Terror as justice, justice as terror: counterterrorism and anti-Black racism in the United States

Abstract

How do counterterrorism policies in the United States reproduce anti-Black racism? Research on U.S. domestic counterterrorism post-9/11 has largely focused on the experiences of Muslim Americans while marginalising both overlapping and separate effects of counterterrorism policy on non-Muslim people of colour, particularly non-Muslim Black communities. I argue that domestic counterterrorism policy, as an act of determining what kinds of political contention the state finds non-threatening, has roots in the historical treatment of Black resistance and continues to derive power and legitimacy from oppressing Black communities. Using the case of the Black Liberation Army and its members, I show that federal counterterrorism institutions were shaped by opposition to Black liberation, alongside more well-studied threads of xenophobia and Islamophobia. This article thus extends understandings of discrimination and prejudice within the U.S. counterterrorism apparatus and advocates for greater attention to anti-Blackness not only in policing but in security institutions more broadly.