Democracy and America's War on Terror

by Robert L. Ivie

Robert Ivie, who has written extensively over the last thirty years on America's rhetorical appetite for war, discusses democracy's centrality to the national identity and how prevailing constructions of democracy constitute a republic of fear in which the threat of foreign and domestic "otherss" chronically exaggerated through rituals of vilification and victimization. In reassessing the nation's traditional distrust of democracy (the lively and healthy exchange of differing ideas and ideals) and critiquing the rhetoric of evil, Ivie argues that the problem of international terrorism is best addressed by strengthening, rather than weakening, America's democratic practices—that is, by enriching a democratic culture of robust debate. Divisive issues, for Ivie, should be engaged overtly and constructively, contested through a rhetoric of identification that bridges the differences between adversaries without effacing their identities. This would be, he believes, a strategy more responsive to, and realistic for, the prevailing condition of racial diversity in the global information age. Democracy and America's War on Terror will be of interest to public policymakers and informed general readers as well as students and scholars in the fields of rhetoric, political theory/philosophy, democratic theory, U.S. foreign relations/policy, war and peace studies, terrorism, and cultural studies.

 

264 pages, Paperback

First published February 28, 2006

Reviews

[Meg Bernard · Rating 5 out of 5]

In celebration of both/and, my dears.

Ivie focuses attention on the metaphors and myths that we have long been using to make our democracy meaningful, and he describes the consequences of these dominant perceptual schemas. He suggests that deliberative rhetorical practice can be used to remedy this warped idea of democracy, enriching public participation in politics and civil society. Ivie champions Mouffe’s idea of agonistic (not antagonistic) pluralism, which frames political conflict not as a threat but as collaborative discourse between mutually respectful opposing forces.

This book is a site for exploring how this agonistic model for political conflict could benefit American civil society and diffuse the war on terror.