The Foreign v. the Domestic after September 11th: The Methodology of Political Analysis Revisited

Abstract

The implications of the terrorist attacks on 11 September 2001 are far-reaching and have been discussed and analysed at great length. In this article, it is contended that the methodology of analysing the political, too, has been affected. The policies that liberal democracies have adopted over the past three years to contain the new threat of transnational terrorism call into question the methodological approaches that political researchers conventionally employ to analyse their subject matter. Rather than examining political processes at home separately from those occurring abroad, developments since September 11th demand that we dispense with those boundaries and develop an integrated approach.