Secrecy and Methods in Security Research A Guide to Qualitative Fieldwork

Introduction: navigating secrecy in security research

Interlude: rigorous research in critical security studies

PART 1:Secrecy complexities

1 The problem of access: site visits, selective disclosure, and freedom of information in qualitative security research

2 The state is the secret: for a relational approach to the study of border and mobility control in Europe

3 Postsecrecy and place: secrecy research amidst the ruins of an atomic weapons research facility

4 Navigating difficult terrain

5 Accessing lifeworlds: getting people to say the unsayable

6 Research dilemmas in dangerous places

PART 2: Mapping secrecy

7 Writing secrecy

8 Gender, ethics and critique in researching security and secrecy

9 (In)visible security politics: reflections on photography and everyday security landscapes

10 The black box and its dis/contents: complications in algorithmic devices research

11 Multi-sited ethnography of digital security technologies

12 Researching the emergent technologies of state control: the court-martial of Chelsea Manning

Sarah M. Hughes and Philip Garnett

PART 3: Research secrets

13 Searching for the smoking gun? Methodology and modes of critique in the arms trade

14 Critical engagement when studying those you oppose

15 Secrecy vignettes

Section VI: Research ethics in practice

16 Research ethics at work: account-abilities in fieldworkon security

17 Material guides in ethically challenging fields: followingdeportation files

Index

Biography

Marieke de Goede is Professor of Political Science at the University of Amsterdam. She is author of Speculative Security: the Politics of Pursuing Terrorist Monies and Associate Editor of Security Dialogue. She currently holds a Consolidator Grant of the European Research Council (ERC) called FOLLOW: Following the Money from Transaction to Trial.

Esmé Bosma is a Doctoral Candidate at the Department of Political Science of the University of Amsterdam and a member of project FOLLOW, funded by the European Research Council. For her research project she has conducted field research inside and around banks in Europe to analyse counter terrorism financing practices by financial institutions. She has taught qualitative research methods to political science students and holds a master's degree in Political Science from the University of Amsterdam.

Polly Pallister-Wilkins is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Political Science, at the University of Amsterdam. Her work has been published in Security Dialogue, Political Geography and International Political Sociology amongst others. She is a principal investigator in the European Union Horizon 2020 project ‘ADMIGOV: Advancing Alternative Migration Governance’ looking at issues of humanitarian protection in wider systems of migration governance.

'The volume succeeds in giving insights into a variety of research methodologies and at the same time gives a kaleidoscopic insight into how secrecy shapes contemporary security practices, its technologies, and most importantly its politics. The volume will be of interest not only to scholars of security sites but it will hopefully attract attention outside the field. The short chapters and the description of various research project make it a great addition for any syllabus on research methods in IR.'--Linda Monsees, Security Dialogue