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C HAPTER 15
Human security
Gunhild Hoogensen Gjørv
A BSTRACT
In this chapter, students will learn about human security and the status of this concept in policy and research today. The popularization of human security through the UN Development Programme’s 1994 Human Development Report promised a revolutionary move in security studies, reorienting the focus to individuals rather than states. The hope that this concept would significantly change the course of security studies thinking did not come to fruition, at least not as some had hoped. States and international institutions adopted the con- cept but often for their own purposes, losing sight of individual, contextualized experiences of insecurity that were often brought about by these same states and institutions. Some critics of human security saw this development as the demise of an ineffective, non-state-based security concept. However, other critics argue that it still has potential, and they continue to provide empirical evidence that recognizes the work non-state actors do in providing security and to influence the policy of states and international institutions. As such, the human security concept continues to be relevant to state and non-state actors alike.
C ONTENTS
z (^) Introduction 222 z (^) Human security 223 z (^) A brief history of human security 227 z (^) Human security: the role of states? 228 z (^) Human security: from state-dominated to critical approaches? 230 z (^) Conclusion 234
z Introduction
The concept of human security came into popular use through its introduction in the United Nations Development Programme’s (UNDP) 1994 Human Development Report (UNDP 1994). This report marked a milestone in the field of security studies and in security policy, explicitly contesting the dominant, realist approach to security promoted during the Cold War (see Chapter 1). It also had a substantial impact on debates around the theory and practice of security. Human security made explicit the possibility, not just in academic circles but also in policy, of thinking about security beyond the confines of the state. By virtue of distinguishing ‘human’ security from ‘security’, the fears, needs and priorities of ordinary people were brought to the forefront, highlighting that the security (and interests) of states did not necessarily coincide with the security (and interests) of people. Almost 25 years after the UNDP report, human security continues to have relevance and application both in policy and academic worlds. It provides a frame- work for discussions about humanitarian intervention and the ‘responsibility to protect’ (R2P) (ICISS 2001; Orford 2013) and it is increasingly engaged by scholars and practitioners in diverse disciplines from health and medicine to criminology, to gender and feminist studies, as well as in security studies and international relations (Wibben 2008; Anand 2012; Roses Periago 2012; Newman 2016). The concept has also gained attention beyond the context of armed conflicts, with analysts using it to make sense of the intersections between challenges of identity, health, food and environmental security issues, for example (Cassotta et al. 2016). Since its introduction, however, human security has also been subjected to sustained critique. Some saw this as inevitable given the absence of a clear theoretical foundation or definition (Breslin and Christou 2015). Other critics suggested that as a concept it is ‘everything and nothing’, constituting the IR equivalent of ‘mother- hood and apple pie’ (Paris 2001; Hoogensen and Rottem 2004). Roland Paris (2001) noted that it was unclear whether advocates of human security saw it operating as a new security paradigm for theorists or a progressive policy agenda for practitioners. On the former, some critics argued that, as a conceptual framework, human security fails to provide a resource for either understanding global security politics or the processes through which political communities give meaning to security (McDonald 2002). On the latter, human security has been accused of failing to alter the security considerations and practices of key actors, namely states (Booth 2007: 322–4) or conversely of being co-opted to serve as a tool of neo-liberal power- brokers that perpetuates Western-dominant interests, particularly through the use of military intervention (Chandler 2012). The development of the concept helps to explain its relative resilience. By the early 1990s, in an atmosphere of international cooperation after the Cold War, it was clear that the narrow definition of security as a militarized and elite notion reserved for the ‘state’, bound within an anarchic international system regulated by superpowers, was insufficient for making sense of key international political concerns (Walt 1991; Hough 2008). Since the late 1970s, some analysts have noted how security referred to issues that went well beyond the use of military power to protect the state (e.g. Ullman 1983; Rothschild 1995). Early advocates of human security,
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be seen as isolated or independent indicators that define security when taking indivi- duals into account. Human insecurity is equally severe under conditions of food insecurity, job or income insecurity, human rights violations and inequality (political insecurity), or gross environmental degradation. Thus at its core, human security is concerned with how people experience security and insecurity. The 1994 UNDP report highlighted four essential characteristics of human security (1994: 22–3). First, human security is universal, meaning that it applies to all human beings, rich or poor, Global South or Global North. As will be noted, however, human security was heavily oriented towards the concerns of people of the Global South and the sources of their insecurity, a focus arguably reflective of the interests of the UNDP in addressing global poverty and inequality. Second, human security is interdependent, meaning that human insecurities derive from both the local environment as well as across international borders and can have global implications. The third characteristic of human security, the imperative of prevention, argues for the necessity to implement measures such as primary health care for example, so that insecurities are less likely to arise. The fourth characteristic of human security is that it is ‘people-centred’, which, given the increased dominance of the state-based security concept during the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, made human security quite revolutionary (UNDP 1994; Breslin and Christou 2015). The definition of human security has often been referred to as ‘freedom from fear and freedom from want’ (Winslow and Eriksen 2004). This phrase was popularized by US President Roosevelt in his 1941 State of the Union address. The UNDP report reinvigorated it as encompassing the ‘two major components of human security’ (1994: 24). This characterization has been criticized for being either too vague or too all-encompassing – everything in life becomes a potential human security issue
- or a ‘shopping list’ of a wide range of otherwise disconnected issues (Krause 2004). The 1994 UNDP report further defined seven main categories of threats against human security: political, personal, food, health, environment, economic and community security (see Box 15.1). The categories identified in Box 15.1 provide more narrow foci within which one can identify human insecurity, but they are also interconnected. Poverty, youth unemployment, general population unemployment, and temporary or contract work all fall under economic security issues; however, they simultaneously closely impact health security, including access to general health care, maternal health care services, clean water and food sources and affordable medicines. Environmental security focuses on clean water resources, access to energy and food resources (and their sustainability and manageability), air pollution and natural disasters, all of which affect economic, food and health security. The political and community security categories serve to recognize that the ways in which we organize and create order in society can have an impact on individual security. Community security focuses on the role of ethnicity and cultural traditions that can impact individuals positively (providing a sense of identity and belonging to a community) or negatively (where persecution and discrimination on the basis of gender, sexuality, race, or religion, for example, continues). Political security, mean- while, acknowledges the role of the state as a potential threat to human security. The absence or violation of human rights owing to oppressive or dictatorial regimes,
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BOX 15.1 The UN Development Programme’s categories of human
security
Source: UNDP 1994: 25–
Economic security : economic security is defined as an assured income, preferably through paid work, but also includes (in the last resort) public safety net measures ensuring income to those who are unable to obtain an income. Food security : food security concerns adequate access to food, both physically and economically. Some (see Box 15.2) note that food security is also about getting access to those foods that are important to culture, health, and well-being. Health security : health security entails access to health care and protection against diseases: infectious and parasitic diseases linked to malnutrition and environmental degradation (including pollution), and also those diseases linked to lifestyles (such as circulatory diseases or cancer). Environmental security : human well-being is intricately linked to the condition of the environment. Deforestation, overgrazing and poor conservation methods lead to environmental degradation such as desertification where the land can no longer support communities. Climate change has emerged as a central human security concern in recent years. Personal security : personal security addresses threats from physical violence including threats from the state (including torture), from other states (war) and from other groups of people (ethnic tension), as well as violence stemming from crime, gendered violence or threats against women, threats against children and threats against oneself (suicide). Community security : community security addresses the security individuals get within a group, establishing a sense of belonging and identity rooted in shared values. Political security : political security affords individuals the freedom to be governed in a way that respects basic human rights, protected by democratic institutions in which individuals are given a voice. Control over information and media, physical repression by militaries, and threat of prison or detainment (or worse) during political protests are all examples of political insecurity.
restrictions on ideas and/or information-sharing, and lack of democratic political processes are identified as signs of political insecurity, which in their worst form can lead to violence against individuals by the state. This example serves as a reminder of the rationale for human security: while states exist to provide for the security of their populations under the social contract, many are not only failing to perform this role but represent a source of threat to the very people they claim to protect.
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that ‘people are the most active participants in determining their well-being’ (CHS 2003: 4). They are security actors in their own right, able to ‘meet their own essential needs and to earn their own living’ (UNDP 1994: 24). As such, we can say human security
is achieved when individuals and/or multiple actors have the freedom to identify risks and threats to their well-being and values... the opportunity to articulate these threats to other actors, and the capacity to determine ways to end, mitigate or adapt to those risks and threats either individually or in concert with other actors. (Hoogensen Gjørv et al. 2016: 186)
The concept of human security thus draws attention to security dynamics at the level of civilians or non-state actors. Understanding the needs and capacities of persons, and how they understand and manage their security needs, is crucial for both academics and policymakers. Scholars exploring potential theoretical avenues in human security are increasingly aware that people, and in particular marginal- ized women, ethnic minorities and the poor, for example, need to be included in any lens that helps us understand security from the local to the global levels. Policy- makers need to be aware of how their decisions may decrease human security or work against the initiatives of other, non-state security actors operating in the same environment. As discussed in the next section, the ideas behind ‘human’ security have been a part of the debate about definitions of security throughout the history of Western political thought.
z A brief history of human security
The concept of ‘human’ security has its roots in the concept of security in general. The distinctions between ‘human’ or ‘state’ security, for example, are historically contingent, reflecting the values of those who have the power to define security at a given time. At its core, the concept of security is about reducing or eliminating fear. The work of Cicero (106–43 BCE ) is frequently taken as the departure point for our understanding of the concept of security. Cicero coined the word ‘securitas’ to reflect a state of calm undisturbed by passions including fear, anger and anxiety (Liotta and Owen 2006; Hamilton, J. 2013). The concept also included the acknowledgement that without security one was ‘incapable’ (Hamilton, J. 2013: 62). This implies that the condition of security ensures that the individual has the capacity to pursue tasks and ambitions without fear (or, at least, with as little fear as possible). The concept was grounded in the condition of the individual, though Cicero recognized its relevance for larger political communities (Hamilton, J. 2013). Even after the creation of states within Europe through the Peace of Westphalia (1648), Western political philosophers, including Thomas Hobbes, Jeremy Bentham and Adam Smith, continued to theorize security from the standpoint of the individual, focusing on the tensions and responsibilities for security between the individual and the state (Rothschild 1995; Hoogensen 2005).
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It was arguably not until the Napoleonic wars of the early nineteenth century that the central referent object of security – the individual – was replaced by the state (Rothschild 1995). In this vision of security, as long as the state was secure it was assumed that human beings were also secure via a form of ‘trickle-down’ security (Hoogensen and Rottem 2004). Throughout the twentieth century, the idea of the state as the sole security actor became increasingly prevalent, especially during the Cold War. However, attempts to widen and deepen the concept of security continued throughout this period, with the focus broadening, for example, to include environ- mental issues and a vision for society/nation as opposed to solely security for the state (Buzan 1983; Ullman 1983). By the early 1990s, the security of the individual was reintroduced through the concept of human security. The dominance of the state as the referent object and agent of security remains today, and is even referred to as ‘traditional’ or ‘classical’ security. Human security, however, challenges the state’s privileged position. Analytically, the human security concept demonstrates that there is nothing about security (its origins or contemporary usage) that necessitates a focus on states and precludes a focus on individuals. Rather, the focus reflects a particular choice made by the analyst or the practitioner, rather than the essential meaning of security. This view shares some common ground with constructivist approaches (see Chapter 3) and the securitization framework (see Chapter 7). The concept of security has thus always allowed for diverse and multiple actors, or multiple referent objects. But it has often reflected the interests of those who have the power to define it. It embodies a competition of values: which values should be prioritized and who decides (Hoogensen and Rottem 2004; Wibben 2008)?
z Human security: the role of states?
If one issue, beyond the lack of a universally recognized definition, has consistently raised challenges and questions concerning human security, it is the question of the role of the state. The human security concept is clear about the need to reorient towards the individual as a security referent. It is also clear that individuals as well as states are recognized as providers of security, at least in principle. What has been less clear, however, is how the provision of security is operationalized. How are freedom from fear and freedom from want secured, and by whom? Operationalizing human security is important not just because of the practical need to know ‘who does what?’ in creating and/or maintaining security, but because it also speaks to who decides which human security issues need attention. The question about the role of the state thus implies an additional question regarding where the power behind the concept lies. Can the concept be revolutionary if it is operationalized primarily by states? Is the concept an empowering tool for non-state actors, or have states co-opted it for their own devices, including using it as justification for military intervention? While individuals clearly have a role in providing their own security within the concept and practice of human security, there are many instances in which individual action is insufficient – responding to interstate violence, structural threats or issues requiring transnational cooperation, for example. States are powerful actors in the
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provider, Chandler criticized the human security agenda for becoming another tool of the state. Like Bellamy and McDonald had stated six years earlier, little systemic reflection and change occurs when state actors continue to dominate security discourse and practice, as well as the provision of security.
z Human security: from state-dominated to critical approaches?
Instead of giving up on human security – and indeed the state as a provider of security – a critical academic approach can be pursued that engages with policy but which promotes a greater consideration of the structural dimensions of deprivation and insecurity. Human security must be used to interrogate and problematize the values and institutions which currently exist as they relate to human welfare and more thoroughly question the interests that are served by these institutions. (Newman 2016: 1179)
At first glance, it may appear that the debate has been stuck in a holding pattern between those who see the state as an adequate, and still primary, human security provider, and those who are looking for a more critical approach to security. Taylor Owen’s response to Chandler’s 2008 critique noted that the human security agenda, rather than exaggerating new threats, made existing threats and vulnerabilities more visible since the end of the Cold War, including the impacts of disease and extreme poverty and ‘dire human development conditions’ (Owen 2008: 447). He further argued that the policy focus on the Global South was driven by the fact that ‘those that are dying in the greatest numbers’ were located there (Owen 2008: 448). David Ambrosetti added that integrating a new security approach into established bureaucracies such as the UN and its member states required time for it to be amenable to state-based interests and to be considered legitimate by certain ‘audiences’ within the international system (2008: 442). From this vantage point, it might be concluded that the human security agenda has no other option than to be integrated, if not co-opted, into the state system. Annick Wibben agreed with Chandler’s critique of the lack of critical engagement within the human security concept, but she saw the potential for an opening that would give non-state actors a much larger role and stronger relevance (Wibben 2008). Have debate and progress regarding human security stagnated? One analysis claimed that human security was of little interest to the international community, arguing that the term human security had ‘all but vanished’ from UN documents (Martin and Owen 2010: 211). The authors noted that a report from UN Secretary- General Kofi Annan’s High-Level Panel on Threats, Challenges and Change, titled A More Secure World: Our Shared Responsibility (UN General Assembly 2004), employed the concept of human security but almost always as a complement to state security. They also noted that in the 2005 Secretary-General’s report In Larger Freedom: Towards Development, Security, and Human Rights for All (UN General Assembly 2005a) human security was not mentioned at all, though the components of ‘freedom from fear’ and ‘freedom from want’ played a central, defining role in the document.
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Contrary to the argument that the human security concept was largely dying out, however, it was again highlighted in the UN’s 2005 World Summit Outcome , a document that provided the definition of human security for the UN Trust Fund for Human Security (UNTFHS). The UNTFHS finances UN organizations to carry out projects and activities that promote human security, including rebuilding war- torn communities, supporting people after natural disasters and events causing extreme poverty, addressing human trafficking and other activities, amounting to 210 projects by 2013 (Human Security Unit 2014). The intentions and operating definitions of human security have thus continued to stimulate debate and develop at the UN level, including in reports from the Secretary-General and in General Assembly resolutions. The UN General Assembly has continued to work on an effective and operational human security concept, and its 2012 resolution plays a central role in the defini- tion of human security for the UNTFHS Strategic Plan 2014–2017 (UN General Assembly 2012; Human Security Unit 2014). Though sceptical about the UN’s operationalization of the concept, Martin and Owen (2010) remained cautiously optimistic about the EU’s incorporation of the concept into its security policy, as long as the concept and intent stayed clear. NATO’s comprehensive approach to civil–military operations, meanwhile, has reflected human security perspectives (Weller 2014), and the concept has continued to be considered relevant, though controversial to NATO antiterrorism efforts (Kfir 2015). Finally, the IPCC (the official international scientific body whose assessments inform the UNFCCC climate negotiations) included a chapter on the human security implications of climate change in its 2014 impact assessment report (IPCC 2014). It can thus be concluded that the human security concept is still active within leading international institutions and, by association, to the states that are members of them. All this may just prove Chandler’s point, that human security is nothing more than a tool to further state and international agendas. However, as Newman (2016) argued, it is imperative that critical human security perspectives develop simul- taneously, informing and pushing institutional approaches towards changing harmful state and global structures that contribute to human insecurity. Wibben (2008: 457) noted that critical security studies (CSS) itself (and not just human security) could be subjected to Chandler’s critique, where CSS scholars ‘have been careful not to divert too much from a traditional security framework’. Wibben, however, has encouraged human security scholars to challenge ontological and epistemological assumptions – in other words, she has urged them to outright challenge the politics of security (2008: 460). These challenges were already reflected in the debates referred to above, where the potential of a revolutionary, non-state-centric security concept instead became a Western-centric and state co-opted conception of security (see Bellamy and McDonald 2002; Chandler 2008). Human security policies, largely from northern states such as Canada and Norway, were criticized for perpetuating ahistorical claims that assumed that ‘strong states provide better security’ (Wibben 2011: 70; see also Tadjbakhsh and Chenoy 2007). Not only was the Global North assumed to be composed of ‘strong’ states that successfully addressed their own human security issues and that could assist the perceived insecure Global South, but ‘securing’ the
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BOX 15.2 Human security in the Arctic
While a human security lens is most often applied to contexts of the Global South, dynamics in the Arctic region also serve to illustrate the utility of a human security perspective. Until very recently, there has been a marked increase in proposed activities regarding energy and mineral resource development in the Arctic region. Even with the current downturn in prices for oil and gas, and the recent UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) COP 21 Paris Agreement, many analysts claim that oil and gas (particularly in the Arctic) will still have a role to play in global economies and politics, not least replacing dependencies on coal (Topdahl and Stokka 2015). The tensions between economic security, energy needs and energy security, and environmental security have thus been heightened within the context of increasing global attention to and scrutiny over extractive indus- tries and their potential impact on global climate change, habitat degradation, community health and welfare, and apprehensions regarding offshore drilling that powerfully resurfaced in the aftermath of the 2010 Gulf of Mexico oil spill. Environmental impacts of continued oil and gas exploration in the Arctic thus have implications globally, but also locally, where climate change and environ- mental contamination of territories occupied by Indigenous peoples impact food and health security, as well as the ability of Indigenous communities to continue traditional economic and social activities such as hunting marine mammals (whale, seal) and reindeer herding (Huntington et al. 2016; Stammler and Ivanova 2017). At the same time, however, the reduction or elimination of oil and gas development in the Arctic has profound impacts on the economic security of regions that have become reliant on these extractive industries as a promised or actual primary source of income and way out of poverty, including the Murmansk region in north-west Russia (Lvova forthcoming). Human insecurities in the Arctic provide important case studies for understanding the contextualized, at times competing, and complex nature of human security.
as an institutionalized strategy of warfare and/or from the gendered roots of war itself. In other words, regardless of the way traditional approaches to security position the state as the exclusive security provider, in practice states have never been the only ‘security’ providers, particularly where human security is concerned (Kaldor 2006). Government officials, politicians and military leaders are not always the leading actors in providing security or identifying threats, nor do they need to intervene at all levels of human insecurity. They can, however, act as important conduits for knowledge between communities and actors, and they have the capacity to respond to human insecurities when communities can no longer effectively confront threats on their own (Soderlund et al. 2008).
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z Conclusion
The concept of human security will continue to be a part of the broader debate on security for the foreseeable future. It has staying power within many global institutions, including the UN, EU and NATO. Though operationalizing the concept still strongly reflects state interests, they have also slowly but surely begun to reflect an increasing awareness of the ways in which institutions and states cause human insecurity (see the women, peace and security agenda, for example, discussed in Chapter 34). Human security is a complex concept that will continue to play an integral role in the history of security studies as a whole. It continues to be subject to debate regarding whether or not it has been co-opted by the state, which uses humanitarian rhetoric to perpetuate measures and policies that in fact may not be conducive to the security of individuals, or whether it is indeed a revolutionary and radical concept that opens up the security debate to bring marginalized voices into the security conversation. It is safe to say that, at this stage, it is both. Critical approaches to human security have exposed activities and processes taking place on the ground, where individuals are constantly creating spaces of security that are often fragile but in constant development. Local efforts made by women and men according to varying capacities can be influential not only to their security but to perceptions of security beyond the individual and community levels. Sometimes, the powers behind competing geopolitical interests also understand that local community perceptions and experiences of security can be decisive for their own purposes. The lessons learned thus far are that human security perspectives emanating from individuals and communities, from the bottom up, are not irrelevant to so-called traditional or state security priorities articulated by governments. Particularly in situations where state authorities are weak, fragile or virtually non- existent, the relevance of community needs and interests can be crucial to strengthening security at multiple levels.
Further reading
J. Peter Burgess and Taylor Owen (eds), ‘Special Section on Human Security’, Security Dialogue , 35(3) (2004): 345–71. Provides insights and critiques by leading security studies scholars about the value and potential of human security. Commission on Human Security, Human Security Now (CHS 2003). The Japanese-led and UN-sanctioned commission to further pursue a definition of human security that could serve UN policies. Lorraine Elliot, ‘Human Security/Environmental Security’, Contemporary Politics , 21(1) (2015): 11–24. Discusses intersections between human security and developments in other areas of security such as environmental security. Gunhild Hoogensen and Kirsti Stuvøy, ‘Human Security, Gender and Resistance’, Security Dialogue , 37(2) (2006): 207–28. A response to the 2004 Security Dialogue special section on human security, it demonstrated the benefits for human security research in drawing on gender and feminist security studies research. United Nations Development Programme (UNDP), Human Development Report 1994 (UN, 1994). The original report, which served as the foundation for much of the subsequent human security debate.
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