ULUSLARARASI İLİŞKİLER TEORİLERİ II

Positive peace thinking directs the peace studies to address new issues such as health, education, socio-economic welfare and environment, whereas negative peace refers to the absence of violence. When, for example, a ceasefire is enacted, a negative peace will ensue.

Ken Booth and Richard Wyn Jones, as two important representatives of the Aberystwyth School, not only criticize the traditional security conception in terms of deepening and widening of it, but also argue for reconceptualization of security studies by focusing on emancipation of human beings. According to Booth and Wyn Jones, realist security conception in the sense of ‘power’ and ‘order’ does not lead to a ‘real’ security. For these two scholars, sovereign state is not the main provider of security, but is one of the main reasons of insecurity.

Security conception of critical security studies is also affected by Marxist theory, Antonio Gramsci’s hegemony conception, critical social theory Frankfurt School, critical theory of International Relations discipline developed by Robert Cox and post-positivist perspectives in international relations theories.

The most important argument of Aberystwyth School is to comprehend security as “emancipation” that requires the abolishment of all limitations such as poverty, violence and political pressure for realization of human potential.

Jurgen Habermas, Theodore Adorno, Herbert Marcuse and Max Horkheimer are the most important representatives of Frankfurt School.

A problem-solving theory takes the nature of international politics into consideration as given. According to this view, there are specific actors and issues that should be focused on. In Security Studies, this actor is the state and the main problem that should be solved is the inter-state war.

It can be argued that the most important challenge of Aberystwyth School to traditional security conception is to deal with security as a political phenomenon.

Emile Durkheim argues that the state becomes stronger and more active as the individual becomes freer.

In United Nations Development Programme’s (UNDP) 1994 Human Development Report, it is stated that the most important concerns for human security are grounded in socio-economic problems and human rights violations. Accordingly, the concepts of personal security, community security, economic security, food security, environmental security, political security and health security are described as categories of human security.

In economic security, threats are defined in the following ways; working conditions, employment opportunities, wage and income conditions, poverty, homelessness and job security, etc.

Critical perspectives on security have intensively benefited from sociology, social psychology, philosophy and social anthropology.

Positive peace thinking directs the peace studies to address new issues such as health, education, socio-economic welfare and environment, and in this respect affects the development process of critical security studies (Columba and Vaughan-Williams, 2015: 18).

It privileges individual as the referent object of security, not the state. 

In contrast to traditional security conception’s claim of being ‘scientific’, Aberyswyth School seeks to display roles of security representations, normative choices and security concerns and practices on social and political circumstances.

While traditional security conception defines the Security Studies in terms of the study of the threat, use, and control of military force (Walt, 1991), critical approaches to security focus on the normative choices and their political implications.

Aberystwyth School questions the objective world conception of traditional security thinking. It suggests security would get different meanings depending on different worldviews and different rhetorics.

Positive security that means the absence of structural and cultural violence should have a priority (Buzan and Hansen, 2009: 188-189).

Ken Booth is known for his views against the traditional view of security that considers the state as the main actor for security.

In addition to classical security issues such as power competitions among state actors, there are many issues such as violations of human rights, minority issues, repressive regimes, environmental problems and poverty that have a significant place in contemporary security thinking.

Security can be in the best way ensured through human emancipation that is described as elimination of social, physical, economic, political and other sorts of limitations for the realization of potential of individuals and social groups (Baylis, 2008: 81).