On September 20th, 2001 – nine days after the 9/11 attacks – President George W. Bush gave a speech to Congress announcing the launch of the War on Terror. His definition was a dangerously expansive one: “Our war on terror begins with al Qaeda, but it does not end there. It will not end until every terrorist group of global reach has been found, stopped and defeated.” The War on Terror quickly evolved into a framework of warfare, draconian immigration policies, mass surveillance, terrorism prosecutions, and detention and torture that has not only endured, but expanded with US wars devastating Iraq, Afghanistan, Pakistan, Syria, Turkey, Somalia, Sudan, Yemen and Nigeria among other countries. Some estimates calculate 1 million killed directly from war, with millions more killed from sanctions, starvation, disease, the destruction of sovereign state institutions, and displacement. For twenty five years, the architecture of the War on Terror has profoundly reshaped the lives of Muslims, Arabs and other targeted communities in the United States and across the globe.
This conference will analyze the impacts of the global War on Terror and how the United States and its allies continue to deploy War on Terror frameworks, particularly Islamophobia and xenophobia, to manufacture consent for draconian surveillance and immigration policies, and exorbitant military spending for campaigns of ethnic cleansing, genocide, occupation, and extractivism.
The goal of this conference is to confront the quarter-century of structural violence that has operated under problematic, violent policies that claim to battle “terrorism” by bringing together scholars, organizers, advocates, survivors, journalists, and community members to examine lessons from the War on Terror, explore what resistance to this framework of state violence has looked like, and ask how we can imagine a future where infrastructure of the War on Terror is finally abolished. Finally, this conference will hold space to mourn and remember survivors and the millions of victims of the War on Terror, as we continue to demand accountability, justice and reparations.
Visit the conference website for a full list of panels, speakers, and sponsors.
What You Can Expect
- Connecting with Conference Speakers and Participants from Diverse Fields: Scholars, Organizers, Advocates, Survivors, Journalists
- 8+ Planeries (ex: Past to Present, From Iraq and Afghanistan to Palestine and Iran, The Global War on Terror’s Blueprint (domestically and globally), Immigration and the Carceral State)
- 4+ Workshops: (ex: Exposing and Targeting War Profiteers, Journalistic Responsibility: Countering State Propaganda)
- Gallery Exhibit for War on Terror Timeline: Shattering Justice and Remaking the Muslim Threat
Conference Goals
- Interrogate the War on Terror as an enduring system of power that has evolved into a permanent global infrastructure of state violence, shaping law, policy, and public discourse.
- Expose the role of Islamophobia + xenophobia and analyze how racialized narratives have justified surveillance, detention, militarization, and national security policies
- Center the experiences of impacted communities and highlight the human costs of the War on Terror on Muslim and marginalized communities.
- Critically examine legal and political frameworks that has facilitated ongoing state violence under the guise of “counterterrorism.”
- Highlight and learn from resistance movements from grassroots organizing to narrative interventions to policy change.
- Envision abolitionist futures by fostering collective imagination around dismantling this infrastructure and build systems rooted in justice, care, and collective liberation.