Human security is understood as a response to the proliferation of new security threats which fit awkwardly within the relatively narrow confines of the traditional, state-centric national security paradigm. Human Security is a field of study that has emerged over the last 20 years. It is a sub-section of security studies but encompass a diverse range of academic disciplines and policy discourses (development studies, international relations, environmental studies, public health, economics, gender issues, human rights and foreign policy). It is also increasingly being adopted by policy-makers from individual nation states (Canada and Japan), bodies (European Union and the African Union) as well as institutionalized by the United Nations, and used by non-state actors in such as NGOs and the corporate sector. This volume serves as ...

Editor's Introduction: Human Security

TaylorOwen

Security can no longer be narrowly defined as the absence of armed conflict, be it between or within states. Gross abuses of human rights, the large-scale displacement of civilian populations, international terrorism, the AIDS pandemic, drug and arms trafficking and environmental disasters present a direct threat to human security, forcing us to adopt a much more coordinated approach to a range of issues.

– Kofi Annan

When asked critically about the level of uncertainty, debate, conjecture and outright skepticism regarding the concept of human security, former Canadian foreign minister Lloyd Axworthy responded assertively: ‘The world had no idea what sovereignty and the security infrastructure would look like immediately following the signing of the Treaty of Westphalia. Norms evolved through decades of debate, thought, ...

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