ABSTRACT

This paper focuses on Operation Usalama Watch, a counter-terrorism crackdown that was conducted in Eastleigh, the predominately Kenyan-Somali neighbourhood of Nairobi, in April 2014. Using the response to the operation as a case study, it seeks to build on criticisms of the Copenhagen School by arguing that the notion of the ‘speech act’ is limiting when considering alternative media through which subtle forms of dissent are channelled and counter-narratives are expressed. Moreover, it argues that conventional securitisation theory has predominately focused on discursive attempts to construct rather than deconstruct security threats. By drawing together, criticisms of securitisation theory, the scholarship on subaltern studies and the literature on youth politics in Africa, the political agency and forms of resistance used by young people that do not resort to overt contestation through speech become apparent. This paper argues that during the operation, young people in Eastleigh used novel and often informal mediums to speak back to power, challenge convention and ultimately contribute to a process of de-securitisation by creating a culture of resistance.

摘要

本文着重于2014年4月在内罗毕（主要是肯尼亚-索马里居民区）伊斯特利进行的一次反恐镇压行动“乌萨拉马观察”行动。该行动的回应以案例研究为基础，力求对哥本哈根学派认为，在考虑替代媒体时，“言语行为”的概念是有局限性的，通过这种媒体可以传播不同形式的异议并表达反叙事。此外，它认为，传统的证券化理论主要集中于对安全威胁进行构造而非解构的话语尝试。通过聚集在一起，对证券化理论的批评，对次要研究的奖学金以及关于非洲青年政治的文献，年轻人所使用的政治机构和抵制形式不通过言语公开竞争。本文认为，在行动中，伊斯特利（Eastleigh）的年轻人使用新颖且通常是非正式的媒介来发声，挑战常规，并最终通过建立抵抗文化来促进去证券化进程。