Political: measures against political repression and human rights abuses.
Community: measures against inter-ethnic, religious and other identity tensions.ħ. Personal: measures against physical violence, crime, terrorism, domestic violence and child labour.Ħ. Environmental: measures against environmental degradation, resource depletion, natural disasters and pollution.ĥ. Health: measures against disease, unsafe food, malnutrition and lack of access to basic health care.Ĥ. Food: measures against hunger and famine.ģ.
Economic: creation of employment and measures against poverty.Ģ. OCHA’s expanded definition of security calls for a wide range of security areas:ġ. Accordingly, it has become necessary for states to make conscious efforts towards building links with other states and to consciously engage in global security initiatives.
With the advocacy of the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) human security elements have acquired a wider dimension, for they go beyond military protection and engage threats to human dignity. The remedy for such rivalry lies in cooperation which can only be found in global security initiatives among states. 5 The fear or threat content of security complex breeds rivalry among states. One of the major challenges that the field of global security has to contend with is the concept of security complex, 4 a situation in which the security concerns of states are deeply interconnected to the point that one state’s security needs cannot be realistically considered without taking into consideration the security needs of the other states. The global interconnection and interdependence among states that the world has experienced and continues to experience since the end of the cold war, makes it necessary for states to cooperate more and work together. These are demands that no national security apparatus has the capacity to handle on its own and, as such, call for the cooperation of states. Global security, on the other hand, evolved from the necessity that nature and many other activities, particularly globalization, have placed on states. Makinda’s definition of security fits into this confine of national security. National security has been described as the ability of a state to cater for the protection and defence of its citizenry. This article is aimed at articulating reasons for more collaboration, cooperation and synergy between national and global security apparatus and mechanisms. Equivalently, there are issues at the international sphere that will require a domestic security apparatus to deal with. Rather, they have a symbiotic relationship, although limited to the local security sphere, which states lack the capacity to handle unilaterally. Although, in theory, a boundary exists between these two conceptual frameworks, such a boundary is not sufficient to maintain a clear-cut delimitation between them. In many forums on the topic of security, there has been an attempt to establish a divide between national and global security. Hence, the perception of the leadership of a society determines its actions and guides its efforts, which becomes evident in the width and depth of the security agenda of that society. 3 The term “preservation”, as an important component of this definition, presupposes conscious, deliberate and definite steps and actions. He further argues that all the institutions, principles and structures associated with society, including its people are to be protected from “military and non-military threats”. In the context of this article, Samuel Makinda’s definition of security as “the preservation of the norms, rules, institutions and values of society” 2 appears to be useful. Williams argued that “security is therefore a powerful political tool in claiming attention for priority items in the competition for government attention”. Because of its seeming lack of conceptual boundary, security, as a concept, is used to entice and whip up patronage for many political projects both at the state and international levels of politicking. In the name of security, people and governments have taken actions where intended and unintended outcomes have become difficult to handle. If defining security is that elusive, there is little wonder why operating within its coverage is so fluid. Hence, broad areas of description of the term “security” exist. Unfortunately, many contributors approach these concepts from their own ideologies. Security, like peace, identity and other terminologies in that fold of international political theory has attracted many definitions.