Securitization is (normal) politics: Epistemological insights from Kenya’s forced migration and security experience

Abstract

Using Kenya as a case study, this article contributes to the ongoing migration security debate, calling for a fundamental rethinking of the conceptual framework that underpins securitization theory. Drawing on research, participant observation, and key informant interviews, the article offers new insights into the entanglement of securitization with politics, showing how elites, local politicians, and global stakeholders leverage security to advance political agendas. It challenges the Copenhagen School’s perspective on securitization, collapsing its foundational norm/exception, politics/securitization binaries. By underscoring the mutually constitutive nature of these processes, the study questions the very existence of a clear distinction between ‘normal’ politics and securitization, arguing that violent and exclusionary practices often operate alongside, rather than outside of, democratic politics. In doing so, the study seeks to amplify the epistemological and ontological significance of African contributions to theory building, countering narratives that label African countries’ politics as methodological outliers. Ultimately, this recovery not only offers a more accurate understanding of securitization in Kenya, it critiques understandings of ‘normal’ politics as ‘good’, exposing the complicity of liberal democracy in the forceful exclusion of securitized identities.