25 December 2024

Necropolitics and Counterinsurgency: The Costs of Population Resettlement in Small Wars

Matthew P. Arsenault

In counterinsurgency warfare, isolating insurgents from civilian populations has long been seen as essential. As Brigadier General S.B. Griffith stated, countering guerrilla warfare relies on location, isolation, and eradication (1989). In practice, this often means forcibly relocating civilians away from insurgent support networks, disrupting community life in the name of security (Bender 1972). But a deeper analysis of these strategies reveals a grim dynamic. By forcibly resettling people and controlling their basic necessities like food, water, shelter, and physical security, states impose a form of power that philosopher Achille Mbembe terms necropolitics (2019). This is a kind of rule where the state exerts dominance not only through direct violence but by controlling the conditions of life and death for entire populations.

Necropolitics explains how resettlement strategies often fail by inadvertently dehumanizing those affected. Forced into “protected villages,” communities often found themselves stripped of autonomy, unable to sustain their livelihoods through traditional means such as farming or trade. Instead, they became reliant on the state for basic necessities, including food, water, and security (Jundian 1974; Hoffman et al. 1991). This dependency reinforced the state’s control but simultaneously dehumanized the affected populations, reducing them to subjects of governance rather than active participants in society. For these populations, life becomes a matter of survival, dictated by the whims of the state, with little regard for personal well-being. By examining failed and semi-successful counterinsurgency (COIN) resettlement strategies in places like Rhodesia, Angola, and Vietnam, we can see how necropolitics shapes not only the experience of those displaced but also the effectiveness of COIN strategies themselves.

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