ABSTRACT

This new book shows how from the end of the Cold War, the security agenda has been transformed and redefined, academically and politically.

It focuses on the theme of protection. It moves away from the dominant question of whom or what is threatening to the crucial questions of who is to be protected, and in the case of conflicting claims, who has the capacity to define whose needs prevail.

It also poses the question of political agency in relation to some of the most significant questions raised in relation to the governance of insecurity and protection in the contemporary world. The authors identify and explore issues that challenge or raise a number of questions about the traditional notion that states are to protect their citizens through retaining a monopoly over the legitimate use of violence.

chapter 1|18 pages

Agency and the politics of protection

Implications for security studies 1

chapter 2|15 pages

Privatizing the politics of protection

Military companies and the definition of security concerns

chapter 4|20 pages

Taking rights, mediating wrongs

Disagreements over the political agency of non-status refugees

chapter 5|16 pages

Resisting sovereign power

Camps in-between exception and dissent

chapter 6|17 pages

Protection

Security, territory and population 1

chapter 7|21 pages

‘Civilizing’ the Balkans, protecting Europe 1

The international politics of reconstruction in Bosnia and Kosovo

chapter 8|14 pages

The judicialisation of armed conflict

Transforming the twenty-first century 1

chapter 10|21 pages

Sovereignty, international security and the regulation of armed conflict

The possibilities of political agency