The Extension of the Concept of Security

Abstract

The classical view of security as relating to nation states and the protection of their territory still lies at the heart of thinking about national and international security. Defence in the sense of national defence is a key task of the nation state and for centuries the sovereignty of states has formed the basis of the international legal order. Today, however, security encompasses more than protecting the state’s territory against military aggression by another state, as is illustrated in Fig. 2.1.

2.1 Security: A Tricky Concept

The classical view of security as relating to nation states and the protection of their territory still lies at the heart of thinking about national and international security. Defence in the sense of national defence is a key task of the nation state and for centuries the sovereignty of states has formed the basis of the international legal order. Today, however, security encompasses more than protecting the state’s territory against military aggression by another state, as is illustrated in Fig. 2.1.

Fig. 2.1

Dimensions of security. (Source: DAASE 2013: 13)

With globalisation and the emergence of new economic powers, for example, the relationship between economic and military security has become a far more prominent issue. In an interconnected world, flow security – safeguarding global flows of goods and services, infrastructural hubs and systems – is of the utmost importance. In a world of transnational connections, protecting national territory against hostile armies is not enough.

Moreover, since the 1980s, and to an even greater extent since the end of the Cold War, there has been a significant increase in concern for human rights and for economic and social development (human security). After all, physical violence is partially explained by the structural violence as a result of disadvantaged social circumstances. National and international security are therefore linked to the security of the society and the individual. The security of the nation state is not a goal in itself, but is for the benefit of the society.

Particularly since 11 September 2001, the blurring of the boundaries between internal and external security has also entered the debate about security policy¹ with the realisation that non-state actors such as Al Qaida and Da’esh have come to form part of the landscape of security and insecurity. The sovereignty of states over their own territory only offers limited protection against transnational networks of this type. An adequate geographic concept of security encompasses both the territories defined by individual states and the networks that transcend the borders between states. It therefore is possible to place international relations in a spatial perspective, provided that, in addition to national territories (protected by the internationally recognised right of self-determination), this perspective embraces transnational connections in which non-state actors also play a major role. Transnational issues such as migration, terrorism and climate change also mean that security is increasingly a matter for regional and international communities of states, such as the eu and nato. Dutch security policy is part of European and North Atlantic security policy, although that does not mean that the Netherlands cannot set its own priorities within the security strategies of these alliances.

How the notion of threat is interpreted has also expanded. Security policy is no longer geared solely to the specific, known threat of armed aggression by another state. Nowadays, it also encompasses anticipation of diffuse, potential threats. The rise of risk governance² is part of a trend towards ‘securitisation’, by which we mean the enormous increase in recent years in concern for security, both in the sense of a desired situation and in the sense of policy or other activities aimed at achieving it,³ as already mentioned in the introduction. Diffuse vulnerabilities and risks – and the associated emotions and feelings of insecurity – can in fact give rise to conduct that in itself becomes a factor in creating insecurity.

In other words, the meaning of national and international security has changed radically. In 2017, security refers to multiple substantive domains, reference objects, levels of geographic scale and interpretations of danger. Every dimension of the concept of security has expanded ‘beyond’ the classical view of security as it relates to nation states and the military protection of their territory. But that expansion is not a linear process proceeding step-by-step in a fixed sequence, but also has a non-linear dynamic. For example, the bipolar Cold War was followed by a unipolar world order, in which issues such as human security and the importance of multilateral institutions gained wider recognition, at least in many Western countries. But with the relative decline in the power of the West and the emergence of the brics countries – accelerated by recent developments in the belt of instability around Europe and the election of Donald Trump as president of the United States – a multipolar order now seems to be emerging in which the (collective) military defence of territorial integrity is once more growing in importance. Traditional power politics or geopolitics seem to have returned (if indeed they ever went away).⁴

In the following Sects. (2.2, 2.3, 2.4, and 2.5) we explain the concept of extended security against the background of historical developments in the second half of the twentieth century until the present day. The extension of the concept of security presents significant challenges for the government’s security policy (Sect. 2.6).

2.2 The Substantive Dimension

The substantive dimension of security relates to the question: in which specific domains are security threats actually being observed? It concerns the type of security that security policy has to guarantee. Whereas military threats dominated the security discourse in the 1950s and 1960s, economic, ecological and humanitarian issues have come to the forefront in the succeeding decades.

In addition to the ‘realistic’ view, in which military threats to the state’s security are central – and which is characteristic of the period after the Second World War and the Cold War − since the oil crises in the 1970s there has been a growing awareness of a new threat: in an economically integrated world, economic security is at least as important as military security. Later, with the publication of the Brundtland Report in 1987, ecological threats to security came to prominence. Nowadays, we speak mainly of the threat to ‘planetary security’ from the consequences of climate change. After the Cold War, the concept of security expanded further with the attention for ‘human security’ and human rights, although in the decade since 2008 (the year of Russia’s war with Georgia against the background of the prospect of nato membership for Georgia) traditional considerations of power politics have again come to the forefront.

2.2.1 Economic Security

In the 1950s and 1960s, international security policy was primarily concerned with protecting the security and sovereignty of the nation state against external military threats. Unlike military security, the term economic security was not yet in common usage. In the literature on international relations, economic security was usually narrowly defined as a country’s capacity to ensure it has sufficient economic resources to sustain its own security, military or otherwise.⁵

The interest in the economic security of states received a substantial boost with the oil crises in the 1970s and the pursuit of strategic trade policy by emerging powers from the 1980s. These trends made it clear that imports of energy and strategic commodities and the general stability of the global trading system represent crucial interests.⁶ Some experts argued that military, economic and political instruments should be incorporated into a more integrated approach to security, including a strategic policy on raw materials. In the us, the two oil crises led to a securitisation and militarisation of the country’s policy towards raw materials. The Carter Doctrine (1980) made it clear that the us would use military means to safeguard its own national and international economic interests, not only in the Middle East but also elsewhere.⁷ Globalisation and the rise of new economic powers gave a further impulse to the integration of economic and military security. The interconnectedness of global production chains means that severe disruptions of those chains occur more frequently, with the accompanying risks of cascade effects. A well-known example is the disruption of the global supply chain that occurred after the earthquake and tsunami in Japan in 2011. The event badly affected production at Toyota and Honda, but major economic ‘aftershocks’ were also felt elsewhere in Asia and in Europe and the us. Similar cascade effects with interruption of industrial production occurred after the eruption of the volcano in Iceland in 2009.⁸ The vulnerability of global production chains lies mainly in the fact that the production of key components is concentrated in a small number of locations.^9,10 Emerging economies with only modest financial buffers are particularly vulnerable to this type of disruption, particularly if they are dependent on just a few sectors or activities.

Figure 2.2 gives an indication of the importance of economic security on the basis of the multilingual MetaFore Approach used by The Hague Centre for Strategic Studies (hcss). The figure contains the number of times and the frequency with which different economic aspects of security appear in hundreds of reports on security in the different language regions. Because a large proportion of international trade in industrial products consists of semi-manufactures, countries have become more dependent on one another. The end product consists of many components sourced from numerous locations and sometimes a product is exported and imported again several times before reaching its final stage. A notable finding is the large number of references in non-Western reports. The availability of water is naturally an important subject in the Arab world, while the financial system plays an important role in the Western sources.

Fig. 2.2

References to ‘security’. (Source: The Hague Centre for Strategic Studies, Strategic Monitor 2016 The Wheel of Fortune,2016: 160–161)

Economic security has been gaining in prominence in the last few decades and a broad definition of the term encompasses security in the domains of cyberspace, maritime affairs, raw materials, energy, food and ecology. So-called ‘non-traditional’, more comprehensive security studies focus predominantly on these themes.

The challenges connected with the increased interconnectedness and transnational spill-over effects are also sometimes clustered under the title of flow security, a term that was coined in 1972 by the economist Michael Adelman in the context of the vulnerability of the American oil supply during the first oil crisis.¹¹ The term flow security expresses the reverse of territorial security. Although initially the concept did not really catch on, about 10 years later it was also being used in relation to the electricity network and electronic data traffic. Flow security is essentially concerned with the risk of supply being threatened by an interruption at a certain point in the chain. In the case of consumer goods, investments, money, (digital) information, tourists and employees, it relates to functional systems that have consciously been created to meet specific needs of society. However, there are also systems with flows that are undesirable or have negative consequences, such as irregular migration, drug trafficking and crime.

Flow security encompasses the capacity to prevent undesirable flows (or interruptions to essential flows) or to deal with them in an acceptable manner by mitigating their negative effects. There are two major challenges in addressing flow security. First, investments in the infrastructure must be sustained in order to prevent blockages, leaks, loss of quality, contamination, etc. in the channels and hubs used by the flows. Second, and by extension to the first, flow security requires that all the actors involved in the system possess the capacity to anticipate and adapt − for example, the ability to deal with internal system failures that interrupt supply or with damage caused by actors or influences external to the system. Another example is the management of a global public good like cyberspace. Cyber security is high on the agenda of a growing number of countries and companies because of the growing frequency with which they are subjected to digital attacks, espionage and other forms of cyber crime.¹² Furthermore, they increasingly regard the Internet itself, its infrastructure and central protocols, as a legitimate instrument for promoting their own strategic interests. This is usually at the expense of the public core of the Internet.¹³ The security of the physical infrastructure on the seabed that keeps this virtual world intact, is equally crucial. Approximately 95% of all intercontinental communication depends on the 600,000 miles of submarine fibre optic cable and some 24 cable landing points. An attack on this infrastructure could cause enormous damage for the global economy because of the total reliance of worldwide electronic data traffic on it.¹⁴

2.2.2 Ecological Security

The Brundtland Report already drew attention to the security aspects of environmental problems in 1987. More recently, climate change has pushed the ecological threats to security higher up the political agenda. With the focus on the potential for climate change to cause conflicts, the concept of security has expanded once again.

The economic growth of countries in Asia, the Pacific region, Latin America and Africa, the worldwide population growth and the rise of a global urban middle class are driving an enormous increase in demand for energy, water, food, minerals, land and other natural resources.¹⁵ Safeguarding a steady supply of energy, being able to cope with price fluctuations and reducing vulnerabilities by diversifying and making the transition to renewable energy sources are urgent challenges, especially in light of the persistent crises in the Middle East and North Africa and the tensions with Russia.¹⁶ The Atlantic Basin is likely to become increasingly important because roughly 60% of the increase in oil production until 2030 will come from there. Estimates suggest that the international trade in energy will have doubled by around 2050 and increasingly involve liquid gas rather than oil. Furthermore, raw materials extraction and the trade routes in the Arctic region will grow in importance because of climate change. Some even argue that the Bering Sea will become a formidable competitor of the Panama Canal for the transport of energy.¹⁷

These trends will also further increase the migration potential in the world, with more of the people concerned coming from unstable and weak states confronted with protracted internal and regional conflicts, as is now the case in Syria, Iraq, Afghanistan and Libya, or with combinations of conflict, drought and scarcity of raw materials and food, as in Yemen and some Sahel countries. The oecd forecasts that by around 2030 almost half of the world’s population will be confronted with the negative effects of the rising sea level and that this will cause more people to seek their fortune elsewhere.¹⁸ Unless mankind takes effective action against climate change, the un High Commissioner for Refugees has estimated that between 250 million and 1 billion people will be forced to leave their own countries over the next 50 years. The poorest and most vulnerable groups in the developing countries of Africa and South and East Asia, and some small island states, will be hardest hit. This explains why climate security is high on the research and policy agendas of many governments, companies and international organisations.¹⁹ Although recent developments in biotechnology offer possibilities for improving food production, breakthroughs in gene technology could also pose a threat because they facilitate new forms of warfare, for example by allowing the genetic composition of organisms to be quickly altered using so-called gene-drive technology to give them properties that are harmful to humans (Trendanalyse biotechnologie 2016 [Analysis of Trends in Biotechnology 2016]).

2.2.3 Human Security

After the end of the East-West conflict, attention shifted to conflicts within societies and to the security of social groups and individuals. The concern for protecting people in safe zones in crisis situations, and more generally protecting basic human rights, once again created a new domain in the security discourse: human security. Nevertheless, the thinking in terms of humanitarian security has been under pressure in recent years due to the relative waning of the power of the West. There seems to be greater reluctance to carry out stabilisation operations with a humanitarian goal.

Central to the concept of human security is the protection, freedom and development of individuals in society²⁰ and therefore closely related to a full realization of human rights. In the 1990s, humanitarian disasters in Somalia, Rwanda and Bosnia and the civil war in Kosovo fuelled the debate about whether the international community, and the un in particular, had done enough to prevent those serious crimes against international law and human tragedies or at least end them sooner.

The concept of human security embodies the post-1990 thinking about development issues. It initially comprised two different, partially competing schools of thought.²¹ The first advocated the ending of the arms race and the use of the money spent on defence for development purposes. After all, poverty and economic hardship form a breeding ground for violence in a number of regions. Structural development aid could ultimately remove this root cause of violence. This appeal was later fleshed out in the Human Development Report 1994, which described human security as “… concerned with how people live and breathe in society, how freely they exercise their many choices, how much access they have to markets and social opportunities – and whether they live in conflict or peace”.^22,23 Such a fairly comprehensive interpretation of human security – which was adopted by the Japanese government, among others – has been described as an approach aimed at creating a society that is free from fear and provides adequate social security.²⁴ In this approach, attention is devoted both to addressing chronic problems like hunger, disease and oppression and to providing protection in conflict situations and crises.

The second school of thought – which is propagated by the Canadian government, among others – narrowed the concept of human security, partly for pragmatic reasons, to the protection of individuals against direct physical violence. In practice, this translated into diplomatic efforts and humanitarian interventions to tackle violent conflicts and violations of human rights.²⁵ The so-called Brahimi Report (Report of the Panel on United Nations Peace Operations 2000) called for greater coherence in the actions of various un organisations during peacekeeping operations and introduced the concept of ‘protection of civilians’. In the report of the International Commission on Intervention and State Sovereignty in 2001 and in a later amendment passed during the United Nations World Summit in 2005, this reasoning was fleshed out into the concept of Responsibility to Protect (R2P), which enunciates the principle that every actor – whether it is a state or an international organisation like the un – is obliged to protect the civilian population, by military means if necessary, against ‘genocide, war crimes, ethnic cleansing and crimes against humanity’ if the state where the atrocities are taking place fails to do so.^26,27 This interventionist element of human security was severely criticised by countries in Asia and Latin America, as well as by the us and Russia. They saw it as an infringement of the principle of non-intervention. The southern countries, in particular, regard it as legitimising military interventions by strong states in weaker states on the basis of their national interests.²⁸ Furthermore, R2P goes further than the original right of humanitarian intervention by referring to the responsibility to intervene. According to these countries, this would significantly lower the threshold for military interventions (Box 2.1).^29,30

Box 2.1: Human Security in the UN and the EU

In formulating the Millennium Objectives in 2000, the un tried to codify human security and make it quantifiable. In 2012, the un General Assembly adopted a resolution based on a broad definition of human security as ‘freedom from fear, freedom from want and freedom from indignity’. Human security is an approach that can help the member states to address the broad challenges to ‘the survival, livelihood and dignity of their people’.³¹ The ‘human security’ approach also resonates in the Sustainable Development Goals (sdgs) that the un adopted in 2015.

At eu level, human security is closely connected with the efforts by the former High Representative for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy Javier Solana to give the eu – with the war in Iraq fresh in the mind – a stronger, more international and above all multilateral role in security that differed explicitly from America’s unilateralism. The European Security Strategy (2003) did not mention human security, but did expressly state that military responses alone are no longer sufficient in light of the new challenges facing the international community and that there was a need for a comprehensive approach with a balance between civil and military efforts. The so-called Barcelona Report in 2004, A human security doctrine for Europe, elaborated on this and proposed the creation of a 15,000-strong human security response force.³² This was followed by the report entitled A European way of security (2007), in which the human-rights dimension of human security assumed an important position.³³

The Global Strategy on the eu’s Foreign and Security Policy (June 2016) was drafted in a drastically altered geopolitical and security context. In it, the eu chose for ‘principled pragmatism’ as the guiding principle of the eu’s external action. Human security, and an integrated approach to conflicts and crises derived from it, is one of the five priority areas. In this context, ‘integrated’ refers to the use of all the policy instruments at the eu’s disposal, but also to action in every phase of the cycle of conflict and at various levels of governance and with various partners.³⁴

The adoption of r2p at the un’s World Summit in 2005 was welcomed by its proponents as a victory for human security and a humanisation of the international legal order.³⁵ But there was also criticism. The first objection was that the securitisation of development and human rights can all too easily end in military interventions and ‘just war’,³⁶ which could actually reinforce the insecurity (or feeling of insecurity) of citizens and bring the un’s human-rights regime into discredit in regions and among population groups that are on the ‘receiving end’ of such actions. One example is the American ‘war on terror’ in Afghanistan and Iraq in the wake of the attacks on 11 September 2001, which was accompanied by grave violations of human rights and created new breeding grounds for regional instability and insecurity.

That leads on to the second fundamental criticism, namely that up to now human security has been used mainly in the context of North-South relations, for interventions and stabilisation and crisis operations in weaker or fragile states. Consequently, the human-security discourse is said to primarily strengthen the existing, Western-dominated power structures in the international order. The claim that human security is a universal challenge then loses cogency.³⁷

The different approaches to human security have meanwhile converged somewhat in the policy discourse of the un, the World Bank, the eu, nato and the Organisation for Security and Cooperation in Europe (osce), but also of many nation states including the Netherlands.³⁸ This has two major consequences. The first is that human security has greater potential than formerly to function as a corrective of a narrow state perspective when the classical social contract between state and citizens is under pressure and the protection of human rights demands urgent attention.³⁹ The second consequence is that human security is nowadays given a broader and more inclusive interpretation within these international organisations. As a result, the needs and wants of ordinary citizens can also be spotlighted. There is also greater attention to the underlying causes, and hence for a preventive, integrated approach to tackling violence, insecurity and instability. In short, human security has drawn development and humanitarian issues into the traditional domain of state security, but also brought security into the domain of non-state actors in the field of development and humanitarian aid.⁴⁰ Accordingly, the United Nations Organization has accepted the view that a human security approach is indispensable to accelerate progress on the Sustainable Development Goals.⁴¹ The 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development lists Sustainable Development Goals. The 16th of these goals in particular – on ‘peace, justice and strong institutions’ – is plainly related to the overreaching aim of international peace.

2.3 The Reference Dimension

The reference dimension of the concept of security turns on the question of whose security must be guaranteed: the nation state’s, the society’s or the individual’s. Here too we see an extension of the concept of security beyond the state as the referent object of security policy.

2.3.1 From State Security to Social and Individual Security

The realistic school of thought on security is state-centric: the priority is the security of the nation state. The security interests of other referent objects (specific groups or individuals) are deemed to coincide with that. Critics of the realistic tradition in international relations have pointed out that it is in fact generally states that threaten the security of non-state actors and individuals. Particularly after the end of the Cold War, a view of security emerged that gave more weight to social development and individual human rights.⁴² The concept of security then centres not only on physical and inter-state violence, but touches on other types of threats to communities and individuals.

At the height of the Cold War, there was a large degree of consensus between the state and the people in the West. In return for protection against the (nuclear) threat from the Eastern Bloc and protection of their personal liberties, citizens gave their loyalty to the authority and the monopoly on the use of force of their nation state. When political leaders lose sight of this crucial dimension of the relationship, security policy becomes cynical realpolitik and the interests of the state come to dominate exclusively.⁴³ As we saw in the preceding paragraph on human security, a functioning state is necessary for the security of the population, but a (failing) state can also endanger the security and development potential of its own citizens. Accordingly, the referent object of security – at least in Western democracies – shifts from the state to the society and the individual. In that context, ‘societal resilience’ is a theme that is receiving growing attention.⁴⁴

The extension of the referent object means that the traditional role of international law in promoting and guaranteeing peace and security also needs to be expanded. Terrorist crimes by non-state actors fall under international or national criminal law, while it is generally accepted that international humanitarian law also applies to national conflicts between combatants that cannot sign up to the Geneva Conventions. However, the broader sources of international security are not confined to restricting methods of warfare and prohibiting wars of aggression. Far more attention and resources need to be devoted to the human rights laid down in the Vienna Declaration of 1993 if they are to be genuinely relevant for removing and preventing (feelings of) deprivation and creating the prospect of a meaningful life. In the Near East a new large-scale military intervention would further exacerbate the feelings of frustration, especially if it was again followed by further chaos – as previously in Iraq and in Libya – after a political revolution. Longer-term stability calls for a deeper engagement with social and economic development. The Advisory Council on International Affairs (aiv)^45,46 referred to this in a advisory report on security and stability in Northern Africa: “The aiv encourages the government to tackle underlying causes. Africa’s rapid population growth requires paying attention to the complete range of human rights described in the Vienna Declaration. Serious deficits in the observance of fundamental rights to education, healthcare and economic development severely exacerbate the problems described in this book, and it is essential to address these negative developments in the preventive approach that the aiv considers necessary in Northern Africa”.⁴⁷ Hence the following recommendation by the aiv with regard to eu policy: “The eu member states should make promoting stability and security - and human security in particular - in Northern Africa one of the main aims of European foreign and security policy in the coming period, together with responsible economic development, political reform and respect for universal human rights”.⁴⁸

2.4 The Geographical Dimension

The geographical dimension of the concept of security determines the levels of geographic scale to which security policy applies. Is it the territory of a state, based on the idea that domestic and foreign policy are strictly separate and that the limits of the state coincide (or should coincide) with the borders of the society? This defensive ‘container model’ of security has been inadequate for a long time. The expansion of the geographical dimension has drawn more attention to regional, international and global security complexes, in which states are so interconnected that their national security cannot be considered separately from the security of other states.⁴⁹ Security is then no longer a hallmark of a national territory, but a relational, inter-state concept. Moreover, security and insecurity are manifested more than ever in networks of non-state actors which cannot be classified as ‘internal’ or ‘external’, as international terrorism consistently demonstrates. Regional, international and global interrelationships demand investment in collective security and supranational alliances.

Security has a particular geographic or territorial connotation. Article 8bis of the Statute of the International Criminal Court defines an act of aggression as the use of armed force by a State against the territorial integrity of another State. On a smaller scale, trespassing and disturbance of public order cause insecurity. For many centuries the state performed its task of guaranteeing the general safety of persons and goods by guarding and defending the territory of the state and by preventing and ending incidents of public violence and other breaches of the peace. Fortifications, watchtowers and watch keepers typically personified the state’s security task; respect for national borders and the boundaries of a person’s property were manifestations of peace abroad and at home.

By their nature, promoting security and combating insecurity still extend to a particular physical area used by people. Defence is essentially the defence of the territory of the Kingdom of the Netherlands and, as a member of nato, that of the member states north of the Tropic of Cancer.⁵⁰ This accords with the idea that the sovereignty of states is in principle circumscribed by their physical land and maritime borders.⁵¹ A properly functioning international legal order, as it has grown with ups and (deep) downs since the First Hague Peace Conference in 1899, guarantees international peace because states respect one another’s borders and jurisdictions. It is one of the tasks of the un Security Council and the International Criminal Court to ensure they do, a task they can only perform if states genuinely cooperate. The Dutch armed forces, however, are not there solely to defend and protect the interests of the Kingdom, but also to enforce and promote the international legal order.⁵²

2.4.1 Security in a Regional, International and Global Context

In the annual report for 2002, the former Minister of Defence wrote: “The high level of deployment in the last year underlines the continuing need for well-trained and well-equipped armed forces. In light of current international developments, in which the distinction between internal and external security is becoming increasingly blurred, that need will not diminish in the future”.⁵³ The minister was referring to military contributions to the peace and reconstruction process in various countries and to the war against international terrorism. Many others have also noted that internal and external security are interrelated, often with reference to the transnational impact of civil wars and terrorism. Security and insecurity manifest themselves more than they used to in networks that cannot be classified as ‘internal’ and ‘external’. International terrorism testifies to that, as does the – still inadequately restrained – international arms trade. Unrestrained internal conflicts like those in Ukraine and Syria had an enormous international impact, in one case in the form of political and military interventions by a neighbouring country, in the other through the exodus of large numbers of refugees to other countries in the Near East and Europe. The international risks ensuing from Da’esh have also arisen from irreconcilable differences in Iraq and the Levant.

These developments have led some to rediscover ‘geopolitical’ models of security policy, in which the emphasis is entirely on a ‘realistic’ approach to external security, in contrast to models that link internal and external security. However, a closed, defensive approach to the relationship between states with ‘sovereignty over their own territory’ – defence as a bulwark against external forces – is actually at odds with economic and cultural integration, and increases the risk of conflicts when it evokes nationalism and xenophobia.

Franklin D. Roosevelt already established the relationship between internal and external security in his State of the Union address on 6 January 1941: the relationship between respect for fundamental rights – the four freedoms – within states and peaceful relations between states. This is why the promotion of the international legal order (in the Netherlands, a constitutional obligation: see Article 90 of the Constitution) is an essential element of an effective peace and security policy.

In the absence of peaceful and prosperous internal development, the chance of international conflicts increases. But efforts to create internal peace have generally had less of a preventive effect than expected. They were often a vain attempt to control a crisis - and were sometimes even counter-productive because the intervention was associated with a party to the conflict that was not seeking reconciliation, as in the case of the regime in Iraq which is dominated by a single population group. Rather than being intensified, genuine prevention by investing in the social and economic development of ‘fragile states’ declined in the wake of the need for austerity measures – particularly in the years after the financial and economic crisis in 2008. Making the situation worse was the fact that traditional military capabilities were also substantially reduced, which meant that exerting pressure on dubious regimes lacked credibility and the sense of insecurity on the peripheries of nato and eu territory grew.

The enormous increase in the number of non-state actors⁵⁴ is closely connected with the end of the Cold War, globalisation and processes of democratisation since the 1990s. With the liberalisation of the flows of goods and services and financial flows and the lifting of stringent barriers to the movement of persons, companies, media and ngos can move more easily around the world and have quicker and easier access to capital and manpower. Cheap information technology further means that even the very smallest organisations and movements can portray themselves as actors not bound by national sovereignty.⁵⁵

What does this trend mean for the international context and security? Just as globalisation is not by definition favourable or unfavourable, the growth in the number of non-state actors is not inherently a good or a bad development in security terms, nor does it automatically undermine state authority. At the same time, it is clear that the combination of the diversity of actors and the ongoing technological developments makes it more difficult to determine where threats are coming from.⁵⁶ The cyber technology, biotechnology, robotics and drones that can make life more pleasant, can also fall into the hands of ill-intentioned non-state actors.⁵⁷ Increasingly, these groups organise themselves as illegal networks that are difficult to track and make smart use of global chains and flows.⁵⁸ This category includes terrorist groups such as Al Qaeda, Boko Haram and Da’esh, which undermine weak state institutions and the precarious security situation of citizens in fragile states (see Fig. 2.3). Furthermore, like states they use both ‘hard’ military means and ‘softer’ instruments, such as media, social media and the Internet, to bolster their legitimacy and to win the hearts and minds of potential supporters.⁵⁹

Fig. 2.3

Fragile states. (Source: oecd, States of fragility 2015: 15; other states, such as Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan and Venezuela, could also be added to the list)

Privatisation of security is a trend that can be seen in the many fragile states afflicted by conflict (see Fig. 2.3), but also in developed countries.⁶⁰ As a result, the boundaries between state and non-state security actors are blurring. The current reality is one of a sliding scale from more to fewer state services and actors in the field of security.^61,62 The private security industry has been growing since 11 September 2001 when (state) security rose higher on political agendas and a growing number of national armies, ngos and companies started outsourcing security tasks. Private Military Contractors played an important role (from providing catering and guarding oil plants to organising transport and interrogating prisoners) in Afghanistan and Iraq, for example. Governments often hire private contractors for reasons of cost control and flexibility.^63,64

There is also increasing evidence that future inter-state conflicts will be played out in the free, still open spaces of international waters, the ocean floors with their deposits of minerals and fossil fuels, fishing grounds and transnational waterways and drinking water reservoirs. The potential for conflict is particularly great where there are competing claims to access, control and ownership, but where there is no political willingness to embrace rules and dispute-resolution mechanisms for such global public goods or global commons. Closer to Europe, this mainly concerns the eastern part of the Mediterranean with its large gas reserves, the Arctic region with its oil, gas, minerals and fish, and the Horn of Africa and Sub-Saharan Africa. In these regions, the scarcity of water and energy and lengthy periods of drought due to climate change are taking their toll in the form of regional conflicts and increased migration.⁶⁵ At the same time, the traditional tasks of a state’s security and defence policy, such as defending against violations of the integrity of the state’s territory, air space and territorial waters, deterring the enemy and preventing nuclear proliferation in various regions of the world, including Europe, remain as necessary as ever. This all implies the need for a simultaneous strengthening of more defence-oriented and prevention-oriented elements of international security policy.

2.5 The Danger Dimension

The most recent expansion of the concept of security relates to interpretations of what constitutes danger. It depends on how specifically or diffusely danger is defined. It makes a great deal of difference whether security is viewed as the absence of a military threat to a clearly-defined territory or as the reduction of economic vulnerability in a globalised world. Or as the reduction of risks and insecurity even before there is any question of an acute threat. The conceptualisation of security as defence against a military threat was closely connected with the realistic theory and the Cold War era, when hostile states confronted each other in a clear balance of deterrence. However, security is increasingly also connected with the far more elusive violence of non-state actors. It is even linked to diffuse dangers without any identifiable actor with hostile intentions. Subjective perceptions – including feelings of hope, humiliation or fear – play an important role in the securitisation of threats, vulnerabilities and risks.

2.5.1 Securitisation of Threats, Vulnerabilities and Risks

By ‘securitisation’ is meant that political actors in nation states actively engage in the ‘top down’ framing of tensions as threats to security and securing institutional and public support for their views.⁶⁶ By establishing what the threats are, how they manifest themselves and who or what is threatened, they give meaning to the world around them and establish order in the international environment. However, securitisation also arises from society itself, particularly when there are fears involved. Societal actors can themselves draw attention to specific issues and urge politicians to take prompt action and adopt tougher security measures. Thanks to the proliferation of actors in civil society, the privatisation of some security tasks and the ever-present media, the question of who can place which threats on the security agenda is increasingly the outcome of a wider public debate. Politics and governance are then part of a wider agenda-setting process.⁶⁷ In other words, security is a social construct: it is the result of a process in which an actor is able to convince an audience that a referent object is threatened and has to be protected.⁶⁸

This leads to two observations. First, a wide range of narratives concerning security can exist alongside one another in the society. The problems that are placed on the agenda and addressed, and how, can vary depending on the time and place. Some civil-society actors are simply better than others at getting across their interpretation of security or insecurity. Second, certain interpretations - including those of select individuals in the society – can become dominant and anchor themselves in institutions and the collective consciousness for lengthy periods. They find their way into more formal strategic documents, parliamentary papers and military doctrines, but also into folklore and popular wisdom.⁶⁹

This means that what ‘society’ or particular communities and networks describe as urgent security issues are not necessarily more objective, more morally just or more rational than those identified by the ‘state’.⁷⁰ For example, the security interests articulated by some population groups in multi-ethnic states could harm the security interests of other ethnic groups. And in some societies, militant nationalism, the demand for self-determination or calls for stricter government action against illegal migrants are in fact sources of actual or unrealistic insecurity.

What this also means is that the government cannot automatically be guided by what the public regard as urgent or relevant. After all, it is the government’s task to represent the wider public interest and protect the freedom and equality of every citizen. That is a two-fold task. On the one hand, it calls for the creation and preservation of public support for sustainable long-term investment in the necessary (military) security capacity, even if it has no immediate or visible added value for people’s day-to-day lives in the short term. On the other, it is necessary to guard against the government being permanently expected to meet excessive demands in the field of security.⁷¹ After all, in many countries the attention to public safety leads in practice to a strong focus on anticipating exceptional events that could disrupt society. As a result, a variety of risks and uncertainties come to the fore, which can lead to over-reaction and imbalances in the security policy.⁷² Figure 2.4 shows the deployment of the armed forces in the performance of a number of public security tasks other than the traditional task of protecting the territory and the public against threats from other countries.⁷³

Fig. 2.4

Deployment of armed forces to provide ad-hoc assistance. (Source: Clingendael, Strategic Monitor 2014, A World Order Balancing on the Brink [Een wankele wereldorde], 2014: 105–107)

The question is what effects focusing on a wide range of risks, uncertainties and worst-case scenarios have on the perception of security and civil liberties. The socialisation of security can lead to increased pressure on the government and civil-society actors to take measures to address a perceived ‘feeling of insecurity’. Those feelings of insecurity can then be sustained if the measures are further magnified in the media and on social media. An expanded, inclusive security agenda could then even cause security to become a goal in itself rather than being a prerequisite for further social development which therefore has to be weighed against other political priorities.⁷⁴

Violent conflicts prompt the most direct feeling of insecurity, which is why when one speaks of ‘security policy’ thoughts normally turn principally to the area of operations of the armed forces and of the police and other law-enforcement agencies. Since 1945, and for more than a century preceding the Second World War, the Netherlands has not been involved in military conflicts on its own territory on the European continent. So far – at the time this book was being written – the Netherlands has also been spared the large-scale terrorist violence that has recently afflicted a number of European cities. Nevertheless, there are many who feel that there is a greater threat of international and national insecurity at this point in time. A distinction is sometimes made between security as ‘objective circumstances’ and ‘subjective feelings of security’, which are easier to measure in surveys.⁷⁵ The former refers to the absence of actual threats to our way of life, the latter to the absence of a fear of that way of life being undermined. Furthermore, the threat can relate to attainments of a material nature (for example, access to work, housing or education), but also to idealistic attainments (e.g., values and customs that are taken for granted).

In the last few years the feelings of insecurity have been compounded, in the Netherlands and elsewhere, by violent incidents that do not bear the hallmarks of aggression by another state. Neither the shooting down of Flight mh17 nor the capture of areas in the Near East by Da’esh nor the attacks in Paris, Brussels and Berlin correspond with the traditional image of military conflicts between states seeking to control parts of each other’s jurisdiction, in other words territory. Nor can these events be – literally - mapped in the former customary manner. International security (or insecurity) increasingly clearly displays the characteristics of a ‘hyper-connected world’.⁷⁶ The view that the conflicts between regimes and rebel movements in Iraq and Syria were domestic conflicts that did not affect the states in Western Europe, for example, proved very short-sighted. Not only were these armed conflicts nourished by financial support and arms sales from other countries, some of the fighting itself has moved to cities in Europe with the terrorist activities of Da’esh. But impulses are also emerging from the European cities themselves to move and connect battlegrounds, particularly where radicalised individuals are recruited by Da’esh to come and fight in the Middle East and for terrorist activities.

2.5.2 The Geopolitics of Emotion

Another important perspective that can be added to the analysis of the entanglement of national and international security is thinking in terms of emotions. Personal humiliation, for example due to the structural absence of the prospect of securing a livelihood and of personal development, but also at collective level, such as Russia’s loss of international stature in the 1990s, play an important role in this respect. Fears, particularly among groups that come under attack because of their ethnic or religious identity, figure in this, as do hope and trust, for which a properly functioning democracy and the rule of law, whereby all citizens are treated equally, are relevant. Dominique Moïsi has mapped the world in these terms in his writing on the geopolitics of emotion.⁷⁷

The dominant expectation in the Western world around the turn of this century was that – after the disappearance of the threat from the Communist bloc following its collapse in 1989 – the growth of a worldwide network of open societies and free-market economies would be sufficient to guarantee lasting peace. Some predicted that a ‘clash of civilisations’ would stand in the way of that, but the simplifying geographic assignment of characteristics of civilisation to countries and peoples was unconvincing. After all, almost everywhere different types of ‘civilisation’ which rival groups seek to join are to be found within one and the same society. A far more important question seems to be what does or does not hold a society together, in other words what determines the degree of social cohesion in a society. As already mentioned, Dominique Moïsi has referred to the role emotions play in international relations, with hope, humiliation and fear as the principal affects. A carefully thought-out, realistic security strategy must take these emotions into account and simultaneously help to create the conditions in which emotions can play a positive role in promoting peace and security. As Moïsi notes, hope comes from stable mutual trust.⁷⁸

Feelings of hope, humiliation and fear dominate in various parts of the world. The conflicts arising from these feelings - within, but certainly also between societies - explain revolutionary movements, rebellions and wars − the feeling of humiliation that dominates in the Arab world, for example. The Russian desire to regain its legitimate place in history is an important factor in Putinism.⁷⁹ Chinese nationalism is also rooted in a deep sense of being short-changed.⁸⁰ In interaction with shifting power relations, the geopolitics of emotions is leading to a ‘mixed revival of geopolitics in Europe’.⁸¹ The underlying social micromechanisms must be given a place in a better underpinning of security policy. This is one of the reasons why the culture of hope in Western Europe has given way to widespread, but also often diffuse fears. It has frequently been observed that the manifestation of violent international conflicts has changed, but the nature of the associated affective dimension is not sufficiently recognised.⁸²

These patterns translate into an altered experience of security: the absence of human security reinforces frustrations and fears; insufficient improvement in the functioning of governments constrains mutual trust. The rise of nationalist regimes that oppress or persecute other groups leads directly to insecurity. The rise of terrorist (in other words, frightening) movements, sometimes in reaction to repressive regimes, but often in fact opposed to democracies, further undermines the feelings of security and causes migration movements, which in turn have their own disruptive effects. Terrorist organisations, piracy on supply routes, off the Somali coast for example, and forms of aggression coming from fragile states also undermine an aspect of security that we describe as flow security.

There are also mixed forms of conflict, as we have seen in the eastern regions of Ukraine, in which national groups and foreign – in this case Russian – soldiers mingle to the point of becoming indistinguishable. The most important point in that context is that besides the ‘classical’ socio-economic causes of armed conflicts, the emotional swings and confrontations have a powerful knock-on effect in terms of a willingness to engage in armed conflict, and hence genuine insecurity. Those who flee situations in which they feel unsafe and hopeless arrive as asylum migrants in countries in which their presence is portrayed by some as a source of insecurity, although in the Netherlands they are not suspected of crimes more frequently than native Dutch persons with similar demographic and socio-economic profiles.⁸³ In other words, in this day and age violence and insecurity are no longer solely the consequence of decisions by governments to take up arms, but also the consequence of a dynamic of popular emotions, both within a state and across borders.

These changes in the nature and perception of conflicts point to an important distinction compared with earlier wars driven by geopolitical motives. Formerly – especially in the First World War – populations and armies were persuaded relatively easily to obey their commanders by existing motives of national pride and loyalty (‘in defence of the fatherland’), even when they were sent to sacrifice themselves in the trenches; this loyal following of orders was enforced with military discipline. In a time of extensive communication networks,⁸⁴ the leadership has become even more dependent on the intensity with which strong emotions can be stirred in broad sections of the population. The ‘total war’ conducted by the Third Reich was the product of the unprecedentedly intensive ideologisation of the German people. In contrast, the British and American war efforts were driven, far more than during the First World War, by the realisation that it was not only their interests but also their fundamental values that were at stake. The incapacity of the American political leadership of the time to present the Vietnam War as a national calling was a turning point in American foreign policy; only in reaction to the attacks on 9/11, and then only for a few years, could the American public again be mentally mobilised for a distant war. The strength of Da’esh lies not in superior weaponry, but in the total subjugation of the fighters to a goal that is presented as super-human, is supported by modern communication technologies and plays on both frustrations and religious codes.⁸⁵ In a commercially-oriented culture like that of Western Europe, such extreme movements appear all the more frightening.

Populations stir themselves if regimes expose them to suffering and death for a military objective they do not share. On the other hand, the suggestibility arising from existing feelings of frustration and fear itself can be a potential source of violence. Especially in the digital era – with all of the possibilities it offers to manipulate the supply of information with the help of hackers or troll factories – this ‘horizontalisation’ is in no way reassuring. It is therefore necessary, both in this country and elsewhere, to incorporate the experiences and feelings of the citizens in a broad and thorough reorientation of security policy (for example, among the populations of unstable societies on the other side of the Mediterranean). The concern for state security focused on defence of the territory must be linked to other dimensions of security.

This is manifested to a large extent at the crossroads – in terms of connections and cultures – of the three continents of the old world: the Near East. The destabilising factors include (a) the international feeling of inequality in standards of living, such as the enormous growth of the population in regions such as North Africa without a corresponding development in terms of the economy, education and infrastructure; (b) a significant absence of European involvement in those domains in the immediate vicinity, in particular in the countries to the south and east of the Mediterranean; and (c) a military-political power vacuum in those same regions, with failing states and complicated ‘new wars’ that are totally different in character from the classical inter-state wars or civil wars.⁸⁶

2.6 Challenges for Security Policy

The intensification of cross-border flows, the sharp increase in the number of non-state actors and the disappearance of national border controls within the eu underscore the complex interconnectedness of internal and external security. What does this mean for governments? They will be confronted more often with transnational (security) issues whose origin, course and consequences are difficult to oversee. Examples are the unexpected appearance of criminal networks with worldwide branches, but also the disruption of complex production chains and technical systems by sabotage or technical or human failure.⁸⁷ Highly developed, open societies appear to be relatively vulnerable to the threat from lone wolves or groups that turn against them and who exploit the blurring of the boundary between ‘internal’ and ‘external’. After all, the authorities are bound by their own statutory powers and international human-rights treaties. Their actions are under the microscope of the media, critical ngos and the articulate general public. Furthermore, there is often less public tolerance for risks and uncertainties in those societies precisely because of the strong belief in the malleability of society and the high expectations for government intervention. A government that does not meet those expectations with visible security measures can quickly stir up feelings of fear and insecurity. Equally, however, a government that does meet them can reinforce the feelings of insecurity. If politicisation in society comes to overly dominate security policy itself, it can lead to a negative spiral of fear and mistrust, which could even threaten the open society itself.⁸⁸

Prioritising

This presents the government with a number of major challenges. The first involves distinguishing and prioritising: how can it still rank the variety of claims to national and international security? In what areas are fundamental public interests at stake which require the government to play a public role (as director or otherwise), and in which are they not? Processes of securitisation are due in part to the expansion of the security agenda. It is therefore essential to guard against ‘normative over-demand’ on government.⁸⁹ Naturally, prioritisation is ultimately a question of making political and normative choices. But in the process of making those decisions, sound considerations, based on relevant knowledge and public deliberation, are essential for taking effective action and securing public support.

Governance

The second and connected challenge concerns the division of roles and coherent action by the relevant actors (governance). Globalisation, Europeanisation, socialisation and privatisation call for a rearrangement of powers, tasks and relationships among the various actors. Which interests can now be performed better by European or global institutions or civil-society organisations and which cannot? Where is joint action desirable, and what demands does it place on the growing number and variety of civil and military actors at social, national and supranational level? The ‘scaling up’ of security issues to European and global level and the (partial) privatisation of security functions often lead to uncertainty about who is responsible and legally and political liable for specific security issues, and under what circumstances. We see this, for example, in the international security and stabilisation missions carried out by multinational coalitions of countries, international organisations and military and civil actors. These missions blur the boundaries between the civil and military roles and powers, demand a high degree of mutual cooperation and constant coordination within and between nation states, ministries, civil-society organisations and other non-state or semi-state actors. They also call for a larger degree of interoperability of civil and military materiel capacities. There is a reason for the constant calls for a more ‘integrated approach’ to international security issues and missions. This wider range of international security challenges presents smaller countries with limited resources in terms of materiel with relatively major challenges, which is another factor that compels a rethinking of the priorities of security policy and resources needed to implement it.⁹⁰

Diffuse Threats

The third challenge, finally, arises from the gradual expansion of the danger dimension of security. In addition to immanent threats, more diffuse, potential future vulnerabilities and uncertainties play an increasingly important role. The clear and present danger of the nuclear threat that was prominent in the security agenda during the Cold War has faded into the background somewhat, although the role of nuclear weapons has again risen higher on the security agenda in recent years with the ‘return’ of power politics. But that agenda also includes less obvious threats, ranging from global climate change and international terrorism to energy insecurity. In principle, the vulnerability of humans, society and the natural environment calls for a proactive response to uncertainties,⁹¹ but where reactive and defensive military action makes way for a preventive, interventionist approach, as in the case of the invasion of Iraq in 2003, it creates tensions with the classical principles of national and international law, the fundamental rights of citizens and public support.⁹² This also applies to a growing extent for various new preventive European and national policies in relation to counterterrorism, cyber security or tackling irregular migration.