In the absence of substantive distinctions between the ‘coalition of the willing’ and an ‘axis of evil’ tainted by their association with enemy, the latter have been constructed as ‘rogue states’.
Ultimately though, the roguishness of these ‘rogue states’ functions as a floating signifier. Empty of meaning, it provides an easy way to ‘other’ those who harboured (and continue to harbour) the limitless threat, denying the legitimacy and reality of their claims to statehood.
Unable to be represented as ‘real’, these rogue states are portrayed as not fully in control of their territory; lawless zones which provide ‘a ‘breeding ground’ for nonstate power’ (link, p. 2097); an ‘axis of evil’ irrevocably tainted in its collusion with the absolute enemy.
In another sense, the naming of the ‘rogue state’ represents an attempt to defer the reality of the limitless threat, as something which ‘no longer [came] from … some state or some identifiable state form.’ (link)
As long as the diffuse threat of global terrorism could be ‘reterritorialised in the sands of Afghanistan and Iraq’ (link, p. 2083), there was still a possibility that it could be contained. It enabled the American administration to cast the continuing existence of its sovereign enemies as tantamount to an affront to international society and the precepts state system, with the enemy’s roguishness legitimating the use of unbracketed violence.
