Description
A common argument in security studies is that global security narratives originate in western countries and western-led institutions, according to a colonial logic which describes non-western countries as helpless against the influence of the West. This paper aims at shifting this perspective, highlighting the role of the ‘margins’ in the construction of security narratives and practices. Studying the work of a youth centre and a cultural centre involved in a US-funded CVE programme in a Tunisian suburb, this paper argues that non-traditional security actors (such as youth workers) play a pivotal role in challenging, shaping and ultimately co-producing local security policies and measures. Building upon hooks’ definition of the margin as a “central location for the production of a counter hegemonic discourse” (1989: 20), I argue that investigating the subjugated knowledges of local actors in the field allows us to go beyond global security narratives and to see alternative approaches to security.
