Beyond Binary Legal Categories

Abstract This concluding chapter of the book offers an overview of the insights gleaned from the previous chapters regarding why IHL is silent on suicide attackers’ deaths and presents how these insights provide tools to unpack the impact of classifications and binary constructions on how we process complex phenomena, going beyond suicide attackers. First, the chapter elucidates how complex cultural narratives shape our understandings of the agency that suicide attackers exercise in death. Second, it proposes that a culturally plural approach, which challenges binary constructions, can open new avenues for IHL scholars and practitioners to examine and situate themselves in relation to other wartime phenomena. Third, this chapter problematizes the demand placed on scholars engaging in critical work to propose policies or recommendations stemming from their findings. The chapter discusses how critical scholarship can be approached as an ethical practice that underlines the importance of challenging structural biases in normative frameworks.