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A New Security Paradigm

Chris Abbott

Abstract: With limited resources governments must decide how best to respond to the whole
spectrum of threats that they are presented in the post-9/11 security environment. However,
these decisions are not made on a purely objective basis: psychology, emotion, and the next
election all play their part. At the same time, there is an assumption from many in power that
international terrorism is one of, if not the, greatest threats to global security; an assumption
that is not borne out by the evidence.

This article argues that future insecurity will actually arise from four interrelated trends:
climate change, competition over resources, marginalisation of the majority world, and global
militarisation. While all these issues are rising up the political agenda, they are largely ignored
as security concerns.

Where they are addressed, the response is usually an attempt to maintain the status quo,
using overwhelming military force where necessary. However, it is impossible to successfully
control all of the consequences of insecurity, and so these responses will ultimately fail. This
article outlines a new approach being developed by Oxford Research Group. This system of
‘sustainable security’ aims to resolve the root causes of threats to security - using
preventative, rather than reactive, strategies.

In the post-9/11 context, the issue of where the future threats to our security are likely to
come from has become a highly charged one. The events played out live on our TV screens
on 11 September 2001 have become iconic moments of our times. Forever burned into the
public consciousness, they also seem to have affected many world leaders in a profound way:
they are now convinced that international terrorism, particularly international Islamic terrorism,
is one of the greatest threats to world security.

This is a potentially dangerous assumption. It is not enough to insist that international


terrorism is such a global threat, when the evidence simply does not support this claim. A
recent book from the global security think tank Oxford Research Group (ORG) paints a very
different picture of the fundamental threats that we all face. In Beyond Terror: The Truth
About the Real Threats to Our World the authors argue that these threats will come from four
interconnected trends:

• Climate change
• Competition over resources
• Marginalisation of the majority world
• Global militarisation

There are, of course, other trends to consider, but these are the ones that Oxford Research
Group concludes are most likely to lead to large scale loss of life – of a magnitude unmatched
by other potential threats – and have the greatest potential to spark violent conflict, civil unrest
or destabilisation that threatens the international system as we know it.

It is worth briefly exploring how each of these trends are related to insecurity and interrelated
to each other.

Climate change. The environmental impacts of climate change are likely to lead to more
extreme weather events and loss of infrastructure, arable land and clean water sources. The
resulting massive displacement of people from island, coastline and river-delta areas would
contribute to increased human suffering, greater social unrest, and revised patterns of living.
This has long-term security implications for all countries which are far more serious, lasting
and destructive than those of international terrorism. Indeed, the effects of climate change
have the potential to stretch to breaking point local and international systems of governance
as they struggle to adapt.

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Competition over resources. Linked to the issue of climate change is that of competition
over resources. Industrialised and industrialising states are increasingly dependent on
imported resources, especially oil and gas (key contributors to climate change). Oil is
currently the main marketed fossil fuel and the Persian Gulf is the dominant region, with two-
thirds of world reserves. It is a deeply unstable region with continuing potential for conflict as
the United States seeks to maintain control against opposition from regional state and sub-
state paramilitary groups. As China also seeks to gain access to key oil resources, the
potential for conflict is only increasing.

Marginalisation of the majority world. This competition will be occurring in an increasingly


marginalised world. While overall global wealth has increased, the benefits of this economic
growth have not been equally shared, with a very heavy concentration of growth in relatively
few parts of the world and with a small global elite. These divisions are being exacerbated by
increasing oppression and political exclusion, coupled with a growing sense of marginalisation
as a result of improvements in education and modern communication technologies, leading in
places to increased levels of political violence. This is a key factor that is largely ignored by
Western governments.

Global militarisation. The fear is that this marginalisation is also happening in a world where
military force is far more likely to be used to control insecurity. The cold war showed that there
is a persistent tendency by the authorities to maintain an aura of control and responsibility,
when this is very far from what is actually happening. The current focus is still on maintaining
international security by the vigorous use of military force combined with the development of
both nuclear and conventional weapons systems; the first five years of the "war on terror"
suggest that this is failing. Post-cold-war nuclear developments involve the modernisation and
proliferation of nuclear systems, with an increasing risk of limited nuclear-weapons use in
warfare – breaking a threshold that has held for sixty years.

The control paradigm

These trends will be major security concerns in the medium-to-long-term. However, in the
short term, it is actually our response to international terrorism, rather than terrorism itself,
that will be a major cause of insecurity. The so-called "war on terror" is not reacting
appropriately to the key trends identified above. In fact, in many instances the policies and
abuses of the "war on terror" – Guantánamo Bay, extraordinary renditions, civilian casualties
– are actually increasing the likelihood of future terrorist attacks.

This is because the "war on terror" is based on the false premise that insecurity can be
controlled through military force, thus maintaining the status quo. It is an example of what
Oxford Research Group calls the "control paradigm". This approach essentially aims to "keep
the lid" on insecurity, without addressing the root causes of that insecurity. This will not work
in the long term and, in fact, is already failing in the face of increased paramilitary action and
asymmetric warfare. Even when judged by its own goals, it becomes clear that the "control
paradigm" simply is not working:

• Support for political Islam is increasing worldwide


• The number of significant terrorist attacks is on the rise
• Peace and democracy are elusive in the middle east
• The price of oil remains volatile and increases with every new crisis
• Iraq is in a state of bloody chaos nearing civil war
• The Taliban is a re-emerging force in Afghanistan
• Iran, Syria and North Korea are increasingly emboldened
• US strategic influence is waning, especially in Africa and the Middle East
• The United States is increasingly viewed as the greatest threat to world peace.

The current approach to security is deeply flawed, and is distracting the world's politicians
from developing realistic and sustainable solutions to the non-traditional threats facing the
world, among which terrorism is by no means the greatest or most serious.

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Sustainable security

In contrast, Oxford Research Group proposes a new system of "sustainable security". The
central premise of sustainable security is that you cannot successfully control all the
consequences of insecurity, but must work to resolve the causes. In other words, "fighting the
symptoms" will not work, you must instead "cure the disease".

The key elements of such a sustainable response to the trends outlined above might include:

Climate change. Introduction of a carbon tax and rapid replacement of carbon-based energy
sources by diversified local renewable sources as the primary basis of future energy
generation.

Competition over resources. Comprehensive energy efficiency, recycling and resource


conservation and management policies and practises. This would be coupled with large-scale
funding for alternatives to oil.

Marginalisation of the majority world. Reform of the global systems of trade, aid and debt
relief in order to make poverty reduction a world priority.

Global militarisation. Alongside non-proliferation measures, states with nuclear weapons


must take bold, visible and substantial steps towards disarmament, at the same time as
halting the development of new nuclear weapons and new bio-weapons.

While focussed on non-traditional elements of security policy, this approach does not – as
some claim – underestimate the impact of so-called “hard” security issues such as terrorism.
A truly effective counter-terrorism strategy would tackle and police immediate dangers whilst
implementing policy changes to address longer-term trends that fuel terrorist recruitment,
finance, legitimacy and effectiveness. The current approach prioritises the former; a
sustainable approach would commit as many if not more resources to the latter. A sustainable
security approach to terrorism would therefore include:

• Rapid coalition troop withdrawals from Iraq, replaced by a United Nations stabilisation
force, with United states recognition that a client state or puppet regime cannot be
sought there
• The closure of Guantánamo Bay, the cessation of "extraordinary renditions", and the
observance of the Geneva convention on detainees
• Sustained aid for the reconstruction and development of Iraq and Afghanistan
• A genuine commitment to a viable two-state solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict,
and third-party brokerage of the wider Arab-Israeli confrontation
• A firm and public commitment to a diplomatic solution to the current crisis with Iran
• Police targeting of the international funding networks that support terrorism
• An opening of political dialogue with terrorist leaderships wherever possible
• Intelligence-led counter-terrorism police operations against violent revolutionary
groups.

By aiming to cooperatively resolve the root causes of threats using the most effective means
available, sustainable security is inherently preventative in that it addresses the likely causes
of conflict and instability well before the ill-effects are felt.

Moving forward

Over the next decade a radical shift towards sustainable approaches to security will be hugely
important. If there is no change in thinking, security policies will continue to be based on the
mistaken assumption that the status quo can be maintained: an elite minority can maintain its
position, environmental problems can be marginalised, and the lid can be kept on dissent and
insecurity. In this scenario, little attempt will be made to address the core causes of insecurity,
even if failure to do so threatens the elite minority as well as the marginalised majority.
Alternatively, a change in thinking could lead to an era of substantial progress in developing a
more socially just and environmentally sustainable world order.

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What is ultimately needed is recognition by governments that current security measures will
be ineffective in the long-term and that a radical rethink of what is meant by ‘security’ is long
overdue. However, this is unlikely to happen without pressure from below, as governments
are all-too-often focussed on their own narrow interests. Therefore, NGOs and the global civil
society will need to co-ordinate their efforts to convince governments that this new approach
is practical and effective, and is the only real way to ensure security.

A new linking between the peace, environment and development movements will be
necessary for this. We must now work together and recognize that we all have an urgent
responsibility to embrace a sustainable approach to global security. The obvious failure of
current policies may present the best chance yet for such a shift to come about.

Chris Abbott is the Programme Coordinator and Researcher at Oxford Research Group
and lead author of Beyond Terror: The Truth About the Real Threats to Our World
(Rider, 2007). www.oxfordresearchgroup.org.uk

Chris Abbott, “A New Security Paradigm”, Cosmopolis (January 2008)

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