This edited volume critically assesses emerging trends in contemporary warfare and international interventionism as exemplified by the ‘local turn’ in counterinsurgent warfare. It asks how contemporary counterinsurgency approaches work and are legitimized; what concrete effects they have within local settings, and what the implications are for how we can understand the means and ends of war and peace in our post 9/11 world. This book is essential reading for anyone interested in understanding recent changes in global liberal governance as well as the growing convergence of military and seemingly non-military domains, discourses and practices in the contemporary making of global political order.

Louise Wiuff Moe is a Postdoctoral Researcher at the Danish Institute for International Studies, Copenhagen. She holds a PhD in Political Science from the University of Queensland. Her research focuses on counterterrorism, counterinsurgency, global security governance and peacebuilding, with a regional focus on East Africa.

Markus-Michael Müller is an Assistant Professor of Political Science at the ZI Lateinamerika-Institut, Freie Universität Berlin. His research focuses on transnational security governance, knowledge production, and violence. He is author of Public Security in the Negotiated State. Policing in Latin America and Beyond (2012) and The Punitive City: Privatised Policing and Protection in Neoliberal Mexico (2016).