Treason and Political Community:Exclusion, Belonging, and Loyalty

Recent years have witnessed a surprising resurgence of treason accusations in public discourse, despite their rarity in legal prosecutions, particularly within democratic states. This article examines the effects of treason accusations, shifting focus from their causes to their role in shaping political communities and the meaning of allegiance. Deploying the term treason has important effects, as it contributes to delegitimizing groups of people, branding them as disloyal outsiders. Based on a historical analysis of the discourse on treason and political community in England after the Reformation, I show how treason played a central role in securing the English state through prosecuting dissent and continues to shape collective identities. Drawing attention to changing notions of treason, I show how these contributed to understandings of loyalty, belonging, and exclusion. Through stigmatizing dissenters as disloyal outsiders, treason accusations not only reveal alternative imaginaries of political community and authority but also uncover the violent dynamics sustaining group identity. This historical lens offers insights into contemporary debates about treason’s role in redefining sovereignty and belonging, underscoring its enduring power as a fundamental discursive and performative political act.