Performativity and the project: enacting urban transport security in Europe

Abstract

In April 2011, a large consortium of European rail and security suppliers, transport operators and research organisations launched the Secured Urban Transportation – European Demonstration (SECUR-ED) project with the objective of providing public transport operators with the means to enhance urban transport security. Drawing on a detailed study of the SECUR-ED project, this article examines the way in which the problem of urban transport security has been addressed in Europe. It analyses the SECUR-ED project as a performative space, in which risks and capabilities are identified, enacted and contested, and relations across public and private actors are forged. Combining the literature on the performativity of security with John Law’s work on “the project”, the article proceeds by assessing how, in the context of SECUR-ED, connections and continuities are performed across European differences and across public–private space. Hence, it argues that the main function of the project was precisely this: to enact a common security culture, outlook or network in the realm of mass transportation in Europe. This is not a stable culture, but one that is subject to multiple possibilities for re-articulation and mis-performing. The article aims to engage with these moments of re-articulation by focusing on the situated practices of mass transport security. It concludes with a critical analysis of the broader European Union project for security research under the Seventh Framework Programme.

Keywords:

• urban security
• vital systems
• performativity
• security culture
• security markets
• Europe

Disclosure statement 

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author.

Notes

1. “Summarising SECUR-ED” promotional video.

2. “Summarising SECUR-ED” promotional video.

3. Observations at the SECUR-ED demonstration in Milan, 29 November 2013.

4. Observations at the SECUR-ED demonstration in Milan, 29 November 2013.

5. “Protecting passengers and staff” promotional video.

6. “Development of training programmes”, SECUR-ED promotional material.

7. “Development of training programmes”, SECUR-ED promotional material.

8. “Development of training programmes”, SECUR-ED promotional material.

9. “Protecting passengers and staff” promotional video.

10. “Development of training programmes”, SECUR-ED promotional material.

11. “Development of training programmes”, SECUR-ED promotional material.

12. In many respects, the problem of how to operate jointly and in an effective manner had long been on NATO’s agenda. Nonetheless, it had become more persistent in relation to a presumably global security context in the immediate aftermath of the Cold War on the one hand, and uneven defence spending across the organisation on the other. With respect to the latter, this was particularly the case in relation to the new operational concepts of intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance that the United States was developing in the context of the Revolution in Military Affairs. As part of these discussions, interoperability took a slightly different form. In particular, it became linked to the ability to share information and awareness with individuals operating at the edge of a networked organisation.

13. Observations from the final conference in Brussels, 17 September 2014.

14. “Summarising SECUR-ED” promotional video.

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by the Dutch Council for Scientific Research (NWO) through the VIDI-grant European Security Culture [grant number 452-09-016].

Notes on contributors

Marijn Hoijtink

Marijn Hoijtink is a PhD candidate in the Department of Political Science at the University of Amsterdam. Her research critically analyses the convergence between security and commerce in spaces of everyday life, focusing on how industry involvement organises new security practices and structures of governance that go beyond the public–private divide. Her work has been published in Security Dialogue.