Isis and its enemies: Evaluating the Dabiq Magazine from Carl Schmitt's perspective

This study aims to find out who are the enemies of the Islamic State of Iraq and Sham (ISIS) and how the organization constitutes these enemies. A total of 15 issues of the Dabiq magazine (released between 2014-2016), as one of the most important publications of the ISIS, are used as the basic empirical data source of the study. Carl Schmitt's concept of sovereignty is at the center of this work in the theoretical sense. Even though ISIS, which manifests itself as a state, has a more sophisticated structure than other armed organizations; it lacks the qualifications of the modern state. The only exception to this is the soverign characteristic of the organization. In this study, the enemies of the ISIS are discussed and classified from this perspective. Two basic axes have been established for this purpose. The first one is ideal-pragmatic enemies; the second axis is state-nonstate enemies. On the basis of the Dabiq magazine, the enemies pointed out by the ISIS are detected and placed in these axes. This study aims to contribute to the International Relations literature by analysing a global security threat like ISIS outside the dominant security studies literature.