Human Security in World Politics
Professor Keith Krause
Graduate Institute of International
and Development Studies, Geneva
June 2008
Outline
I Changing conceptions of security: the
context
II Human security: origins and development
III Practicing human security
IV Conclusion: dilemmas and tensions
I Changing conceptions of security
•
•
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•
•
The traditional concept of security
Why it erodes
Broadening and deepening security
Two examples: environmental and societal
security
“Constructing” and “securitizing”
The “traditional” conception of
“national” security
“Safeguarding the population and core values
of a nation”:
• Securing the nation-state
• Against external threats
• Of a military/forceful nature
Why it erodes: three changes
•
Shift from inter-state to internal or intrastate wars
•
Fragmentation: few global or common
threats
•
Decline of a state-centred vision: security
threats above and below the state level
Deepening
global
regional
Broadening
economic
environment
military energy
state
societal
human
food
health
.
Environmental security: three
meanings
•
•
•
Does environmental change or degradation
cause conflict?
Does environmental change threaten the
well-being or survival or communities?
How does human activity threaten the
environment?
Societal security
•
Threats – not to “sovereignty” – but to the
“identity” of a social group
• Whatever challenges “we feeling”
•
Example: ethno-national conflicts (Kurds,
Basques, Tamils, Kosovars, Hutu vs. Tutsi)
•
Explanations:
• Primordialist
• Constructivist
• Institutionalist
Constructing security
What is “constructivism?
•
A method for studying social phenomena
•
…that focuses on the role of ideas in
shaping our identities
•
…and the meanings we give to the world
around us
Key tenets
•
the actors in world politics — states — are constructed
through historical processes that include social, political,
material and ideational dimensions
•
the security identities and interests of these actors are
constructed (and reconstructed) through political practices
that create shared understandings
•
identities and interests can change
•
the structure of world politics (anarchy) does not
determine outcomes since it is also socially constructed
Constructing security interests
• The threats that weapons pose:
• Banning anti-personnel land mines/cluster munitions,
and the “civilization” discourse
• Identifying the enemy:
• Why North Korea and Iran are a threat; why the UK
and Israel are not
• From Pyongyang to Harare – authoritarianism as threat
• Humanitarian intervention:
• Kosovo, Somalia, Darfur?
Securitization: from “challenge”
to “threat”
What is “securitization?
•
The identification of an existential threat that takes an issue
beyond the usual rules of politics and calls for urgent or
extreme measures to respond
•
Threats are socially constructed through “securitization”
by powerful actors
•
Examples: “war on drugs,” “war on terror” “HIV/AIDS is
a threat to international peace and security”
•
“securitization is a double-edged sword”
II
Human security: concept and
context
•
What is the concept?
•
How did it emerge: immediate context
•
Why did it emerge – deep roots
•
Why did it emerge: recent developments
•
“Broad” versus “narrow” visions
•
How is it situated vis-à-vis other concepts
What is human security?
“protecting individuals from existential and pervasive threats
to their personal safety and physical well-being.”
…the protection of the vital core of all human lives from
critical and pervasive environmental, economic, food, health,
personal and political threats”
Human Security Commission
• A people-centred
security concept
• Includes threats from a state against its citizens
• conceptual evolution of security
Human security: catalysts and roots
•
Catalysts:
• UNDP 1994 Human Development Report
• 1995: Copenhagen Social summit
• Seven elements: economic, food, health, environmental,
personal, community and political security.
•
Roots:
• ICRC and IHL, civilian protection
• Human Rights versus state sovereignty
Human security: background
conditions
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•
•
•
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changing nature of conflict
crisis of development policy
the post-conflict “relief-development” gap
emphasis on good governance: WB and IFIs
changing nature of UN activity: “deep
multilateralism”
security sector reform (SSR) agenda
Two visions of human security
• “Freedom from Want”
• Elements: “safety from chronic threats such as hunger,
disease and repression”; economic, food, health,
environmental, personal, community and political
dimensions
• Agents: UNDP, Commission on Human Security, Japan
• “Freedom from Fear”
• Elements: physical security violent threats, conflict and
crime, post-conflict peacebuilding, small arms, land
mines, women in conflict, etc.
• Agents: Norway, Canada, Switzerland, Human Security
Network, UN peace operations
Human security and the functions of
the modern state
From state to human security
From national to
human development
From sovereignty to
human rights
III Practicing human security
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New forms of multilateral action
•
New issues
•
New “interventions”
New Forms of Multilateralism
•
The “Human Security Network” (HSN)
•
Regional responses to human security
•
“Geneva Declaration” on armed violence
and development
Regional Expressions of Human Security
Where
Understanding of
Human Security
Mode
Western
Europe
(plus
Canada)
Outward projection of European
experience of evacuating violence from
the public sphere; freedom from fear
concept, fused to the needs of European
foreign and security policy imperatives
Externalizing
Middle East
Little resonance for either freedom from
want or freedom from fear; human
security as « tolerance », « education, »
dialogue; no challenge to state society
relations and statist conceptions of
security
Subverting
Southeast
and East Asia
Grafted onto ideas of comprehensive and
cooperative security (state-centric),
oriented towards freedom from want and
economic development needs, silent on
state-citizen relations
Appropriating
Latin
America
Grafted onto notions of citizen security,
public security (and democratic security)
freedom from fear, violence reduction and
security sector reform
Embracing
The Geneva Declaration on armed
violence and development
Objectives:
•
•
•
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Raise global awareness of the negative impact of armed violence on
development: 92 states adhere to it
Support the reduction of armed violence within a development
perspective
Strengthen efforts to achieve “a measurable reduction in the global
burden of armed violence and tangible improvements in human
security by 2015”
Three implementation pillars:
• Advocacy, dissemination, coordination
• Measurability and monitoring
• Programming
A spectrum of armed violence
Armed violence:
“The intentional use of
illegitimate force (actual or
threatened) with arms or
explosives, against a
person, group, community
or state, which undermines
people-centred security
and/or sustainable
development”
About 700,000 deaths
annually
~40-50,000 direct conflict
deaths
~490,000 homicides
~200,000 indirect conflict
deaths
New issues on the security agenda
•
Landmines, cluster munitions, small arms and
light weapons
•
Child soldiers
•
Civilian protection in conflict (including women
and children: SC Resolution 1325, 2000)
•
Conflict “goods” (diamonds, timber, etc.)
Spotlight on small arms: key initiatives
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UN Programme of Action (2001)
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UN Firearms Protocol (2001, 2005)
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UN Basic Principles on the Use of Force and
Firearms by Law Enforcement
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OAS Firearms Convention/Model Regulations
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European Union initiatives
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OSCE Document on SALW
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ECOWAS Convention, SADC and Nairobi Protocols
First generation (supply) measures
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Marking, record-keeping and tracing of arms
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Export control initiatives
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Stockpile management and security
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Weapons destruction, both surplus and post-conflict
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Ammunition (in all its dimensions)
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Portable air-defense missile systems
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End-user certification
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Brokering (including transport/financial agents)
Second generation (demand) measures
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Demand for small arms (state and non-state)
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Small arms and development
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Small arms and armed violence reduction
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Disarmament, Demobilization and Reintegration
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Small arms and Security Sector Reform
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Victim assistance
Human security’s new “interventionism”
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“Responsibility to protect” (R2P) and ICISS
- under what conditions should the world act?
•
International Criminal Court
- who can be held responsible for international crimes?
•
Post-conflict peacebuilding and fragile states
- how can fragile states be strengthened and made
legitimate?
Conclusion: four challenges
•
State-centrism and the top-down promotion of
human security
•
Does the “new multilateralism” represent a
genuine civil society engagement?
•
Does the practice of human security make a
different
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Striking a balance: the difficult relationship
between individuals and the state