Human Security vs. National Security

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Human Security vs. National Security

• Dr Katerina Standish
• National Centre for Peace and Conflict Studies

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Definitions

• National Security a term that refers to the
  defense and foreign interests of a country
• Human Security a term that can refers to the
  defense and personal interests of people

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What we hope to achieve this morning?

• Understand where the paradigm of HS comes from
• Appreciate that HS envisions humanity as
  multidimensional and interconnected

• Realize that HS is theoretically unstable
• Recognize that the HS paradigm is not
  ideologically neutral

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Human Development Index HDI
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Global North and Global South
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Focus of Interest National Security vs. Human
Security

• National Security Variable Human Security
• State Foci Civilians
• Absolute Sovereignty Not
  absolute
• To Prevail Responsibility To
  Protect
• Governments Locus of Interest
  Victims
• Fight Terror Motivation
  Social Justice Hegemonic
  Political Focus Humanitarian
• Ultimatum Dispute Technique
  Negotiation
• Hard Power
  Soft
• Reactive Action
  Proactive

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Defining Human Security

• the protection of individuals from risks to
  their physical or psychological safety, dignity
  and wellbeing.
• Tadjbakhsh Chenoy (2007)

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Understanding the Human Security Paradigm (Nef,
1985)

• The global system is made up of a juxtaposition
  of five subsystems
• Ecology (or environment)
• Economy
• Society
• Polity
• Culture

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Interconnectivity of Insecurities

• Andthese subsystems are linked
• environment and economy are linked by resources
• economy and society, to social forces
• society and polity, by brokers and alliances
  and,
• politics and culture, by ideology.
• The concrete interplay among and between regimes
  and their linkages defines the nature of systemic
  entropyor homeostasisat any given point in time
  and at any level, whether global, regional,
  national or, local
• (Human Security and Mutual Vulnerability,IRC,
  1999)

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The Human Security NUTSHELL

• Human security as a concept takes its standpoint
  from the position of people instead of states and
  sees security as contingent upon successful
  (nonviolent) management of threats to social,
  cultural, economic, environmental and political
  processes.

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The Human Security paradigm shift

• Political Realism
• Critical theory
• Radical theory
• Postmodernism
• Feminism
• Human Security

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Lecture Flip!

• The term insecurity embraces almost all forms of
  harm to an individual so it loses any real
  descriptive power.
• Human Security proponents make dangerous attempts
  to prove false causal assumptions linking
  socio-economic issues to political outcomes.
• Human Security as a concept aspires to explain
  almost everything and consequently, in reality
  explains nothing.
• Human Security should be neutral. A social
  science concept should not propose ethical
  choices.

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Extra Questions

• How does NS consider forms of violence such as
  ethnic cleansing and global warming?
• Does HSs emphasis on the individual make it
  difficult to incorporate it into Global National
  discourses?
• Does the failure of the UN system to address
  forms of collective violence mean that it, like
  the state system, is underperforming?
• What changes do you see as necessary to infuse
  national and global security platforms with
  human security concerns?
• What role can HS play in the so-called global
  north? ¼ children in NZ are starving and poverty,
  structural and cultural violence are rife in many
  parts of the developing world. Is HS a way for
  developed nations to point fingers at the
  developing world and then hold them up to a
  higher standard?

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