Security concerns, crucial for well-being of a nation, often appear detached from the daily lives of regular citizens in a democracy. However, in a democratic setting, the importance of security extends to every citizen. Therefore, as participants in a democracy, individuals must gain a deeper understanding of the concept of security and become well-versed in its various dimensions. The 1994 UNDP’s Human Development Report raised concerns about human security, emphasizing that conventional interpretation of security has been overly focused on nation-states rather than well-founded worries of ordinary people seeking security in their everyday existence. 

Security

Security implies freedom from threats. It only has to do with incredibly grave threats that could jeopardize fundamental principles, principles that would be irreparably destroyed if nothing were done to address the situation.

External Traditional Notions for Security

• Conventional Security Threats: The greatest danger to a country is from military threats. The source of this danger is another country that by threatening military action endangers core values of sovereignty, independence, and territorial integrity. 
  • The lives of common people are also in jeopardy when there is military action. It is improbable that troops will be the sole ones wounded or killed in a battle. 
  • Ordinary men and women are frequently made the targets of war to undermine their support for it. 
• Government Responses: In responding to the threat of war, a government has three basic choices: to surrender; to prevent the other side from attacking by promising to raise the costs of war to an unacceptable level; and to defend itself.
• Deterrence and Defense: Security policy is concerned with preventing war, which is called deterrence, and with limiting or ending the war, which is called defense.
• Role Balance of Power: Traditional security policy has a third component called balance of power. When countries look around them, they see that some countries are bigger and stronger.  
  • A good part of maintaining a balance of power is to build up one’s military power, although economic and technological power are also important since they are basis for military power.
• Alliance Building: A fourth and related component of traditional security policy is alliance building. 
  • An alliance is a coalition of states that coordinate their actions to deter or defend against military attack. 
  • Most alliances are formalized in written treaties and are based on a fairly clear identification of who constitutes the threat.
• External Threats: In the traditional view of security, then, most threats to a country’s security come from outside its borders. 
  • That is because international system is a rather brutal arena in which there is no central authority capable of controlling behaviour.
• Internal Security: Within a country, the threat of violence is regulated by an acknowledged central authority — the government.

 Internal Traditional Notions For Security

• Shifting Focus of Security: Traditional security also concerns itself with internal security because after the Second World War, internal security was more or less assured to powerful countries of the world.
• Europe’s Focus: Most European countries faced no serious threats from groups or communities living within those borders. Therefore, these countries focused primarily on threats from outside their borders.
• Security Challenges: The security challenges facing newly independent countries of Asia and Africa were different from the challenges in Europe in two ways.
  • External: The new countries faced the prospect of military conflict with neighbouring countries.
  • Internal: Internally the new states worried about threats from separatist movements which wanted to form independent countries. 
• Separatism and Civil Wars: Internal wars now make up more than 95% of all armed conflicts fought anywhere in the world. 
  • Between 1946 and 1991, there was a twelve-fold rise in the number of civil wars—the greatest jump in 200 years.

Traditional Security and Cooperation

In traditional security, there is a recognition that cooperation in limiting violence is possible. These limits relate both to ends and means of war. The most important of these are disarmament, arms control, and confidence building.

• Disarmament Through Treaties: Disarmament requires all states to give up certain kinds of weapons. For example, the 1972 Biological Weapons Convention (BWC) and 1992 Chemical Weapons Convention (CWC) banned the production and possession of these weapons.
• Arms Control vs Disarmament: More than 155 states acceded to Biological Weapons Convention (BWC)  and 181 states acceded to 1992 Chemical Weapons Convention (CWC).
  •  Both conventions included all great powers. But superpowers — the US and Soviet Union — did not want to give up a third type of weapons of mass destruction, namely, nuclear weapons, so they pursued arms control.
  • Arms control regulates the acquisition or development of weapons. The Anti-ballistic Missile (ABM) Treaty in 1972 tried to stop the United States and Soviet Union from using ballistic missiles as a defensive shield to launch a nuclear attack.
• Arms Control Efforts: The US and Soviet Union signed several other arms control treaties including Strategic Arms Limitations Treaty II or SALT II and Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty (START).
• Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) of 1968 was an arms control treaty in the sense that it regulated the acquisition of nuclear weapons. 
  • Under this, those countries that had tested and manufactured nuclear weapons before 1967 were allowed to keep their weapons; and those that had not done so were prevented from acquiring them.
  • NPT did not abolish nuclear weapons; rather, it limited the number of countries that could have them.
• Confidence Building: Traditional security also accepts confidence building as a means of avoiding violence. 
  • Confidence building is a process in which countries share ideas and information with their rivals. 
  • They tell each other about their military intentions and, up to a point, their military plans.
• Role of Force: Hence, in traditional security, force is both principal threat to security and principal means of achieving security.

Non-Traditional Notions

• Definition: Non-traditional ideas of security encompass a broad spectrum of hazards and dangers influencing human existence, extending beyond military concerns.
• Challenging Security Concepts: They start by casting doubt on the conventional definition of security. In the process, they also call into question the other three components of security:
  •  The strategy for security
  •  The kind of threats facing system
  •  The object of security.
• Redefining the Referent: The state, with its territory and governing bodies, is referent in conventional security ideas. 
  • Within non-conventional notions, referent is enlarged. When we inquire, “Who needs security?” Supporters of non-traditional security respond, “Not just the state, but also people, communities, and humanity as a whole.“ 
• Human Security is about protection of people more than protection of states. All proponents of human security agree that its primary goal is protection of individuals.
  • “Human security” or “global security” are terms used to describe non-traditional perspectives on security.
• Scope of Human Security: Proponents of ‘narrow’ concept of human security focus on violent threats to individuals while proponents of ‘broad’ concept of human security argue that threat agenda should include hunger, disease, and natural disasters because these kill far more people than war, genocide, and terrorism combined.
• Global Security: The idea of global security emerged in 1990s in response to global nature of threats such as global warming, international terrorism, and health epidemics like AIDS, bird flu, and so on.
• International Cooperation: Since these problems are global, international cooperation is vital, even though it is difficult to achieve.

Conclusion

In conclusion, the evolving concept of security highlights its diverse dimensions in a globalized world. While traditional views emphasize military threats and state-centric protection, non-traditional perspectives like human and global security broaden the scope to include individuals, communities, and global challenges like climate change and pandemics. Achieving security today necessitates international cooperation and a reevaluation of strategies to address both traditional and emerging threats effectively, ensuring collective well-being in an interconnected world.

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