Shaw, IGR orcid.org/0000-0002-4289-1740 (2017) Robot Wars: US Empire and geopolitics in the robotic age. Security Dialogue, 48 (5). pp. 451-470. ISSN 0967-0106
Abstract
How will the robot age transform warfare? What geopolitical futures are being imagined by the US military? This article constructs a robotic futurology to examine these crucial questions. Its central concern is how robots – driven by leaps in artificial intelligence and swarming – are rewiring the spaces and logics of US empire, warfare, and geopolitics. The article begins by building a more-than-human geopolitics to de-center the role of humans in conflict and foreground a worldly understanding of robots. The article then analyzes the idea of US empire, before speculating upon how and why robots are materializing new forms of proxy war. A three-part examination of the shifting spaces of US empire then follows: (1) Swarm Wars explores the implications of miniaturized drone swarming; (2) Roboworld investigates how robots are changing US military basing strategy and producing new topological spaces of violence; and (3) The Autogenic Battle-Site reveals how autonomous robots will produce emergent, technologically event-ful sites of security and violence – revolutionizing the battlespace. The conclusion reflects on the rise of a robotic US empire and its consequences for democracy.
Metadata
Item Type: | Article |
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Authors/Creators: |
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Copyright, Publisher and Additional Information: | © The Author(s) 2017. This is an open access article under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International (CC BY 4.0) (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/) |
Keywords: | Drones, empire, geopolitics, robots, US military, warfare |
Dates: |
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Institution: | The University of Leeds |
Academic Units: | The University of Leeds > Faculty of Education, Social Sciences and Law (Leeds) > School of Politics & International Studies (POLIS) (Leeds) |
Depositing User: | Symplectic Publications |
Date Deposited: | 10 Nov 2020 16:19 |
Last Modified: | 10 Nov 2020 16:19 |
Status: | Published |
Publisher: | SAGE Publications |
Identification Number: | 10.1177/0967010617713157 |
Open Archives Initiative ID (OAI ID): | oai:eprints.whiterose.ac.uk:167785 |
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