War and Its Other: Review of Nick Mansfield's Theorizing War: From Hobbes to Badiou

Abstract

In
 this
 ambitious,
 erudite
 and
 at
 the
 same
 time
 impassioned
 book
 on
 conceptualisations
 of 
war 
since 
the 
seventeenth
 century,
 Nick 
Mansfield 
starts 
from
 the
 premise
 that
 war
 can
 only
 be
 thought
 in
 relation
 to
 its
 other.
 This
 other
 can
 assume 
different 
guises,
 such
 as 
peace,
 the
 social,
 sovereignty
 and 
so
on. 
Mansfield
 persuasively
 argues
 that
 only
 a 
‘humanist 
sentimentality’
 would 
see
 war’s 
other
 as
 unquestionably
 good. 
(165) 
Such
naivete
 forgets
 that
 wars
 have 
always 
been 
fought
 and
 crimes
 have
 always
 been
 perpetrated
 in
 the
 name
 of
 a
 purported
 defence
 of
 humanity,
 even 
of 
life
itself.
 ‘Peace
 might 
be
 the
 most 
aggressive
 thing 
of
 all.’ 
(114)