Meanings
- uncountableThe relationship between sovereignty and power over life and death.
Jasbir K. Puar (2007, 2017) has been particularly instrumental in provoking an expanding body of work on queer necropolitics.
2021, C.L. Quinan, Kathrin Thiele, editors, Biopolitics, Necropolitics, Cosmopolitics: Feminist and Queer Interventions, Routledge, →ISBN, page 41 more example
The idea of a supreme power which monopolizes legitimate violence is as much about limiting and restraining ‘necropolitics’ as it is about engaging in it.
2007, Mitchell Dean, chapter 8, in Governing societies: political perspectives on domestic and international rule, →ISBN, page 148
Origin
From necro- + politics, coined by Cameroonian philosopher and political scientist Achille Mbembe.
Full word history & related roots →Cite this entry
necropolitics. (n.d.). In WatkinsX Dictionary. Retrieved November 3, 2026, from https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/necropolitics
“necropolitics.” WatkinsX Dictionary, https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/necropolitics. Accessed November 3, 2026.
WatkinsX Dictionary, s.v. “necropolitics,” accessed November 3, 2026, https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/necropolitics.
Source: necropolitics on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.