International Security - Concepts of Security in The International Arena

Concepts of Security in The International Arena

See also: National security#Definitions

There is no universal definition of the concept of security. Edward Kolodziej has compared it to a Tower of Babel. Roland Paris (2004) views it as “in the eye of the beholder”. But there is a consensus that it is important and multidimensional. It has been widely applied to “justify suspending civil liberties, making war, and massively reallocating resources during the last fifty years”.

Walter Lippmann (1944) views security as the capability of a country to protect its core values, both in terms that a state need not sacrifice core values in avoiding war and can maintain them by winning war. David Baldwin (1997) argues that pursuing security sometimes requires sacrificing other values, including marginal values and prime values. Richard Ullman (1983) has suggested that a decrease in vulnerability is security.

Arnold Wolfers (1952) argues that “security” is generally a normative term. It is applied by nations “in order to be either expedient - a rational means toward an accepted end - or moral, the best or least evil course of action”. In the same way that people are different in sensing and identifying danger and threats, Wolfers argues that different nations also have different expectations of security. Not only is there a difference between forbearance of threats, but different nations also face different levels of threats because of their unique geographical, economic, ecological, and political environment.

Barry Buzan (2000) views the study of international security as more than a study of threats, but also a study of which threats that can be tolerated and which require immediate action. He sees the concept of security as not either power or peace, but something in between.

The concept of an international security actor has extended in all directions since the 1990s, from nations to groups, individuals, international systems, NGOs, and local governments.

Read more about this topic:  International Security

Famous quotes containing the words concepts of, concepts, security and/or arena:

    “Institutional psychiatry is a continuation of the Inquisition. All that has really changed is the vocabulary and the social style. The vocabulary conforms to the intellectual expectations of our age: it is a pseudo-medical jargon that parodies the concepts of science. The social style conforms to the political expectations of our age: it is a pseudo-liberal social movement that parodies the ideals of freedom and rationality.”
    —Thomas Szasz (b. 1920)

    “Once one is caught up into the material world not one person in ten thousand finds the time to form literary taste, to examine the validity of philosophic concepts for himself, or to form what, for lack of a better phrase, I might call the wise and tragic sense of life.”
    —F. Scott Fitzgerald (1896–1940)

    “Of course we will continue to work for cheaper electricity in the homes and on the farms of America; for better and cheaper transportation; for low interest rates; for sounder home financing; for better banking; for the regulation of security issues; for reciprocal trade among nations and for the wiping out of slums. And my friends, for all of these we have only begun to fight.”
    —Franklin D. Roosevelt (1882–1945)

    “O the joy of the strong-brawn’d fighter, towering in the arena in perfect condition, conscious of power, thirsting to meet his opponent.”
    —Walt Whitman (1819–1892)