Lecture 1 Flashcards
Different conceptualizations of security
o Narrow vs broad? “survival” (freedom from life determining threats) vs “survival plus” (freedom to have life choices).
Referent object
o What needs to be made secure? State, national interest, individual, ethnic group, society as a whole, planet, environment?
o Different referent objects aren’t necessarily independent of one another.
Key dimensions of security Buzan 1991
o Military (offensive/defensive capabilities, consequence thereof), political (stability of states, their systems of government), economic (resources and welfare), social sustainability (maintenance of traditions and customs) and environmental sustainability (maintenance of local and planetary biosphere).
Global attitude survey
o Representative survey of adults in 19 economically advanced countries.
o Asking what event is a threat to their state.
o Adds in 2023 some global south and BRICs countries.
How can security be achieved
- “The search for perfect security defeats its own ends. Playing for safety is the most dangerous way to live.” “There is no such thing as absolute security, life is about living with risks and threats.”
Golden age of security studies 1950-1960
o 1) Influenced by 2 world wars, idea of civilians contributing to study of strategy, long term strategizing to avoid war. Lead to golden age. 2) National interest, security rather than welfare. 3) Nuclear revolution, seminal research on deterrence, containment, coercion, escalation, arms control. Belief in deductive, rational thinking.
End of golden age 1960-1970
o 1) Limits to traditional approaches, not applicable to peasants in Vietnam war and a limited view of politics (not beliefs and perception but military balance) assumes perfect information and constant availability to rationally calculate. 2) Public disinterest in national security, critique of Vietnam war made security studies and unfashionable subject at universities. 3) Focus on international political economy.
Renaissance of security studies 1970-1990
o 1) New realities, end of cold war détente, Iranian and Nicaraguan revolutions; soviet interventions in African states and Afghanistan. 2) New data, more systematic use of historical analysis; more access to archives. 3) New methods, structured focused case comparisons, more diverse social scientific approaches to explain historic events.
Changes due to end of cold war?
o In character of warfare, new war characteristics of civil wars; civilians are targeted, criminalization of violence and identity based wars. Interstate conflict characterized by hybrid wars, gray zone warfare.
o Researchers disagree strongly about whether there have in fact been changes.
Changes after sept 11 2001 attacks?
o Global war on terror, greater international interventionism? Growth in multi-party conflicts? Conflicts more complex? Multi layered? Challenges to post-cold war unipolar balance of power?
Problem solving theory
o Takes the world as it finds it, prevailing social and power relationships and institutions into which they are organized as the given framework for action.
Critical theory
o Doesn’t take institutions and social and power relations for granted but calls them into question. Critical theory is directed to social and political complex as a whole rather than to the separate parts.
