Theories of International Relations

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Theories of International Relations

• Week 14
• Security IV - Critical Perspectiveson Security

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Introduction

• Today we are focusing on a number of critical
  approaches that seek to challenge traditional
  understandings of security.
• These have gained strength in recent decades and
  have had particular impact on policy debates -
  e.g. human security.

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Outline

• Conceptual Issues
• What is security?
• Traditional Approaches to Security
• - Realism
• - Liberalism
• Critical Approaches to Security
• - Emancipation and Human Security
• - Feminism
• - Securitisation/Constructivist approaches

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Conceptual Issues

• What is security?
• - Physical survival Conditions of existence?
• Security studies is the study of the relationship
  between referent objects and threats.
• What is to be secured? (the referent object of
  security)
• State, nation, class, individual, planet, values
• From what is it to be secured? (the threat)
• By whom and how is it to be secured? (the means)

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Conceptual issues (cont.)

• What is the threat?
• - Dependent and relational concept
• - Security requires threat
• - Security vs. insecurity (Ole Wæver)
• - Manageable vs. unmanageable threat
• - Objectively knowable or inter-subjectively
  constructed?
• What/Who are the agents of security?
• - States, IGOs, NGOs, individuals

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Realism/Neorealism

• State competition for power and security in
  anarchic international system
• Anarchy ? self-help
• International politics competition of all
  against all
• Referent object the state
• Security survival/preservation of territorial
  sovereignty
• Threat other states
• Agent the state
• (Negative) Peace absence of war
• (Negative) Security power/dominance ? Security
  Dilemma ? Limited inter-state cooperation

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Liberal Approaches

• Common Security
• mutual trust, verification, confidence-building
  measures, communication
• Collective Security
• states cooperate to provide security for all -
  an attack against one, is an attack against all
  (e.g. UN Security Council)
• Interdependence Theory
• Increasing state interdependence makes war
  increasingly costly
• Democratic Peace Theory

• Referent object States
• Security Preserving sovereignty
• Agents States
• Threat Other states
• Peace absence of war

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Critical Approaches to Security

• What are critical approaches to security?
• A multitude of approaches but some common themes
• Move away from state as sole referent object of
  security - beyond state security
• Military threat not the sole form of threat
• Expanded understandings of peace absence of
  war vs. creating better world
• Increasing focus on environmental / ecological
  security
• preserving the biosphere vs. competition for
  resources
• Some critical questions for you
• Why is this shift in the security agenda taking
  place?
• What are the normative implications?
• For example, what are the consequences of the
  move towards the securitisation of a wider range
  of issues?

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Emancipation and Human Security

• Theoretical point of departure for many critical
  theories
• Marxist Approaches
• Global dynamics ? exploitation
• Capitalist system ? war/conflict
• Referent object the exploited
• Threat clashing class interests
• Solution overthrow capitalist system

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Johan Galtung Peace and conflict studies

• Beyond the focus on causes of conflict to the
  conditions under which peace is attained and
  maintained
• Negative vs. Positive peace
• peace more than just the absence of overt violent
  conflict (negative peace), and include absence of
  violence in its many forms (positive peace).
• Structural violence
• systematic ways in which a given social structure
  or institutions prevents individuals from
  achieving their full potential
• Structural violence Potential vs. actual life
  expectancy
• Structural violence produces conflict and often
  direct violence (e.g. family violence, racial
  violence, terrorism, war)
• Implications for thinking about security
• Referent object Society, humanity
• Security Quality of life equitable
  distribution of power and resources
• Threat Inequality

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Human Security

• Ken Booth - States as means (agents) for
  individual security
• Questioning the privileged status of the state in
  traditional IR theory.
• Individuals threatened by
• - crime, pollution, scarcity, disease
• - economic collapse, poverty, poor education,
• - political oppression home state

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What is Human Security?

• Individual security quality of life
  democracy, liberty, economic wealth
• Emancipation the freedom for people to do
  what they would freely choose
• Traditional approaches security stability and
  order
• Booth security justice, emancipation, change

• Implications
• Redistribution of resources
• Interventionist foreign policies?
• Criticisms
• Western universalism
• Individualism vs. culture

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Redefining Security The Human Dimension

• 1994 UN Development Program (UNDP)
• "Human security is a child who did not die, a
  disease that did not spread, a job that was not
  cut, an ethnic tension that did not explode into
  violence, a dissident who was not silenced. Human
  security is not a concern with weapons - it is a
  concern with human life and dignity It is
  concerned with how people live and breathe in a
  society, how freely they exercise their many
  choices, how much access they have to market and
  social opportunities - and whether they live in
  conflict or in peace".

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Human Security (cont.)

• Referent object Individuals
• Threat Unemployment, disease, scarcity etc
• Security socio-economic justice, freedom of
  expression, dignity
• Agent States IGOs NGOs

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Feminism

• Traditional approaches are state centric and
  gender biased
• Gendered nature of Realism emphasises masculine
  values of competition and violence
• Feminism aims to
• Put women on the international security agenda
• Highlight how ideas of gender impact on IR and
  constructions of security

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Putting Women on the Security Agenda

• Women suffer disproportionate levels of
  insecurity and direct and indirect violence
• UNDP 1996 No society treats its women as well
  as its men
• Objectification, subordination, commodification
• Structural violence
• hunger, education, sanctions

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Constructivism

• Criticise objectivism and ahistoricism
• Analyse representations of security through time
• Discursive concept open for negotiation
• Analyse the politics of security speak
• Does security policy overcoming threats or
  constructing them?

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Securitisation Theory

• Why is speaking security so attractive?
• Two views on Language
• Positivists Language is referential, passive
  and neutral a tool to convey thoughts
• Constructivists Language is constitutive,
  active and powerful

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Securitisation theory (cont.)

• Al Qaeda is a terrorist network and a national
  security threat
• - National security response, military
  operations, invasions of host countries,
  preventive detention, rendition, torture
• Al Qaeda is a transnational criminal
  organisation using violence to further its ends
• - Fact finding law and order response, police
  investigations, arrests, judicial proceedings

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Securitisation theory (cont.)

• Consequences of speaking security
• Emphasises the existential
• Emphasises emergency and immediacy
• Legitimises extraordinary measures
• Undermines democracy by closing down public
  debate through invoking national security

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Conclusions I

• Traditional approaches to security present the
  state as the referent object of security and
  generally invoke a conception of state security
  as the preservation of territorial sovereignty
  and a negative conception of international
  security as the absence of war.
• Critical approaches to security concerned with
  issues of emancipation argue the focus on the
  state as the referent object confuses ends with
  means. Instead they argue states are useful only
  insofar as they can provide for the security of
  other referent objects (e.g. individuals).

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Conclusions II

• Feminist approaches highlight the
  disproportionate insecurities facing women
  globally and the role of gender representations
  in constructing international politics as a
  masculinised realm of competition and conflict.
• Constructivist approaches like Securitisation
  theory contend there are no objective referent
  objects of security. Representations of security
  instead should always be seen as political and
  operating to the benefit of some and the
  disadvantage of others.
• Next time Global War on Terror