"This challenging and bold study is more than a groundbreaking work in CIS literature ... . this book is highly recommended, not only for CIS academics but also for anyone related to and interested in critical thinking in IR. The fluent and clear usage of language makes it pleasant to read, while the pedagogic usage of mythology narratives facilitates comprehension of the theoretical concepts. ... the theoretical framework presented in this book provides substantial guidance." (Elif Ezgi Keles, The Hague Journal of Diplomacy, Vol. 17, 2022)
Chapter 1: Introduction
Why don'y IR scholars study Intelligence?
Bringing Intelligence back in-to the study of International Relations
Chapter 2: The Queerness of Intelligence
Asking Queer Questions about Intelligence
Intelligence Activity as the Third Way
The Queer Mission of the Intelligence Community
Accepting the Reality of our Queer Foreign Policy
Chapter 3: Queer Spies
Intelligence Agents: Bodies Behaving Queerly in Space
The State as Container/State as Vault: The Spy's Queer Moral Status
Her Naked State/Our Naked State: The Myth of Artemis and the Ethics of Spying
Chapter 4: Treason, Agency and Sexuality
The Prevailing Orthodoxy about Treason
Three Narratives about Homosexuality
Chapter 5: Queerness, Secrecy and Revelation
Intelligence and Secrecy
What is a secret society?
The Mythology of the Intelligence Community
Parallel Organizations as a violation of statecraft
Intelligence, Stigma, and the wall of separation
Accountability, Performativity and the Wall of Separation
Outing, Policing and Disciplining Intelligence Activities
Chapter 6: Coming Out as an Intelligence Agent
Memoirs as sourcebooks
The silence of the spy and the ability to tell his story
Other types of queerness: the double agent and the torturer
Coming out as a spy
Chapter 7: The Politics of Covert Activity
IR Theory and the "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" of Covert Activity
Queer Presidents/Queer Precedents
Rescuing the State by Blaming the Intelligence Community
Queer Behavior and the theater of accountability
Chapter 8: The Future is Queer: New Developments in Intelligence Activity
Prying Open the Closet: The Erosion of Secrecy in an Era of Big Data
Join Us in the Closet: Adding New Actors to the Intelligence Community
Normalization: Spying Emerges from the Closet
Mary Manjikian is Professor and Associate Dean at the Robertson School of Government, Regent University, USA. Her work has appeared in International Studies Quarterly, International Feminist Journal of Politics, Intelligence and National Security and International Journal of Intelligence and Counterintelligence. She is a former US foreign service officer with service in the Netherlands, Russia and Bulgaria.
“Gender, Sexuality, and Intelligence Studies is a bold and ambitious engagement across queer theorizing, critical international relations, and intelligence studies. It stirs up conversations that were previously either ignored or impossible while providing a clear argument and a unique perspective. A reader will not be able to help getting involved in the analysis, sometimes agreeing sometimes arguing. Manjikian brings a strong perspective and impressive familiarity across a wide variety of literatures. A worthwhile read!”
—Laura Sjoberg, Associate Professor of Political Science and Women’s Studies, University of Florida, USA
This is the first work to engage with intelligence studies through the lens of queer theory. Adding to the literature in critical intelligence studies and critical international relations theory, this work considers the ways in which both the spy, and the activities of espionage can be viewed as queer. Part One argues that the spy plays a role which represents a third path between the hard power of the military and the soft power of diplomacy. Part Two shows how the intelligence community plays a key role in enabling leaders of democracies to conduct covert activities running counter to that mission and ideology, in this way allowing a leader to have two foreign policies—an overt, public policy and a second, closeted, queer foreign policy.
Mary Manjikian is Professor and Associate Dean at the Robertson School of Government, Regent University, USA.