Webs, walls, and wars

David J Betz

Global Crime, 2016, vol. 17, issue 3-4, 296-313

Abstract: Walls, physical barriers for channelling, slowing, or (more rarely) preventing, network flows are an increasingly prevalent social technology in our seemingly ever more connected world. They are employed by a wide range of actors, both state and non-state, as a means of bolstering resilience against a similarly wide range of perceived threats. With few exceptions, the literature decries this development, seeing it as manifestation of xenophobia, anti-urbanism, and generally being inimical to the existence of a just and peaceful world order. By contrast, this paper contends using historical examples combined with insights from cybernetics and natural sciences that walls are no more intrinsically bad than unfettered flows are intrinsically good. A peaceful and prosperous world order, one which is neither a stagnant securocracy nor a perennially unstable chaoplex, depends upon a balance between the two.

Date: 2016
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DOI: 10.1080/17440572.2016.1179631

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