Interrogating the imaginary turn: Technology, war, and world politics in an era of great power competition

References to the “imaginary” have become prevalent in the study of technology and war in contemporary world politics. As an introduction to this special issue, this article interrogates the “turn” to the “imaginary” by tracing how the concept has been deployed across three overlapping research traditions pertaining to social imaginaries, sociotechnical imaginaries, and security imaginaries. The article addresses two key questions at the heart of this research agenda: what are the core analytical properties of the imaginary, and which research methods can be used to study this concept? In contextualizing the core themes examined throughout the special issue, the article seeks to spur debate on the “value-added” of imaginaries in the study of technology, war, and security in (critical) IR and Security Studies scholarship at a time of renewed great power competition.

Heritage at transnational work: a belated acceptance of “Love and Peace” upon the 1871 shipwreck and 1874 wars across islands between Taiwan and Okinawa

Will contested and difficult heritage exacerbate conflicts, or can it serve as a critical opportunity for communities to reconcile with the past? This question has been a focus of exploration for practitioners and scholars over the past two decades. Based on our in-depth observations of the Mudan-Miyakojima case across Taiwan and Okinawa, we advocate for a more proactive engagement with difficult heritage due to its enabling role in making sense of the past. Notably, 2024 marks the 150th anniversary of the 1874 Mudan Incident, the first war launched by Meiji Japan in foreign territories, targeting Indigenous communities in southern Taiwan under the pretext of protecting the Ryukyu Kingdom (modern-day Okinawa). Through our examination of the symbolic journeys of a pair of statues titled ‘Love and Peace’, along with numerous heritage sites associated with this war, we shed light on the enabling role of heritage materials and spaces – heritage that works transnationally. It demonstrates how heritage facilitates cross-border communities in sharing a difficult past. However, as our findings show, it often takes longer than anticipated to create material and spatial accommodations for uneasy memories and heritage. Moreover, it requires significant willingness to sustain momentum against the unsettling geopolitics in the region.

UNESCO’s institutional drift and normative vacuum: interpreting the failure to protect Palestinian heritage in Gaza

This article analyses UNESCO’s responses to the destruction of much of Gaza’s cultural heritage since the onset of the war in October 2023. Moving beyond portrayals of UNESCO as a norm entrepreneur and exemplar of cultural diplomacy or, alternatively, as an agency mired in politicisation and gridlock, we provide an alternative account by introducing the concepts of ‘institutional drift’ and ‘normative vacuum’. Via an analysis of UNESCO’s handling of the conflict in Gaza, we demonstrate that despite the agency’s formal mandate remaining unchanged, its core functions have withered in practice: it failed to name Israel as the key perpetrator and neglected to admonish it for breaching relevant treaties and international law. We then demonstrate how this drift has created a void that other actors not normally associated with heritage protection were forced to fill. Together, they have catalogued site-specific damage, attributed responsibility, and framed violations in juridical terms. The devastation of heritage in Gaza therefore exposes the limits of multilateral heritage governance, revealing how authority frays and functions migrate under conditions of asymmetric power and occupation. The article concludes by noting that UNESCO’s failures in Gaza set a significant precedent that risk normalising impunity for heritage crimes.

The enigma of the number of ʿAlawis in Syria: 11% indeed?

This article intends to interrogate a common figure that seems to have become accepted in research concerning the number of the ʿAlawis in Syria during the last century. A thorough examination of the dramatic shifts in Syria during the last decades, mainly from the rise of the Asad family to power in 1970, indicates that the number of the ʿAlawis in the Syrian population has diminished gradually, while the number of the Sunni majority remains relatively high. Apart from official surveys and assessments, this study takes into consideration several factors, such as religious conservatism, socio-economic status, immigration into the country, urbanization and other aspects. All the relevant factors indicate that the number of ʿAlawis in the eve of the civil war (2011) was significantly lower than accepted in research, a conclusion that sheds new light on the degree of the threat to their survival which the sect has faced during this conflict.

“Nasir’s Vietnam”: analysing Egyptian intelligence literature on the Yemen intervention

On September 26, 1962, Yemeni conspirators seized Imam Muhammad al-Badr’s palace, declaring the establishment of the Yemen Arab Republic. However, loyalist Zaydi tribes quickly mobilized against the new Republic, prompting its leaders to seek aid from Egyptian President Jamal ‘Abd al-Nasir. This marked the beginning of Egypt’s most extensive and costly military venture, often compared to the U.S. engagement in Vietnam. For decades, historians have puzzled over why Yemen, a relatively marginal country, consumed so many Egyptian resources. Books published by former Egyptian intelligence heads and senior officials provide insight, revealing Yemen as an intelligence ‘black hole’ for Egypt. The intelligence gaps significantly influenced Egypt’s decision to intervene and shaped its conduct in the Yemeni civil war. This article analyzes the Egyptian intervention in Yemen, using accounts from Egyptian intelligence and officials of that era, as well as U.S. and British archival materials.

Urbicide in Syria: a postcolonial understanding of Civil War by Gabriel Garroum Pla, Manchester, Manchester University Press, 2025, 250 pp., £85.00 (hardback), ISBN: 9781526180261; £85.00 (eBook), ISBN: 9781526180247

Words of War: negotiation as a tool of conflict by Eric Min, Ithaca, Cornell University, 2025, 278 pp., 44.95 USD (hardcover), ISBN: 978-1501779220

Negotiating the Peacebuilding Agenda: Social Problems and Post-Conflict Policymaking

This paper examines the inclusion and exclusion of policy issues in the peacebuilding agenda through a constructivist lens, providing a framework for analysing how social problems are ‘framed’ and ‘owned’ in post-conflict settings. It argues that policy issues become part of the agenda through the deliberate mobilization of a variety of both international and domestic actors and institutions over time. Empirically, the framework is applied to land policy in Côte d’Ivoire, a case that illustrates the fluid relationship between peacebuilding and development. The analysis reveals how land policy moved from being central to post-war reconstruction to being reframed within development and security paradigms, reflecting shifting donor priorities and domestic politics. These findings highlight the broader implications of peacebuilding as a contextually embedded, iterative process that reconfigures existing policy sectors. By focusing on the interplay between global and local dynamics of policymaking, this research contributes to a better understanding of the temporal and political mechanisms that shape peacebuilding interventions.

The Return of Multipolarity and Its Implications on International Peace Agreements: Lessons from the Pretoria Peace Agreement

The international order is experiencing a momentous shift towards multipolarity with significant implications for the global peace process. The international conflict resolution and peace agreement enforcement approach is in a limbo situation that neither upholds the unipolar liberal archetype nor the replacement of it in the new order. The Pretoria peace agreement, signed on 2 November 2022 between the Federal Government of Ethiopia and the Tigray People's Liberation Front (TPLF), that halted the deadliest war on Tigray, is suffering from a lack of coordinated international backing to its fullest implementation due to this global deadlock and internal political polarization. This research exploration delves into how the evolving multipolarity is shaping negotiated peace agreements from the beginning through their implementation, taking the Pretoria peace agreement as a reference. Employing power transition theory as a theoretical framework and a qualitative case study approach as a method, the finding reveals that no single factor but multiple factors handicapped the implementation of the Pretoria agreement. To move forward, peace agreements need to acknowledge and adapt to the emerging new world order dynamics that give renewed commitment to constructive multilateral cooperation that, in a way, can alleviate the capacity and credibility shortcomings of regional organizations.

A Perception-Based Approach to Evaluating Legitimacy: Evidence from the Post-War Reconstruction of Mosul

This article investigates whether individuals’ perceptions of the legitimacy of intervening actors influence how they evaluate reconstruction efforts. While legitimacy is widely recognized as a key factor in the success or failure of interventions, it is rarely examined in relation to the multiplicity of actors engaged in complex, competitive conflict-affected environments. Drawing on the distinction between ideological legitimacy (based on who the actor is) and pragmatic legitimacy (based on what the actor does), the study explores how these sources of legitimacy interact and influence local satisfaction with reconstruction efforts. It introduces an index, the Performance-Expectation Gap (PEG), to measure the alignment or discrepancy between ideological and pragmatic legitimacy and assess their impact on local satisfaction with reconstruction efforts. Focusing on Mosul after the defeat of the Islamic State (IS) and drawing on an original local perception survey conducted in the city (702 respondents), the findings reveal a complex interplay between ideological and pragmatic legitimacy across governmental/non-governmental and national/international actors with notable variation across sectors of intervention. Overall, the article offers a bottom-up perspective on post-conflict reconstruction efforts and contribute to broader debates on its goals, implementation and legitimacy.