Terror and Consent: The Wars for the Twenty-first Century Hardcover – 29 May 2008

`Terror and Consent' deserves high praise for both insight and thoroughness. The insights are of an analytical rather than a revelatory kind. It might be true to say that any intelligent citizen given enough time could have come up with many of the better perceptions in the book, but it is certainly true that not many analysts would have been capable of the sustained concentration that we find here. If it is clarity, mental honesty and detachment that you are looking for in trying to sort out this abominable tangle of a topic, I have yet to see these qualities better combined between the covers of a book.

What the work mainly needs, in my opinion, is pruning. Bobbitt has valuable things to say about more topics than really belong together without risking incoherency. A `war on terror' may be metonymy for a `war on terrorism'. It may also validly signify a strategy for coping with natural disasters, but it would have been better to separate the two issues. In fact I would say in general that the thoughts and insights are better than their presentation and expression, although the actual writing is of high quality - articulate, literate and easy to read. The other difficulty that I found concerned some of the basic terms and expressions that underlie Bobbitt's thinking. `Market State' must be a term that enjoys currency among academics, and if so one can go along with it. However Bobbitt labours it in a way that suggests that he thinks we need convincing of its real value, as probably we do. Also, in trying to reinforce it Bobbitt spoils his exposition by talking about `market state terrorism', an expression that surely conveys nothing to anyone. To me, the real point to be made is that terrorists, unlike generals and political leaders, fight today's battle and not yesterday's, so if the current establishment that they wish to attack is some `market state', then a market state is what they will attack, not because it is a market state but because it is what is there to be attacked.

I am certainly convinced by the proposition that these days nations and states are not synonymous entities, insofar as they ever were. The modern battle with terrorism is obviously more a conflict between cultures than between states and `nations' in the old senses. Bobbitt is interesting, illuminating and quite subtle in picking his way carefully through the ambiguities that the whole situation is replete with. I felt nevertheless that he slightly fluffs a good opportunity when dealing with the notion of state terrorism. It is perfectly true, of course, that a state like the former East Germany which treats its own population as its own enemies is a terror state by definition. However that is (intellectually at least) a simple case. What I was hoping for from a thinker of Bobbitt's calibre was some firm and authoritative handling of the deplorably vague but extremely emotive, misleading and dangerous notions surrounding supposed `state sponsorship' of terrorism, together with the even more nebulous and easily abused concept of `sympathising' with terrorism or terrorists. Sympathising is, on its own, a difficult enough idea, but sympathising with terrorism is not the same thing as sympathising with terrorists, and the whole field is fertile with opportunities to muddy matters further by shortening either of these words into `terror'.

It is in the nature of the case that any thoughtful reader is going to jib at some of the points aired in a book of this kind. I felt that section II had a rather hand-wringing feel about it of `Something Must Be Done'. Again, I felt that the chaos and slaughter in Iraq that Bobbitt ascribes, perhaps a little carelessly, to terrorist `strategy' is not strategy but just the nature of the fissiparous and factional Iraqi society asserting itself in what passes for its `natural' way. However I would rate the better insights as far more important. It is absolutely true, for instance, and if it was not clear before it ought to be clear now, that the establishment of civic order is a higher and more urgent priority than the wretched campaign for Demoxy an' Freem that so drove Mr Bush's brainwashed administration. And it is if possible even truer that `the question whether it is wise to invade becomes easy to answer: it is never wise to commence an anticipatory war that is lost.'

When I first read this book I would have reviewed it differently because at that time the expression `War on Terror' was still current. It seems now to be an embarrassment, and so I hope that we and our leaders do not lose sight of some important truths that the expression embodied. In his characteristic way Professor Bobbitt takes us methodically through the various things that such an expression may denote. He might have been better and clearer if he had simply appealed to the man in the street's ordinary way of using such a term and built his alternatives around that. On the other hand, if he is right in his claim that the fault lay with pedantic and legalistic casuistry in Washington when the issue was first sidelined by the DoD and then viewed by them mistakenly as a police operation, then we should treat his corrective linguistic analysis with the respect it deserves. That error may have cost us dearly already.

This extraordinary book, a follow-on to his seminal "The Shield of Achilles", recapitulates the nexus of changes in military science, strategy, and governmental epochs from the 15th century "princely-state" to the 21st century's "market-state". His focus is on the history of governance, with an accent on the development of international norms and law. He shows how the outlaws of each epoch follow in form the governance of those they try to overthrow. He describes the ultimate victory of the parliamentary state of consent over communism and fascism in the wars of the 20th century. A major part of the book describes the evolution of today's market-states from the nation-states of the previous century, and the mimicry of the market state in today's terror: multicentric, franchised, global, decentralized.

The thrust of his argument is that legitimate government requires consent, and that the world of terror is that which denies consent and terrorizes the civilian polity. In order to survive and win the wars of the 21st century, the strategic policy must be to protect the civilian population in the face of changed military tactics and strategy. He holds out hope that these new military strategies and cooperation among market-states to contain the state of terror will force a change in governance among market-states.

Since the time of the Treaty of Westphalia (1648), the nation state has been viewed as a "sovereign entity," designed to protect and promote the general welfare of its citizens. Now, according to Philip Bobbitt, in the age of globalization, this sovereign entity is becoming increasingly "porous." As nation states integrate into the global economy, the constitutional foundations dedicated to protecting their rights and liberties are no longer adequate. The new entity that is emerging is what Bobbitt calls the "market state," a term he borrows from a previous work, The Shield of Achilles, in which he traced the evolution of the nation state.

This new market state Bobbitt describes is no longer confined to a sovereign territory, it is a decentralized and privatized network of relationships. It has all the characteristics of a multinational corporation and it treats its citizens much like a consumers. The market state has many upsides in that it presents its citizens with unprecedented freedoms and opportunities.

This book, however, is about the downside of the market state and the opportunities it provides terrorists. Today's terrorist networks are a byproduct of the market state, indeed they are an opportunistic parasite of the market state. They harness its technology and networks to wage war against it.

Bobbitt is not a neoconservative, he is a law professor who sees the need for a new constitutional order that reflects the needs of this new market state. Although he supported the war in Iraq, he now emphasizes the need for stronger international alliances and a "commitment to globalize the systems of human rights and government by consent." In other words, market states must collectively protect human rights and liberties.

On the counterterrorism side, Bobbitt calls for more invasive intelligence gathering, not only domestically but across national borders. Something along the lines of the Total Information Awareness program. He also calls for "preclusive" actions on the part of governments. Containment and deterrence are no longer adequate since terrorists now have access to weapons of mass destruction; they must be neutralized before they act. In short, terrorism must be fought more aggressively without undermining fundamental human rights and within the framework of international alliances.

This is a very well-researched and very well-argued work on how to fight terrorism in the 21st century. Bobbitt concludes that there is something in his proposals to offend everyone. Liberals will not like his call for preclusive actions by the governments and conservatives will not like his call to abide by some international standards. Achieving a so-called state of consent is already difficult in theory, it will be even more so in practice.

Terror and Consent has opened my eyes and made me aware that warfare in the 21st century has changed drastrically. I picked up on this book when I heard Senator McCain claim he takes it everywhere. We no longer will be fighting nation states like China or Russia unless there is a huge miscalulation; rather we will be in conflict with market states; that is those states without borders where globalization has transformed war from nation states waging war against one another using conventional forces to "stateless forces" waging terror against civilans. Now I understand why double the military force in Iraq was needed. Not to win the battle but to win the peace and protect the populace from terror as we help them rebuild their society. This book is a hard, but necessary read for anyone who wants to understand where the world is headed.

I'm only into chapter 1, so can't say how the whole book is