ASTK12261U Security Studies: Approaches, Theories, Cases

Volume 2014/2015
Content

Security Studies is one of the main subfields of the discipline of International Relations, but it is also a field that draws upon other disciplines, including History, Economics, Development Studies, Anthropology, and Political Theory. Security Studies is devoted to the study of threats, violence and force, and when it was founded in the years following the end of World War II, it focussed on states, alliances and military threats. In the 70 years that have passed since then, Security Studies has grown to include approaches that study non-military threats across a wide range of issues, for example, the environment, the economy, religion, gender, cyber issues, and national identity. One also finds approaches that move from the security problems that states face to the insecurity issues of individuals, ethnic groups, women, the Global South, and other non-state entities. Security Studies is impacted by events in the real world, but also by trends and debates in the Social Sciences and the Humanities. Like in the Social Sciences more generally, a key question in Security Studies is that of epistemology: how do we know whether something is a threat? And what solutions should be devised once a threat has been identified?

This course provides an introduction to the field of Security Studies, the context from which it arose, and the factors and challenges that have impacted its evolution. The course emphasizes that Security Studies is home to a wide range of approaches, many of which disagree passionately on how security should be conceptualized, who ‘security’ should be for, and how it should be studied. The course will also provide an introduction to the main issues on the contemporary Security Studies agenda, for example, conventional military issues such as nuclear proliferation, epidemic diseases like HIV/AIDS, the security-development nexus, and the role of the media in representing threats and insecurity.

Competences achieved: Upon completion of the course, students should be able to demonstrate (a) knowledge of the main approaches within Security Studies, including their strengths and weaknesses, (b) an understanding of the historical evolution of Security Studies and what might explain this trajectory, (c) an ability to analyze military as well as non-military security issues using a range of approaches.

Learning Outcome

To get an understanding of the main approaches within the discipline of Security Studies, an understanding of the debates around which Security Studies has been built and that have impacted its development, and an understanding of how Security Studies approaches can be applied to different kinds of security problems.

Core readings - books:

Barry Buzan and Lene Hansen, The Evolution of International Security Studies,CambridgeUniversity Press, 2009. Appreviated as EoISS. 364 pages.

Barry Buzan, Ole Wæver, and Jaap de Wilde: Security: A New Framework for Analysis,Boulder: Lynne Rienner, 1998. Appreviated as SANFA. 230 pages.

Reading list:

Arnold Wolfers (1952) ‘National Security as an Ambiguous Symbol’, Political Science Quarterly, 67:4, 481-502 (20 pages).

Barry R. Posen (1993) ‘The Security Dilemma and Ethnic Conflict’, Survival, 35:1, 27-47 (21 pages).

Buzan and Hansen, EoISS, chapter 1-9.

Buzan et al., SANFA, chapter 1-9.

David Baldwin (1997) ‘The Concept of Security’, Review of International Studies, 23:1, 5-26 (22 pages).

David Campbell (1990) ‘Global Inscription: How Foreign Policy Constitutes the United States’, Alternatives, 15:3, 263-86 (24 pages).

Frank Möller (2007) ‘Photographic Interventions in Post-9/11 Security Policy’, Security Dialogue, 38:2, 179-96 (18 pages).

George Kennan (X) (1947) ‘The Sources of Soviet Conduct’, Foreign Affairs, 25:4, 566-82 (17 pages).

J. Ann Tickner (2004) ‘Feminist Responses to International Security Studies’, Peace Review, 16:1, 43-48 (6 pages).

Jef Huysmans (2011) ‘What’s in an act? On security speech acts and little security nothings’, Security Dialogue, 45:4-5, 371-383 (13 pages).

Johan Galtung (1969) ‘Violence, Peace and Peace Research’, Journal of Peace Research, 6:3, 167-91 (25 pages).

Keith Krause and Michael C. Williams (1996) ‘Broadening the Agenda of Security Studies: Politics and Methods’, Mershon International Studies Review, 40:2, 229-54 (26 pages).

Ken Booth (1991) ‘Security and emancipation’, Review of International Studies, 17: 4, 313-26 (14 pages).

Lene Hansen (2000) ‘The Little Mermaid’s Silent Security Dilemma and the Absence of Gender in the Copenhagen School’, Millennium, 29:2, 285-306 (22 pages).

Lene Hansen (2011) ‘Theorizing the image for Security Studies: Visual securitization and the Muhammad Cartoon Crisis’, European Journal of International Relations, 17:1, 51-74 (24 pages)

Lene Hansen and Helen Nissenbaum (2009) ‘Digital Disaster, Cyber Security and the Copenhagen School’, International Studies Quarterly, 53:4, 1155-75 (21 pages).

Megan MacKenzie (2009) ‘Securitization and Desecuritization: Female Soldiers and the Reconstruction of Women in Post-Conflict Sierra Leone’, Security Studies, 18:2, 241-261 (21 pages).

R. B. J. Walker (1990) ‘Security, Sovereignty, and the Challenge of World Politics’, Alternatives, 15:1, 3-27 (25 pages).

R. Charli Carpenter (2003) ‘Women and Children First: Gender, Norms, and Humanitarian Evacuation in the Balkans 1991-1995’, International Organization, 57:4, 661-94 (34 pages).

Robert Jervis (1978) ‘Cooperation Under the Security Dilemma’, World Politics, 30:2, 167-214 (47 pages).

Roland Paris (2001) ‘Human Security: Paradigm Shift or Hot Air?’, International Security, 26:2, 87-102 (16 pages).

Samuel P. Huntington (1993) ‘The Clash of Civilizations?’, Foreign Affairs, 72:3, 22-49 (28 pages).

Special section on The Evolution of International Security Studies, Security Dialogue, 41:6, 599-667 (69 pages).

Stefan Elbe (2006) ‘Should HIV/AIDS Be Securitized? The Ethical Dilemmas of Linking HIV/AIDS and Security’, International Security Quarterly, 50:1, 119-44 (25 pages).

Stephen G. Brooks, G. John Ikenberry, and William C. Wohlforth, International Security, 37:3, 7-51 (45 pages).

Stephen M. Walt (1991) ‘The Renaissance of Security Studies’, International Studies Quarterly, 35:2, 211-39, (28 pages).

Tarak Barkawi and Mark Laffey (2006) ‘The postcolonial moment in security studies’, Review of International Studies, 32:2, 329-52 (24 pages).

BA in political science with introductory knowledge of International Relations theory (exceptions tolerated).
lectures, student presentations, small group exercises
  • Category
  • Hours
  • Class Instruction
  • 28
  • Exam
  • 79
  • Preparation
  • 168
  • Total
  • 275
Credit
10 ECTS
Type of assessment
Oral examination
Synopsisexam
Marking scale
7-point grading scale
Censorship form
External censorship
Criteria for exam assesment

Criteria for achieving the goals:

  • Grade 12 is given for an outstanding performance: the student lives up to the course's goal description in an independent and convincing manner with no or few and minor shortcomings
  • Grade 7 is given for a good performance: the student is confidently able to live up to the goal description, albeit with several shortcomings
  • Grade 02 is given for an adequate performance: the minimum acceptable performance in which the student is only able to live up to the goal description in an insecure and incomplete manner