ULUSLARARASI İLİŞKİLER TEORİLERİ II

Aberystwyth

hegemony

Frankfurt

reaction

importance

Military power

State

Human Development Report

awareness

The key question that inspired Gramsci’s theoretical work was “why it was so difficult to promote revolution in Western Europe”. Gramsci’s answer to this question revolves around his use of the concept of “hegemony”. In understanding how the prevailing order was maintained, Marxists had concentrated on the coercive practices and capabilities of the state. Gramsci recognized that while this characterization may have held true in less developed societies, but it was not the case in the more developed countries of the West in which the system was maintained not only by coercion but also through consent. It is this hegemony that allows the moral, political and cultural values of the dominant group to become widely dispersed throughout the society and be accepted by subordinate groups and classes as their own.

The correct answer is A.

The Aberystwyth School questions the narrow, militarized, positivist and theoretically realist security conception. In the framework of this critical attitude, the Aberystwyth School emerged in order to revisit the security concept. The Aberystwyth School addresses the security as a derivative concept, claims for the necessity of widening of security agenda, privileges individual as the referent object of security, regards security issue in the context of emancipation concept, considers threats in a socially constructed manner, and examines the relationships between self and other. 

One of the most important distinguishing features of the Aberystwyth School is the adoption of thoughts of critical theory to security concept and practice. These theories aim to develop a political theory that targets to provide a social transformation through revealing and, if it is possible, eliminating all obstacles for the emancipation of human beings while the traditional theories with a positivist approach are related with the reproduction of the status quo.

The correct answer is C.

Robert Cox introduced his critiques to dominant theories of international relations with a Gramscian perspective, arguing that “theory is always for someone and for some purposes” (Cox, 1981: 128). If values and ideas are the reflections of specific social relationships, all knowledge should reflect a specific context, time and space. In other words, knowledge cannot be timeless and objective in contrast to realist argument. That is why, there is not a simple dividing line between values and facts. In this context, allegedly all objective and value-free theories, thoughts and analyses should be viewed with a critical manner. According to Cox, regarding the world as given helps to legitimization of dominant hegemonic relationships in world politics. Hence, Cox advocates critical theoretical perspective instead of problem-solving one. Because, critical theory attempts to question the dominant order by analysing and revealing social forces that could lead to emancipatory change.

The correct answer is E.

Aberystwyth School addresses security theory as a political activity and brings the politics back to security studies by seeking to display the connection between security theory and political order. For the Aberystwyth School, priority is not about how security will be ensured, but the sources of security issues. Hence, it is not sufficient to undertake security as a negative security situation. Positive security that comprises social, economic and cultural structures should have a priority. Thus, as long as the concept of security is about the improvement of human welfare, it will have a positive meaning for the Aberystwyth School. 

The concept of “survival plus” that means the security beyond survival of state aims to create appropriate environment for perfection human-beings themselves. In this framework, security refers to positive life conditions beyond the survival needs of the state. According to the Aberystwyth School, security is worthwhile for human collectivities and should be understood as a positive value. Therefore, security is conceptualized as a condition of emancipation of individuals from insecurities.

According to the Aberystwyth School which makes effort to reveal the limitations of traditional security conception, security is a derivative concept based on a priori political understanding. While traditional security conception defines the Security Studies in terms of the study of the threat, use, and control of military force, critical approaches to security focus on the normative choices and their political implications. The Aberystwyth School addresses security theory as a political activity and brings the politics back to security studies by seeking to display the connection between security theory and political order.

The correct answer is A.

The Aberystwyth School defines peace and security not only in terms of the absence of wars and physical conflicts, but also absence of all forms of violence, namely physical, structural and cultural ones. In this sense, positive security that refers to the inclusion of non-military threats to the scope of security and the elimination of structural and cultural violence should have a priority.

The correct answer is D.

According to the Aberystwyth School, although state preserves its central position in security studies, its previous privileged position as a referent object of security is contested. This is because, broadening of security agenda is necessarily required to analyse various referent objects of security apart from the state actor.

The state-centric security approaches do not provide theoretical and conceptual tools in order to analyse insecurities of human collectivities and individuals. Hence, Aberystwyth School seeks to give a central position to human emancipation instead of security of the state. Such an effort requires to regard individuals as the privileged referent object of security. Such a conceptualization that gives priority to human emancipation is a radical break from dominant security conception based on national security notion.

In the framework of human security concept, humanitarian needs are much more important than the security needs of the state.

The correct answer is E.

In United Nations Development Programme's (UNDP) 1994 Human Development Report, 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. In food security, threats are defined as poor access to food and drinkable water, etc. In health security, threats are defined as infectious diseases and cancer, absence of drinkable water, air pollution and poor access to health-care services, etc. In environmental security, threats are defined as degradation of ecosystem, water scarcity, deforestation, air pollution and natural disasters, etc. In personal security, threats are defined in the context of physical violence such as torture, war, ethnic tension, crime and street violence, rape, child abuse, suicide and drug use. In community security, threats are defined as discrimination, assimilation, ethnic tension, genocide, ethnic cleasing and weakening and/or disappearing of traditional languages and cultures, etc. In political security, threats are defined as political repressions of the state and governments, systematic human rights violations, militarization of the society, etc.

The correct answer is C.

Emancipation means resisting to oppression, and struggle for a society based on fundamental freedoms, equality, justice, human development and progress. War, poverty, insufficient education and political pressure etc. can be seen as the obstacles for human emancipation. Threats to individuals and societies can include direct (physical) violence such as war, conflict and terrorist activities, indirect (structural) violence such as socio-economic problems, unemployment, poverty, lack or absence of health-care service and/or cultural violence such as discriminatory or assimilative policies to identity-based social groups.

Political parties alone do not constitute a threat to human emancipation.

The correct answer is E.

When the current international security issues are analysed, it is clear that the Western world gives itself a central position and makes non-Western world “others”. Given that the threatened values are the Western values, threats against them emanate from non-Western societies. Therefore, dominant relations, thoughts and actions of contemporary world politics create a hegemony, and solving security problems of this hegemony reflects a unilateral choice without regarding the security needs of all societies of the world.

As xenophobia in the Western societies has increased, interventions conducted in the direction of strategy of “global war on terrorism” have caused massive violations of human rights. In that case, it can be argued that the efforts of the Western world to overcome security problems have contributed to emergence of a global insecurity atmosphere.

In contrast to othering process based on identity that has gained a global characteristic after 11 September, Aberystwyth School draws attention to existence of identity-based oppresive structures that lead to construction of dominative relationships. Therefore, it advocates emancipatory communities based around an inclusionary and egalitarian notions of identity. In this context, it is stated that human emancipation - both that of individual humans and humanity in general - provides the guide both for relations within communities and between them.

The correct answer is B.

The concept of human security is mainly defined accorging to two different conceptions; freedom from fear and freedom from want. Freedom from want conception evaluates human security in a wider perspective by regarding poverty, disease, economy, health and environmental problems. On the other hand, freedom from fear conception of human security with a narrow perspective focuses on physical violence and threats.

The correct answer is B.