Politicizing European Security? Processes of Politicization in Counter-terrorism and Border Security

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The project investigates how and under which conditions politicization processes occur in the area of European security. It challenges prominent arguments about depoliticization in the purportedly special security field, develops a multi-stage analytical framework for the study of politicization and explores politicization processes as well as their facilitating conditions through in-depth case studies. The project aims to open up the black box of politicization processes by studying concrete politicization moves by different actors, the interactive contentious politics they provoke and the resulting, potentially ambivalent consequences. The empirical analysis examines politicization processes in the fields of counter-terrorism and border security at EU level as well as at national level (by using the example of Germany). We start from the observation that the provision of comprehensive security along the blurred divide between internal and external security has become an issue of increasing public interest and controversy at EU and member state level. In the face of a range of transnational risks (in particular migration and terrorism), EU institutions increasingly emphasize their security function as a source of legitimation and authority construction, as recently documented by the proclamation of the Security Union. This, in turn, may put the legitimacy of European security institutions and policies up for debate. On the one hand, there are a number of concerns about civil liberties and human rights, as visible, for example, in relation to issues such as data retention, mass surveillance (including the Snowden revelations) or the expansion of FRONTEX. On the other hand, there are growing demands from different political camps that the EU must increase its role in security affairs or, as right-wing populists have it, the EU itself is seen as a risk for the security of member states. Hence, the question arises whether these conflicting tendencies signal a broader politicization, which we understand as the transfer of previously uncontroversial or not publicly debated issues into the realm of open decision-making, public deliberation and societal contestation. The project puts to the test both traditionalist and critical approaches that tend to depict European security as an area of high politics and prerogative of governments, a securitized field beyond the reach of normal politics or a technocratic form of multi-level governance, respectively, which, therefore, evades politicization. The project links ongoing debates on the politicization of European and global governance to securitization studies, reassessing the relationship between security and politics in general as well as providing a better understanding of the broader political dynamics in European security.