After 9/11: How the Muslim Became a Security Subject

Twenty-five years after September 11, 2001, the most enduring legacy of 9/11 may not be the destruction of the World Trade Center or even the wars that followed. It may lie in something less visible but more enduring: the transformation of the Muslim from a religious and political identity into a security subject. The attacks were an act of mass terrorism, but their historical significance lies equally in how governments subsequently interpreted and responded to them. The question, therefore, is not only why 9/11 happened, but how its aftermath changed the meaning of security itself.

The immediate response was understandable. The United States declared a “War on Terror”, invaded Afghanistan and subsequently Iraq, expanded intelligence cooperation and transformed counterterrorism into a central principle of international security.

Yet securitisation theory, particularly the Copenhagen School, reminds us that threats are not simply discovered; they are politically constructed as existential threats that can justify exceptional measures. After 9/11, terrorism was elevated into precisely such a category.

Security consequently expanded from military defence into immigration, borders, surveillance, policing, finance and social policy.

The more complicated question is what happened to Islam within this process. It would be analytically simplistic to describe the War on Terror as a war against Islam. American leaders repeatedly distinguished Islam from terrorism, and Muslim governments themselves became important partners in counterterrorism. Yet the absence of explicit anti-Islamic rhetoric does not mean that Islam escaped securitisation. Clara Eroukhmanoff’s The Securitisation of Islam (2026) makes this paradox central:

governments can publicly describe Islam as peaceful while simultaneously implementing counterterrorism and counter-extremism practices that make Muslim communities objects of suspicion.

This is what makes the post-9/11 transformation more subtle than a simple “West versus Islam” narrative. The security state increasingly sought not only to identify terrorists but also to identify people who might become terrorists. The focus moved from violence already committed to the possibility of future radicalisation. Muslims could consequently be categorised as “moderate”, “radical”, “vulnerable” or “at risk”. From a Foucauldian perspective, this represents governmentality: power operates not merely by punishing individuals, but by producing categories, managing risks and shaping what counts as acceptable political and religious behaviour.

The consequences extended beyond Western societies. Muslim-majority states were not simply passive recipients of the War on Terror. They translated its security vocabulary into their own political and institutional contexts. Nicholas Chan’s The Politics of Counter-Terror (2026), focusing on Malaysia, challenges the Western-centric assumption that Muslim states merely copied American counterterrorism policy. He argues that counterterrorism can also become connected to regime security, postcolonial status, state-building and the search for ontological security. In other words, Muslim states could simultaneously resist the idea that Islam causes terrorism and reproduce security practices in which Islam remained central to the management of terrorism.

Indonesia illustrates this tension particularly well. As the world’s largest Muslim-majority democracy, Indonesia experienced terrorism directly, most dramatically through the Bali bombings, while also becoming an important partner in global counterterrorism. Yet its experience cannot simply be reduced to the American model. Indonesian counterterrorism developed through democratic institutions, civil society and a political culture shaped by religious pluralism. Recent research shows, however, that counterterrorism also reshaped the relationship between the Indonesian state and civil society, including through intelligence gathering and anti-radicalisation programmes.

This makes Indonesia important not because it represents a perfect alternative, but because it demonstrates the possibility of separating terrorism from Muslim identity. A democratic Muslim-majority state can confront violent extremism without assuming that religious conservatism, Islamic activism or Muslim identity is inherently a security problem.

The distinction is politically crucial. Once the category of “extremism” expands beyond violence into ideology, religious practice or dissent, counterterrorism can begin to regulate political identity rather than simply prevent violence.

The strategic record of the War on Terror also exposes another contradiction. Military power proved capable of destroying terrorist organisations, disrupting networks and eliminating individual leaders, but tactical victories did not necessarily produce strategic stability. Afghanistan demonstrated the limits of transforming military superiority into sustainable political order, while Iraq showed the dangers of expanding counterterrorism into regime change. The subsequent emergence of new forms of extremism suggested that military campaigns could suppress violence without necessarily addressing the political conditions that reproduce it.

This distinction between tactical and strategic success remains essential. The killing of Osama bin Laden was undoubtedly a major counterterrorism achievement, but it did not end the political dynamics associated with jihadist violence. Nor did the enormous expansion of security institutions after 9/11 eliminate the possibility of future terrorism. What it did create was a durable global security architecture involving intelligence agencies, border controls, surveillance systems, financial monitoring and counter-radicalisation programmes.

Twenty-five years later, the international security agenda has changed dramatically. Great-power rivalry, the war in Ukraine, artificial intelligence, cyber conflict, climate insecurity and renewed interstate competition now occupy much of the strategic imagination. Terrorism no longer enjoys the uncontested centrality it possessed immediately after 9/11. Yet the categories created during the War on Terror remain embedded in institutions and political discourse. This is why the legacy of 9/11 cannot be measured simply by asking whether terrorism has declined.

The more important question is whether the security paradigm created after 9/11 remains proportionate to the threat it was designed to confront. Recent evidence suggests that the cultural legacy remains powerful: a 2026 Pew Research Center survey found that 51 percent of Americans still believe Islam is more likely than other religions to encourage violence, compared with 25 percent in 2002. Anti-Muslim hate crimes also remain above their pre-9/11 level.

This is perhaps the deepest paradox of the post-9/11 era. Governments may insist that Islam is not the enemy, while security practices, political narratives and public perceptions continue to reproduce an association between Muslims and risk. The problem therefore cannot be solved simply through better public relations or declarations that Islam is a religion of peace. It requires questioning the categories through which security itself is organised.

Twenty-five years after 9/11, the challenge is not to abandon counterterrorism. States have a legitimate responsibility to protect their citizens from political violence. The challenge is to prevent counterterrorism from becoming a permanent framework for interpreting religious identity, political dissent and social difference.

The most enduring lesson of 9/11 may therefore be that terrorists changed the world through violence, but the response to terrorism changed it through institutions, categories and ideas.

The unfinished task of the post-9/11 era is consequently not simply to defeat terrorism, but to de-securitise Islam: to distinguish the terrorist from the believer, violent extremism from political disagreement, and genuine security threats from identities that have merely been made to appear threatening. The future of global security may depend not only on whom states protect their citizens from, but also on whom they decide no longer needs to be feared.

The views expressed in this article belong to the author and do not necessarily reflect the editorial policy of Middle East Monitor.