Dartmouth Events

In this paper, I argue that the contemporary drone strike is best understood not as anomaly to liberal governance, but rather reflects how power today is produced and maintained.  Drawing on recent reports from non-governmental groups that investigate the effects of strikes in Pakistan and Palestine as well as recent government documents and reports that detail how individuals are targeted through their electronic signatures, I show how contemporary drone strikes are consistent with a longer history of Western liberal violence and how this violence is becoming increasingly informationalized and individualized, mirroring other mechanisms of state power that operate on and through the body.