and to send messages to broader audiences.” As well, “Twitter is already used by some members to post and/or support extremist ideologies and perspectives.”

The way that the news article conveys the report, it seems as if the intelligence report is suggesting that there is somewhat of an implicit relationship between extremist groups and socialists, human rights groups, communists, vegetarians, anarchists, religious communities, atheists, political enthusiasts, and hacktivists. Amusingly, while the political enthusiasts and communists have always been seen as groups who were critical of or in opposition to the status quo, this is the first time that I have seen vegetarians classified as a threat to law and order. In this case, we can relate the underlying reasons for the classification of vegetarians as a security threat back to why Peace Fresno was classified as a security threat. In classifying them as a security threat, it provides rationalization for the surveillance of the group and the curtailment of members’ rights, not because they present a legitimate threat to national security, but because they possess views that are contrary to the national order.

Besides stating that vegetarians are a group actively working against the status quo, the U.S. Army intelligence report seems to list off a never-ending list of groups who could use Twitter as a tool for disrupting the national order. In avoiding any precision in defining who is actually presenting a threat to national security, it creates two consequences. First, the state can pick and choose who they want to target as national security threats. Lack of definition leaves it up to the state to start defining threats. Second, the seemingly endless list of threats to the national order listed in the report presents an image of an omnipresent threat.

The perception of an omnipresent threat creates an atmosphere of fear and sometimes hysteria. In times of fear and hysteria, citizens often look to the state to take action. These actions often involve the wielding of law enforcement power in opposition to basic individual freedoms. However, such adverse effects on basic rights are accepted because it is seen as a necessity in order to protect citizens from that omnipresent threat. It is in this way that those in power are able to consolidate that power. The perception that any group, perhaps even vegetarians, could at any point in time subvert the existing national order and instill their explicit ideologies onto others generates fear amongst the general population. This fear is often to such an extent that the population in general hopes that the state can offer them the protection that they desire.

What underlies this fear however, is the ability of the state and its institutions to be able to effectively generate this fear. Once the population perceives that there is a national security threat from some kind of omnipresent force, it is the state again that is able to roll up, quash the activities of these groups seen as threats to national security, and ultimately uphold the nation's security. In doing all of this, those in power are able to maintain and consolidate their power and their hold on the national ideologies as well.

Side note: I noticed a somewhat unrelated deficiency in the intelligence report. As quoted from the news article, the intelligence report stated that, "Terrorists may or may not be using voice-changing software..." I am not sure where the intelligence sources are coming from, however, it should be noted that voice changing software has been available since the early 1990's. For instance, the Talkboy, a rudimentary voice changing device, was used by Macaulay Culkin's character Kevin McCallister in Home Alone 2: Lost in New York. If U.S. intelligence officials are just now discussing the potential uses of voice changing technologies, it may be a sign that they are severely lagging behind developments in society.

The last blog entry demonstrated how under a framework of security, basic rights such as freedom of speech could be curtailed. That is, not only curtailed, but also justified by government officials under a security context. In this entry, I just wanted to further develop the idea that was developing in the last entry. While the group discussed last week (APEC-Alert!) had a very different objective than the group that will be discussed this week (Peace Fresno), some commonalities can be drawn surrounding the circumstances in which violations of basic rights such as freedom of speech and privacy were violated.

To that end, the related document for this week is:
American Civil Liberties Union, The letter to Attorney General Bill Lockyer, (2004) < http://www.aclu.org/freespeech/protest/11191lgl20040421.html > [17 November 2008].

In every blog entry that has been made thus far, it has been crucial to keep in mind the ideological nature of the term “national security” and more specifically, look at who is defining that term and to see if that definition serves to further any underlying interests. Hence, because the term is ideological in nature, the definition can expand and contract depending on the situation.

As the scope of national security expands however, many groups that aren’t traditionally considered a threat become the target of surveillance. At the same time, if the scope of national security is expanded too far, certain government measures become very difficult to rationalize, whether it is under the framework of security or not. This was the case with Peace Fresno. A community organization based out of Fresno, California, the group’s goal was the promotion of non-violence, peace, and social justice. As well, unlike APEC-Alert!, it can be argued that their methods of trying to achieve social change were less at odds with any government officials. That is, there is no indication that Peace Fresno engaged in the scale of confrontation with police and government officials like APEC-Alert! did. Their activities were mainly surrounding the distribution of flyers and street protests in order to achieve social change, like the end of the U.S. invasion and occupation of Iraq.

The only reasonable explanation of the Fresno County Sheriff Department's Anti-Terrorism unit’s infiltration of the peace group is that they were openly against the U.S.’s invasion and occupation of Iraq. The group was openly protesting the actions of the state and attempting to change the status quo. Hence, in order to deal with the situation, state officials had to take action against the group.

However, it could not just outright censor or outlaw the group. The convenient action for the state to take then was to define them as a national security threat so that it would justify the Anti-Terrorism unit’s infiltration and surveillance of the group. Therefore, what the infiltration of Peace Fresno demonstrates is not that the group was a threat to national security, but that national security served as a way to normalize the curtailment of speech and privacy rights.

The lack of definition for what national security entails means that it can be defined very freely. As well, the ability to define national security is often left up to those who are in power to define, not the citizens. Once a particular group falls within the realm of national security, those that are in power are therefore in a better position to justify any limitations on basic rights. This is because national security, however it is defined, is often portrayed in a manner that makes it seem more important than and trumps individual rights.

This conception of national can be seen at work with the Peace Fresno example. The umbrella of national security was extended by the state in order to incorporate the peace group. Once the group was under the umbrella of national security, their infiltration and surveillance could be rationalized under this national security framework. Thus, far from being objective in nature and protecting its citizens, national security is often used as a measure by the state against its own citizens. All of this can be justified as part of a national security agenda and at the same time serve two main purposes for the state. The possibility of infiltration and surveillance serves to intimidate any groups that could be dissenting against the status quo and second, the framework of national security serves to justify any curtailment of basic rights like free speech.

For this week’s commentary, the related reading is from:

Pearlston, K., “APEC Days at UBC: Student Protests and National Security in an Era of Trade Liberalization” in Whose National Security? Canadian State Surveillance and the Creation of Enemies, Kinsman, G., D.K. Buse, & M. Steedman, eds. (Toronto: Between the Lines, 2000).

As demonstrated in previous blog postings, many actions taken by the state can appear to be justifiable under the umbrella of national security. In the case of the APEC protests at UBC, civil liberties such as freedom of speech were curtailed, not only for security purposes, but also to avoid embarrassment. As the protesters were expressing their discontent with some of the human rights abuses by APEC member countries like Indonesia, Prime Minster Chretien and the police deemed it was necessary to quell such civil disobedience in order to protect Canada’s image on the international stage. While the government has stated that its intention was not to divert or quell the protesters, it is apparent from excessive measures used by the police that shielding foreign dictators from signs of civil disobedience in Canada outweighed citizens’ rights to freedom of speech during the APEC meetings.

In addition, this case also effectively demonstrates the ever-expanding nature of national security and its links with other aspects of government. The government essentially had two choices: 1. Allow the protests to occur and risk Indonesia, who is a major economic player in Asia, from attending the meetings; or 2. Repress the protests in order to maintain economic ties. Because the government at the time chose the latter decision, the question that then must be asked is how far will the government be willing to go in order to maintain economic ties with other countries? It has already been demonstrated that the state is willing to violate basic free speech rights guaranteed under the Charter.

With that said, it is not to say that protesters should be completely absolved of any wrongdoing. They were involved in vandalism at the university, and the author admits that protesters did somewhat rush the barricade and take it down. Her justification for the collapse of the barricade was that the plastic ties holding them together was clearly not strong enough. Regardless of the physical strength of the barricade, individuals still new where the line was being drawn in terms of the fenced in area and decided to cross it. Thus, the civil disobedience, while not violent in nature, escalated in terms of disorderliness.

Nonetheless, this does not justify the other acts of intimidation and harassment on behalf of the police. Numerous leaders of APEC-Alert! were watched for several days, and on the day of the meetings they were taken away by plainclothes officers in unmarked cars. Similarly, the author of the book was prevented from posting signs along the barricade that said things like “APEC off campus.” While the government may be able to justify the pepper spraying of the crowd of people who rushed the barricade, it is more difficult for them to justify individual instances such the author's, where an individual is prevented from posting a sign up on public property.

In this case, security did not mean the security of Canadian citizens and the security of their basic rights. Security in this case actually meant the security of a foreign dictator to be free from seeing any signs of dissent in Canada.

One thing to note from this incident is the somewhat wide public attention that was generated regarding the actions of the police. As evident in the video I have below, the collective action amongst UBC students and some members of the public in general resulted in widespread media reports. At this point, I have not seen as great of media attention for other issues related to security, like the targeting of minorities by law enforcement officials. Of course there are reports of individual cases of minorities being targeted as a result of national security measures, but the individual nature of it is what is problematic to it gaining widespread public concern. The public views these incidences as isolated happenings, which are simply aberrations. The APEC case demonstrates that one of the ways to generate public awareness on any issue is to engage in a collective action rather than have disconnected individual voices. If it was simply the author of the book posting signs up along the barricades, and the police approached her and threatened to arrest her, such an incident on its own would not likely be of any public concern or generate any widespread public attention. However, if the same scenario happened to hundreds or perhaps thousands of people, the general public may begin to reconstruct their perception of what security should entail, reconsider what rights they are truly willing to give up in the name of security, and perhaps move one step towards changing that status quo.

Public Safety Canada's list of terrorist entities.

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From the Public Safety website:
The listing of an entity is a very public means of identifying a group or individual as being associated with terrorism. The definition of an entity includes a person, group, trust, partnership or fund, or an unincorporated association or organization. The Anti-Terrorism Act provides measures for the Government of Canada to create a list of entities.

It is not a crime to be listed. However, one of the consequences of being listed is that the entity's property can be the subject of seizure/restraint and/or forfeiture. In addition, institutions such as banks, brokerages, etc are subject to reporting requirements with respect to an entity's property and must not allow those entities to access the property nor may these institutions deal or otherwise dispose of the property. It is an offence to knowingly participate in or contribute to, directly or indirectly, any activity of a terrorist group. This participation is only an offence if its purpose is to enhance the ability of any terrorist group to facilitate or carry out a terrorist activity.
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Are there any links or commonalities between the groups listed?

For those of you that prefer watching videos instead of reading, or for those of you that are having trouble finding the book, here is a Canadian documentary based on the Noam Chomsky/Edward Herman book.

This week’s analysis will draw primarily from:

Herman, E.S., N. Chomsky, Manufacturing Consent: The Political Economy of the Mass Media (New York: Pantheon Books, 2002).

Last week, I posted a video of a Fox News clip that discussed the drilling for oil in Alaska. While the discussion in the clip revolved mainly around criticizing environmental groups for hindering the drilling of oil in the area, the anchor concludes at the end that not only are these environmental groups a threat to the economy, but a threat to national security as well.

As alluded to last week, the Fox News clip clearly illustrates two things. The first is that the term national security has expanded. The result is that the broader the definition, the greater leeway that the government has to operate while under the umbrella of that definition. As Senator Hart discussed in the first video, national security no longer entails militaristic and physical security, but it encompasses other forms of security under it as well. In the case of the news clip, we can say that the security of the economy can be brought under the notion of national security as well. Specifically to the Fox News video, the well being of the economy is dependent on using American resources to stabilize gas prices.

By incorporating the idea of economic stability under the umbrella of national security, the nature of national security is expanded, and accordingly, the nature of the threat to national security is expanded as well. I want to briefly note here as well that the idea of the state does not only include the government, but media corporations too. I will elaborate on this in the second half of this entry when I discuss the propaganda model and apply it to media conglomerates, using the Fox News clip as an example.

With that in mind however, it becomes important to ask what kind of legitimate threat environmentalist groups pose to national security, or even economic security for that matter. I contend that these groups do not actually pose any sort of legitimate threat to national or economic security. Their only legitimate threat is to the uninterrupted functioning of the state. That is, the only problem they present is a roadblock to the desires and actions of the state. In light of this, how does the state deal with such roadblocks? As this blog has been set out to demonstrate, the state will set out to define such threats to the status quo as threats to national security.

If threats are defined in terms of risks to national security instead of in terms of threats to the status quo, a greater majority of the citizens will come to accept the actions of the state. In this case, the environmentalist group is seen as a threat to economic security, and by extension national security as well. In reality, they pose no legitimate threat to either. However, due to the subjective and ideological nature of national security, the state is able to wield and manipulate the definition of national security in any way they wish.
As the Fox News report demonstrates, the anchor rationalizes the idea of environmental groups being national security threat. It begins with an economic need to use American resources to lower and stabilize gas prices. This idea is then contrasted with the assertion that because these environmentalist groups want to protect the natural environment in Alaska, that they are implicitly frustrating the economy. Next, the idea of a prosperous and secure economy is linked to the idea of the security of a nation. Finally, because environmentalist groups are opposed to the drilling of oil in Alaska, it must mean that they are opposed to a prosperous and secure economy, and as a result, the actions of these environmentalist groups must be seen as conflicting with the security of the nation.
The second item that I want to demonstrate in this entry is how the propaganda model can be applied to the Fox News clip. The media, especially large corporations and conglomerates, can be said to have both systemic biases and chiefly economic objectives. This is what Herman and Chomsky’s propaganda model sets out to explain, the biases in the mass media and their economic causes. The propaganda model essentially has five components:

1. Ownership of the medium: Because mainstream media are usually large corporations, the information that they disseminate is biased in terms of these corporate interests. A company’s financial interests have to be protected, so any news item that may endanger these interests are skewed or censored. Thus, the goal of maximizing profits becomes the main goal in place of objective news reporting.

2. Funding: Mainstream media is largely dependent on advertising for funding. Thus, the interests of the advertisers come before the interests of proper news reporting. Any news item that may be seen as conflicting with the advertisers aims are either excluded or marginalized.

3. Sourcing: Mass media needs a continuous flow of information because of the demand for daily news. To this end, this task can only be accomplished by major businesses and sectors of the government that have the appropriate resources and access to them. There exists a symbiotic relationship between the media and government bodies. The government provides media with the necessary resources for their news. In return, the media will likely not run any news item that may hurt their business interests with the government since they providing them with resources that their corporation depends on.

4. Flak: This is the negative response to a news media item. Those who oppose or cast doubt on the status quo and the established power are targeted and discredited.

5. Anti-Ideology: This refers to the exploitation of public fears or hatred of certain groups that are seen as threats. This fear of certain groups can be real, exaggerated or imagined. Thus, communism would be the primary threat in the Cold War era and terrorism would be the new threat in modern day. They can be referred to as anti-communism and anti-terrorism respectively.

All five of these components of the propaganda model can be applied to the Fox News clip presented last week, but I will emphasize some of them that are especially pertinent with Fox News. First, Fox News is a subsidiary of News Corporation. News Corporation, in turn, is the world’s biggest media conglomerate. It has holdings in all mediums including books, newspapers, magazines, music, studios, television, Internet, and assets outside of media like sports teams. With so many interests interlocking, Fox News may be less likely to disseminate any news that will negatively affect any other News Corporation subsidiary. Second, while perhaps not immediately obvious, it can be said that Fox News is unlikely to be bias against the current government, because it is providing it with the information that is needed for daily news. Next, is the concept of flak. In this case, the environmental group that is preventing the oil drilling in Alaska are the ones who are being discredited because they do not hold a stance that is favourable to the established power. By discrediting certain groups, the media can manage the information that is available to the public. Finally, an anti-ideology is also implicitly present. Through the filter of anti-ideology, the news clip is designed to exploit public fears of groups that present a threat to society. While it doesn’t go so far as to cast the environmental group as a terrorist group, they do portray the environmental group as a danger to national security. By portraying the environmentalist group as a threat to national security, the media is able to stifle critical views of the state.