Theorising the shift from security to insecurity

Résumé du document

This essay is based on Mark Duffield's article (2007): Development, Security and Unending War. This article provides us with an analysis of three different books. What is interesting is to understand in what way these articles share the same focus even if, at first, they seem really opposed. They present specific elements that help us to distinguish the changes in the problematic security from the centered security on the inter-state threat of war to the insecurity coming from a permanent potential instability. Mary Kaldor focuses more precisely on the fact that the questions of international security and development have become internationalized following the globalization process. Her main concept is the idea of human security: the problems of security should not be studied only at the state level but also at the level of individuals.

Extraits

[...] That implies that the western countries use new tools to achieve the new aims. They used to base they control on bureaucratic means but nowadays postcolonial state use governance strategies such as management, regulation of economic, political and social processes. This post- territorial and post political way of doing can also be explained by the threat that underdevelopment represent for western countries. Frank Furedi thinks that the fact that insecurity is becoming more and more important comes from the isolation and the pessimism of political elites of the Western countries. [...]

[...] How can we explain the existence of such values in societies of the western countries? According to Furedi, those values come from the fact that people lack of societal goals: people don't share values and aims anymore. That means that there is a lack of social and political connection and this lack make people feel weak, and think that they future is uncertain. What is really interesting here is that Furedi succeeds to emphasize on the fact that security and development issues are strongly connected to the representations of people: they also have roots in the collective vision of the problems and in the imaginations of people. [...]

[...] Theorising the shift from security to insecurity This essay is based on the article of Mark Duffield : Development, Security and Unending War (2007). This article provides us with the study of three different books. What is interesting is to understand in which way those articles share the same focus even if, at first, they seem really opposed. They all give specific elements that help us to understand the changes in the security problematic from the security centred on the inter-state threat of war to the insecurity coming from a permanent potential instability. [...]

[...] Then, as traditional state security policies are loosing sense, the inclusion of citizens and of the civil society of the countries concerned are crucial. What we will regret in her theory is that she justifies this involvement for human security by saying that human insecurity is a threat for western countries (terrorism, organised crime). This justification seems even more inappropriate when we see that in the rest of her theory she seems really utopian, for example when she proposes: committed global engagement around a programme of social justice''. [...]

[...] What are the concrete consequences of the raising concerns toward security in different part of the world? How can we differentiate those consequences according to different regions and countries studied? Could we say that Western countries deal with security and development issues always in the same way and regardless the country involved? I don't think so and a mere analysis of those policies in various and different countries such as China, North Korea, and Nigeria and Togo could show us that local particularities always shape and alter general theories. [...]