Upcoming Event: Will Munger Speaks on Counter-Insurgency in Salinas, CA, April 21st

On Saturday, April 21st, Will Munger will speak on police and government use of counter-insurgency tactics against the working-class communities in Salinas, CA. Presentation is free and will be followed by Q and A. 

The City of Salinas, CA, the Salinas Police Departments, and the Naval Postgraduate School began collaborating in 2009 to apply counterinsurgency against street gangs. Counterinsurgency is a theory and practice of state control that has undergone significant development as a result of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. The current operation in Salinas is one clear example of how the Long War (formerly the War on Terror) is coming back to affect life in the United States.

This presentation will trace the first explicit uses of domestic counterinsurgency. It will outline how state security forces plan to reassert governance in a neighborhood where the police and city government have lost legitimacy. Based on a critical analysis of recently declassified military research, Munger argues that the Salinas counterinsurgency program intends to reassert social and political control through techniques that build human and technological networks into the Latino population of East Salinas. These police networks are designed to generate a statist sensibility in the population as well as generate information flows about targetable social networks that enable gang formation.


When: Saturday, April 21st
Time: 8pm
Place: Firehouse 51, 410 James Street, Modesto, CA
FREE! KID FRIENDLY!