Racialized Surveillance – A Militarized and Securitized Response to the Black Lives Matter Movement in the United States and Canada

Abstract

The multiple instances of state violence towards Black communities in recent years in the United States and Canada spark the following question: why does Canada and the United States engage in securitizing and militarized strategies as a response to the Black Lives Matter movement? This paper first argues that the United States and Canada have incentives to engage in the production and protection of a racialized hierarchical order. In doing so, it becomes apparent that race and class go hand in hand in caring for the survival of capitalist interests. The paper then focuses on the surveillance mechanisms and strategies that the American and Canadian states use to protect this White supremacy that is so necessary for capitalism to thrive, and studies the ways in which the American and Canadian states generate and promote a context of perpetual self-surveillance on the BLM movement and on Blackness in general. This transitions into an examination of the strategies of the two states in engaging in surveillance capitalism, or computer mediation, as a way to deter and restrict Black association in the context of the fight for justice. Lastly, this paper analyzes the rhetorical characterization of BLM as a racist discourse that seeks to weaken the fight for Black freedom’s popular support.