How societies shape their ways of living together, and what forms of life they recognise, are profoundly political and ethical questions. In an increasingly insecure world, these questions are becoming ever more pressing: in the face of climate change, which sets new limits on possible futures; in the face of wars, even ‘in the middle of Europe’, which fundamentally undermine the modern promise of security; and not least in the face of growing autocratic regimes that tolerate only certain modes of existence and subject a rule-based order to arbitrariness. Life, this is the project’s initial observation, is at the heart of the political. But what exactly life is, is difficult to grasp theoretically. As an epistemic object, it is first of all produced as such, but at the same time it eludes epistemic categorisation. Through the lens of vulnerability and uncertainty, the project explores the analytical benefit of the concept of life for understanding our present.
Susanne Krasmann
Vita
Susanne Krasmann is Professor of Sociology at the Department of Social Sciences, University of Hamburg, Germany. She has published extensively in the field of Security Dispositifs, Vulnerability and the Political, Truth Regimes, Affect and Governmentality Studies. A recent research project is on Architecture in the Anthropocene where she explores the notion of life as an analytical prism of our present. Among the most recent publications are Situational Awareness: Sensing insecurity and coming catastrophes, ed. with Christine Hentschel and Chris Zebrowski, Special Issue in Critical Studies on Security 2015, and Glossar der Gegenwart 2.0, ed. with Ulrich Bröckling and Thomas Lemke, Suhrkamp 2024.
Forschungsschwerpunkt
Architecture in the Anthropocene
Security Dispositifs
Truth Regimes
Affective Publics and Vulnerability
Governmentality Studies
Publikationen (Auswahl)
Krasmann, Susanne. 2025. “Urbicide in Ukraine. On the Multiple Lives of Architecture in International Law”, in Renske Vos, Sofia Stolk, Miriam Bak McKenna (eds.) International Law and Architecture. Edward Elgar.
Hentschel, Christine, Krasmann, Susanne. 2024. “Collapse awareness in the face of climate breakdown and urbicide”, Critical Studies on Security, DOI: 10.1080/21624887.2024.2403795
Bröckling, Ulrich, Krasmann, Susanne und Lemke, Thomas (eds.). 2024. Glossar der Gegenwart 2.0. Suhrkamp.
Krasmann, Susanne. 2024. “Architecture as a Mode of Existence. The Hamburg case of rebuilding the Bornplatz Synagogue.” Cultural Sociology, https://doi.org/10.1177/17499755241260761
Krasmann, Susanne. 2023. “Secrecy Beyond the State. Governmentality, security and truth effects.” In: Walters, William und Tazzioli, Martina (eds.), Handbook on Governmentality. Edward Elgar, DOI: https://doi.org/10.4337/9781839108662.00020
Krasmann, Susanne. 2021. “Architecture in the Anthropocene: The Notre-Dame de Paris fire and the ‘force’ of ‘culture’.” Anthropocenes: Human, Inhuman, Posthuman 2 (1), https://doi.org/10.16997/ahip.929
Krasmann, Susanne. 2019. “Secrecy and the Force of Truth: Countering Post-Truth Regimes.” Cultural Studies 33(4), DOI: 10.1080/09502386.2018.1503696
Krasmann, Susanne. 2015. „Über die Kraft im Recht.“ Zeitschrift für Rechtssoziologie 35(2), DOI: 10.1515/zfrs-2015-0202
Krasmann, Susanne. 2012. “Law’s knowledge. On the susceptibility and resistance of legal practices to security matters.” Theoretical Criminology 16(4), https://doi.org/10.1177%2F1362480612446775
Bröckling, Ulrich, Krasmann, Susanne and Lemke, Thomas (eds.). 2011. Governmentality: Current Issues and Future Challenges. Routledge.
