PHILIP BOBBITT

Terror and Consent argues that, like so many states and civilizations in the past that suffered defeat, we are fighting the last war, with weapons and concepts that were useful to us then but have now been superseded. Philip Bobbitt argues that we need to reforge links that previous societies have made between law and strategy; to realize how the evolution of modern states has now produced a globally networked terrorism that will change as fast as we can identify it; to combine humanitarian interests with strategies of intervention; and, above all, to rethink what 'victory' in such a war, if it is a war, might look like.

The threat of terrorism is now part of the landscape of daily lives all over the world, yet although we have begun to live with the idea of it, we have hardly yet been able to think properly about it. Terror and Consent argues that, like so many states and civilizations in the past which suffered defeat, we are fighting the last war, with weapons which were useful to us then but which have now been superceded. This book aims to provide a fundamental rethinking of most generally accepted ideas about terror in the modern world - what it is, how it operates and above all how it can be frustrated. The answers have very little to do with heightened security at airports. Instead, Phillip Bobbitt argues, we need to reforge the links which previous societies have made between law and strategy; to realize how the evolution of modern states, which have always produced terrorists in their own image, has now produced a globally networked terrorism that will change as fast as we can identify it; to combine humanitarian interests with strategies of intervention; and above all to rethink what 'victory' in such a war, if it is a war, might look like - no occupied capitals, no treaties, no victory parades, but the continuance of states of consent.

For centuries, civilisation has been defined by epoch-making cycles of war and peace. But now our world has changed irrevocably. What faces us in this era of uncertainty? How do we protect ourselves against war machines that can penetrate the defences of any state? Is it too late to try? Visionary and prophetic, The Shield of Achilles looks back at history, at the 'long war' of 1914-1990 and at the future: the death of the nation-state and the birth of a new, terrifying kind of conflict without precedent in our history.