Securitization in
international relations
International relations (IR), sometimes referred to as international studies and international affairs, is the scientific study of interactions between sovereign states. In a broader sense, it concerns all activities between states—such ...
and national politics is the process of
state
State may refer to:
Arts, entertainment, and media Literature
* ''State Magazine'', a monthly magazine published by the U.S. Department of State
* ''The State'' (newspaper), a daily newspaper in Columbia, South Carolina, United States
* ''Our S ...
actors transforming subjects from regular political issues into matters of "
security" \n\n\nsecurity.txt is a proposed standard for websites' security information that is meant to allow security researchers to easily report security vulnerabilities. The standard prescribes a text file called \"security.txt\" in the well known locat ...
": thus enabling extraordinary means to be used in the name of security. Issues that become securitized do not necessarily represent issues that are essential to the objective survival of a state, but rather represent issues where someone was successful in constructing an issue into an existential problem.
Securitization theorists assert that successfully securitized subjects receive disproportionate amounts of attention and resources compared to unsuccessfully securitized subjects causing more human damage. A common example used by theorists is how
terrorism
Terrorism, in its broadest sense, is the use of criminal violence to provoke a state of terror or fear, mostly with the intention to achieve political or religious aims. The term is used in this regard primarily to refer to intentional violen ...
is a top priority in security discussions, even though people are much more likely to be killed by automobiles or preventable diseases than from terrorism. Securitization studies aims to understand "who securitizes (securitizing actor), on what issues (threats), for whom (referent object), why, with what results, and not least, under what conditions."
Origin
Within international relations, the concept is connected with the
Copenhagen School and is seen as a synthesis of
constructivist and classical political
realism
Realism, Realistic, or Realists may refer to:
In the arts
*Realism (arts), the general attempt to depict subjects truthfully in different forms of the arts
Arts movements related to realism include:
* Classical Realism
*Literary realism, a mov ...
in its approach. The term was coined by
Ole Wæver Ole Wæver (born 17 September 1960) is a professor of international relations at the Department of Political Science, University of Copenhagen. He has published and broadcast extensively in the field of international relations, and is one of the mai ...
in 1993, but seems to have become commonplace, at least within constructivist studies of international relations.
Definition
Securitization begins with a
speech act
In the philosophy of language and linguistics, speech act is something expressed by an individual that not only presents information but performs an action as well. For example, the phrase "I would like the kimchi; could you please pass it to me? ...
concerning a particular threat, by an authoritative national leader, institution, or party. The speech act attempts to shift the threat from normal politics into a security concern, thereby legitimating extraordinary measures to contain the threat.
[
Securitization is a process-oriented conception of security, which stands in contrast to materialist approaches of classical ]security studies
__NOTOC__
Security studies, also known as international security studies, is an academic sub-field within the wider discipline of international relations that studies organized violence, military conflict, national security, and internationa ...
. Classical approaches of security focus on the material dispositions of the threat including distribution of power, military capabilities, and polarity, whereas securitization examines how a certain issue is transformed by an actor into a matter of security in order to allow for the use of extraordinary measures.
Moreover, the securitization act, to be successful, must be accepted by the audience, regardless of the subject matter being a real threat. As Thierry Braspenning-Balzacq puts it: "securitization is a rule-governed practice, the success of which does not necessarily depend on the existence of a real threat, but on the discursive ability to effectively endow a development with such a specific complexion". The audience may take several forms including technical, bureaucratic, public, and policymaking, and different audiences can perform different functions by accepting a securitization, as has been explored by Roe.
As a process
All securitization acts involve four components:
* A securitizing actor/agent: an entity that makes the securitizing move/statement;
* An existential threat: an object (or ideal) that has been identified as potentially harmful;
* A referent object: an object (or ideal) that is being threatened and needs to be protected;
* An audience: the target of the securitization act that needs to be persuaded and accept the issue as a security threat.
That a given subject is securitized does not necessarily mean that the subject is of objective essence for the survival of a given state, but means merely that someone has successfully constructed something as an existential problem. However, Uriel Abulof argues that empirical studies on securitization have been "insufficiently attentive to societies engulfed in profound existential uncertainty about their own survival." Taking Israel
Israel (; he, יִשְׂרָאֵל, ; ar, إِسْرَائِيل, ), officially the State of Israel ( he, מְדִינַת יִשְׂרָאֵל, label=none, translit=Medīnat Yīsrāʾēl; ), is a country in Western Asia. It is situated ...
's "demographic demon" as a case in point, Abulof suggests that such societies are immersed in "deep securitization", whereby "widespread public discourses explicitly frame threats as probable, protracted, and endangering the very existence of the nation/state." Principally, anyone can succeed in constructing something as a security problem through speech acts. The ability to effectively securitize a given subject is, however, highly dependent on both the status of a given actor and whether similar issues are generally perceived to be security threats.
Effects on society
Securitization theorists argue that a subject that has been successfully securitized will receive disproportionate attention and resources in comparison with subjects that have not been securitized, even when these other subjects actually cause more harm.traffic incidents cause on average 150,000 fatalities a year in 56 states ... people tend to accept this as a mere fact and do not securitize this by demanding extraordinary measures. It is dealt with as a concern for ordinary politics and legal regulations. There is a tendency to individualize the casualties ... Terrorist attacks caused in the years 1994 to 2004 worldwide average 5,312 fatalities per year. That is less than 5% of the numbers of persons killed annually in traffic accidents in UNECE countries alone. Nevertheless, it is a top priority in security discourses.
If a subject is successfully securitized, then it is possible to legitimize extraordinary means to solve a perceived problem. This could include declaring a state of emergency or martial law
Martial law is the imposition of direct military control of normal civil functions or suspension of civil law by a government, especially in response to an emergency where civil forces are overwhelmed, or in an occupied territory.
Use
Marti ...
, mobilizing the military or attacking another country. Furthermore, if something is successfully labelled as a security problem, then the subject can be considered to be an illegitimate subject for political or academic debate. According to an overview of the field by Roe, securitization theorists tend to treat securitization as a negative process that undermines democratic processes and diminishes necessary scrutiny that would otherwise be focused on political elites.
Affected sectors
In '' Security: A New Framework for Analysis'', Barry Buzan, Ole Wæver, and Jaap de Wilde work with five political sectors in which a securitization could take place:
* Military
A military, also known collectively as armed forces, is a heavily armed, highly organized force primarily intended for warfare. It is typically authorized and maintained by a sovereign state, with its members identifiable by their distinct ...
* Political
Politics (from , ) is the set of activities that are associated with making decisions in groups, or other forms of power relations among individuals, such as the distribution of resources or status. The branch of social science that stud ...
* Economic
An economy is an area of the production, distribution and trade, as well as consumption of goods and services. In general, it is defined as a social domain that emphasize the practices, discourses, and material expressions associated with the ...
* Society
A society is a group of individuals involved in persistent social interaction, or a large social group sharing the same spatial or social territory, typically subject to the same political authority and dominant cultural expectations. Soci ...
* Environment
However, a securitization could easily involve more than one of these sectors. In the case of the 2003 invasion of Iraq
The 2003 invasion of Iraq was a United States-led invasion of the Republic of Iraq and the first stage of the Iraq War. The invasion phase began on 19 March 2003 (air) and 20 March 2003 (ground) and lasted just over one month, including 26 ...
, one could say that the conflict was securitized militarily; weapons of mass destruction
A weapon of mass destruction (WMD) is a chemical, biological, radiological, nuclear, or any other weapon that can kill and bring significant harm to numerous individuals or cause great damage to artificial structures (e.g., buildings), natu ...
was one reason for the invasion. However, the war was also securitized as a societal problem; human rights in Saddam Hussein's Iraq
Iraq under Saddam Hussein saw severe violations of human rights, which were considered to be among the worst in the world. Secret police, state terrorism, torture, mass murder, genocide, ethnic cleansing, rape, deportations, extrajudicial killin ...
was mentioned in the public rationale.
Another example for securitized sectors are immigration
Immigration is the international movement of people to a destination country of which they are not natives or where they do not possess citizenship in order to settle as permanent residents or naturalized citizens. Commuters, tourists, a ...
and refugee issues. Concerns of terrorist infiltration are regularly cited as grounds for the tight control of borders. Because it is easier to securitize an issue following the September 11
Events Pre-1600
* 9 – The Battle of the Teutoburg Forest ends: The Roman Empire suffers the greatest defeat of its history and the Rhine is established as the border between the Empire and the so-called barbarians for the next four hu ...
attacks, this concern for safety and security has taken attention away from the economic factors that have always been at play in international migration. In addition, also in migrants' countries of origin, diaspora, emigration
Emigration is the act of leaving a resident country or place of residence with the intent to settle elsewhere (to permanently leave a country). Conversely, immigration describes the movement of people into one country from another (to permanent ...
, and citizenship
Citizenship is a "relationship between an individual and a state to which the individual owes allegiance and in turn is entitled to its protection".
Each state determines the conditions under which it will recognize persons as its citizens, and ...
issues can be securitized.
As a tactic
Since securitized subjects can receive a disproportionate amount of attention and resources compared to unsuccessfully securitized subjects, some political strategists suggest that existing public policy issues can find more clout and attention among the public if advocates on these subjects succeed in securitizing them.
For example, theorists suggest that advocates of space exploration could achieve more success by convincing state actors of the merits of their proposals around the rubric of security rather than science: that space exploration could be framed around how it protects humanity from looming existential threats such as meteorites, rather than around how it helps advance scientific knowledge.
The existential threat of climate change
In common usage, climate change describes global warming—the ongoing increase in global average temperature—and its effects on Earth's climate system. Climate change in a broader sense also includes previous long-term changes to ...
is another example of an issue that is beginning to become securitized, for example by the trend to declare a climate change emergency. Though as of 2020, in the opinion of Anatol Lieven
Anatol Lieven is a British author, journalist, and policy analyst best known for his expertise on the Taliban of Afghanistan. He is currently a visiting professor at King's College London and senior fellow at the Quincy Institute for Respons ...
, the threat of global warming has not been securitized anywhere near as much as it needs to in order to trigger the substantial changes in government policy needed to give the world a chance to hit the IPCC 1.5 °C target. Lieven argues that securitisation would be especially helpful with climate change as it would enable more military experts to speak out on the subject, with military officers being the one type of expert that conservatives tend to widely respect.[ On the other hand, in a paper published by the ]Transnational Institute
The Transnational Institute (TNI), is an international non-profit research and advocacy think tank that was founded in 1974, Amsterdam, Netherlands. According to their website, the organization promotes a "... just, democratic and sustainable wor ...
Nick Buxton argues that "framing the climate crisis as a security issue is deeply problematic as it ultimately reinforces a militarised approach to climate change that is likely to deepen the injustices for those most affected by the unfolding crisis. The danger of security solutions is that, by definition, they seek to secure what exists–an unjust status quo."
Criticism
Liberal scholars such as Daniel Deudney have criticised securitization as being too liable to unleash the emotive power of nationalism
Nationalism is an idea and movement that holds that the nation should be congruent with the state. As a movement, nationalism tends to promote the interests of a particular nation (as in a group of people), Smith, Anthony. ''Nationalism: The ...
in unhelpful ways.
Even professors who advocate securitization for issues such as climate change, such as Anatol Lieven
Anatol Lieven is a British author, journalist, and policy analyst best known for his expertise on the Taliban of Afghanistan. He is currently a visiting professor at King's College London and senior fellow at the Quincy Institute for Respons ...
, agree that securitizing an issue can cause an overreaction by state actors, for example with the War on terror
The war on terror, officially the Global War on Terrorism (GWOT), is an ongoing international counterterrorism military campaign initiated by the United States following the September 11 attacks. The main targets of the campaign are militant ...
and even more so with the "war" on drugs and crime. In a 2009 report, public policy analyst Ben Hayes warns that the true beneficiaries from securitization are not general populations, but corporations: He argues that the arms and security companies lobby for a securitised agenda in the corridors of power in Brussels and Washington and subsequently win contracts to implement militarised security policies. Regarding the securitization of migration, researcher Ainhoa Ruiz Benedicto warns of the adverse effects for forcibly displaced persons: "In this context of securitisation of border regions, population movement is understood and treated as a suspicious activity that needs to be controlled, monitored and registered, while the migration of often forcibly displaced people and refugees is seen as a security threat that must be intercepted."
In his book '' The Problems of Genocide: Permanent Security and the Language of Transgression'', A. Dirk Moses argues that securitization, not racism, is at the root of most genocides
Genocide is the intentional destruction of a people—usually defined as an ethnic, national, racial, or religious group—in whole or in part. Raphael Lemkin coined the term in 1944, combining the Greek word (, "race, people") with the Lati ...
and similar atrocities.
References
{{DEFAULTSORT:Securitization (International Relations)
International security
International relations theory
Constructivism
Security studies
Copenhagen School (security studies)