ABSTRACT

One of the most promising sources for re-conceptualizing security to replace the present state-centred militarized security with a person-based human security system is in women’s perceptions and experiences of what makes them, their families and societies secure. The concepts of security that this article identifies based on research with Jordanian women reflect the fundamental components of a comprehensive human security framework and resonate with security perspectives of other women, such as South African women. We see women’s perspectives pointing toward human and social wellbeing as the essence of human security. Jordanian women, in placing the highest priority on economic security, indicate that without the fulfillment of basic human needs there can be no human security. The perspectives of Jordanian women provide an instructive example of transition to new ways of thinking about security. Especially significant to the assertion that education is a basic need is their linking of economic security to education, as we would link the education of women to changes in their subservient status and to the development of the authentic democracy integral to human security. This article illuminates the critical interrelationship between militarized state security and women’s subservience that attests to the need to confront the ‘militarism/sexism symbiosis’ in strategizing further transition to human security.