The Securitization of Civil Society in Conflict Zones: A Comparative Study of Iraq and Afghanistan

Abstract Authoritarian and hybrid regimes increasingly crack down on civil society.While existing literature explains these patterns as the outcomes of growing authoritarianism and illiberalism, it provides little insight into the underlying mechanisms. This article addresses this gap by drawing on the securitization theory to identify mechanisms of securitization of civil society in competitions between Western intervention and counter-intervention forces in Afghanistan and Iraq. It finds that civil society is securitized through relations of amity and enmity with other actors and values that have been constructed as security threats or allies. Consequently, we find that rather than an autonomous realm of social life, civil society becomes a field of struggle for domination and a contested referent object that is subject to various forms of securitization by state and nonstate actors, including Western intervention and counter-intervention forces. The article contributes to a critical security agenda by demonstrating the resilience and agency of local civil society, particularly women and marginalized groups, within highly securitized environments. It further broadens the empirical base of securitization theory by demonstrating how security competition can dominate nonsecurity domains like civil society.