Introduction: A decolonial approach to counter-terrorism in a global context

This introduction outlines a novel framework for researching counter-terrorism from a decolonial, postcolonial, and comparative perspective. The editors argue for moving beyond binaries in existing scholarship between liberal democratic and emergency politics, West/non-West, past/present, and domestic/international spheres. Instead, a decolonial approach is proposed that reveals the colonial genealogies and continuities underlying contemporary counter-terrorism globally. Comparative analyses of different cases from the Global North and South show how colonial legacies, nationalist discourses, and transnational dynamics all affect how counter-terrorism is practiced around the world. The introduction delineates how the collection’s empirical chapters challenge Eurocentric, epochal, and state-centric tendencies in critical terrorism studies. Overall, the chapter makes a persuasive case for decolonising and deparochialising scholarship on counter-terrorism.