Horror Vacui: Da’esh and the Inter-Territory Effect - ESPOL - École Européenne de Sciences Politiques et Sociales
Journal Articles Geopolitics Year : 2023

Horror Vacui: Da’esh and the Inter-Territory Effect

Abstract

The ‘Islamic State in Iraq and Syria’, or Da’esh, claimed territorial control and declared itself a state and Caliphate, but scholars disagree on the quality of these claims. Some argue that Da’esh really was a state, others reject this as propaganda of a non-state actor, and still others highlight that Da’esh challenged the international order as a whole. This article combines the notions of the ‘territory effect’ and ‘inter-territory’ to explain why the (self-)presentation of Da’esh appeared as a challenge to the (non-)state dichotomy of the modern international and its territorial underpinnings. While contesting the inter-territorial compartmentalisation of the state system, Da’esh projected a counter-territoriality beyond this system. The resulting horror vacui and collective campaign against Da’esh in turn shed light on an inter-territory effect of assuming and re-enacting contiguous state territories in a globally encompassing system of states, which thus locates and contains – but also enables – violence within states.
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Dates and versions

hal-04154200 , version 1 (06-07-2023)

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Janis Grzybowski. Horror Vacui: Da’esh and the Inter-Territory Effect. Geopolitics, 2023, pp.1-27. ⟨10.1080/14650045.2023.2208032⟩. ⟨hal-04154200⟩

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