Technology and Territorial Change in Conflict Settings: Migration Control in the Aegean Sea

Abstract

How does territorial change occur in conflict settings without a radical transformation of state interests and international norms? Territorial change is understood here as the unfolding of nonconflictual territorial visions, actions, and interactions in the absence of sovereignty transfer and/or transformation of the existing status of a disputed territory. This article addresses the question of territorial change in conflict settings by examining Turkey's coastal radar technology as an evolving border security infrastructure in the Aegean Sea. Entailing remotely controlled unmanned stations, mobile vehicles, and drones, Turkey's radar technology generates territorial change. Rather than merely enabling or constraining territorial engagement, technology actively produces territory by transforming it into a nonconflictual state. The altering of territory is achieved by the realignment of security conditioned by and functionally dependent on technology. Radar technology mediates Aegean security in ways that are different from its conventional external-oriented framework targeting another sovereign state. Yet, far from moving away from militarization, radar technology produces irregular migration as a new referent of militarized border security, while simultaneously bringing civilian actors to the fore. Territorial change materializes as technology alters the directionality of territorial vision, transforms “seeing” into “visualization,” and makes possible new types of sovereign violence.