Perpetuating paranoia: citizenship, civil liberties and counter-terrorism

The adoption of various anti-terror policies by Western governments post-9/11 has generated discussion on the legitimacy of such counter-terror mechanisms and their influence on the rights of citizens. This paper aims at establishing a connection between counter-terrorism, civil liberties and citizenship with the intent of expanding the already existing literature on citizen’s sentiments towards counter-terrorism measures. While presenting data from various research studies from Western nation-states, it is my intention to bring attention to the feelings of racialized citizens as primary targets of the presented counter-terror tools. I will argue that there is reason to assume that such counter-terrorism policies presented foster the development of what I refer to as paranoia for racialized citizens living in Western countries. I will suggest that there is reason to suspect that these mechanisms advance unintended consequences that may exacerbate what the initial policies aimed at deterring.