Dr. Barry Buzan discusses the concept of security.
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Transcript:
"The approach Ive been taking is an analytical approach, its not a normative approach Im not taking sides here. Its an analytical approach which says that you need to distinguish between being part of the process of securitization by saying this is a threat, or accepting that this is a threat. My interest has been in looking at the process by which other people do that. So Im interested in the way in which various things can get rapidly built up into being accepted as a security issue like the war on terrorism, or become contested like Iraq, or suddenly deconstruct like the Cold War or in Southern Africa the whole confrontation between South Africa and the frontline states just disappeared in a very short number of years. My focus in life has not been on identifying what I think are objective threats, but on looking at the way in which others respond to that threat environment. And looking at the correlation or lack of correlation between what gets constructed as a threat or not and what might be thought of, objectively, as a threat.
For example, one of my small hobby horses which I just use as an interesting example of the distance between objective threats and things that actually get accepted as threats - is the business of rocks falling from space and crashing into the planet and doing damage. This is an interesting example because theres a lot of knowledge about that, unlike certain other security issues like global warming, where the science itself is contested. We know pretty much what the threat is. We know how often rocks of various s slam into the planet. Increasingly, we know where they are and what they are. We could do something about this if we wanted to; the technology is there. There are certainly a lot of interest groups out there that might support this for all kinds of reasons industries who would support it because it would produce a lot of high tech contracts, trekkies who would support it because it would support the idea of getting out into space, environmentalists who are concerned about the planet, etc. There should be a sufficient constituency there for this to be constructed as a threat. The statistical evidence is sufficient for it to be so, in the sense that the chance of any one individual dying because of this is greater than the chance of their dying in an aircraft. So its up there in the real world of peoples lives. Hollywood has done its bit; there have been lots of good movies about asteroids crashing into the planet. But has this been securitized anywhere? No. Do people worry about it? No.
Its an interesting case. You could construct this; global leaders might even feel that it would be a useful thing to do because it would give a common project for the whole world to pull together on. So it might be useful from the point of view of global governance. There would be all kinds of good reasons for doing this, its object would be political, but it just hasnt happen. Why? I dont know. But its interesting that it hasnt happened and that other things, which might be thought of as less pressing, do get securitized. So thats the focus of my concern. Im more interested in the choices that other people make than running my own campaign to say this is the thing we should be worried about."
28 авг 2024
