Individual security in academic discourse

Abstract

Contemporary security studies have opened the field for a multitude of new terms and concepts. Professional language enrichment of contemporary security studies has been a logical consequence of the expansion of their research fields, which occurs in response to emerging security threats and challenges, as well as to new subjects and objects of security studies and practices. The newly established post-Cold War era in security studies has been featured by calling in question the dominant state-centric understanding of the concept of security, which brings about the deepening of the concept to the individual level of analysis. In addition to the well-established terms as state security and national security, in contemporary security studies discourse there has been emerging terms that refer to the security dynamics that takes place on an individual level such as individual security, personal security and human security. However, in the academics’ writings these terms and concepts are often vaguely defined, and used in academics’ and public discourse in different ways, sometimes as synonyms, while in some cases the same terms are used with different meanings, which inevitably leads to a certain terminological imprecision. Variations in definition of terms and guidelines such as human security, individual security and personal security in domestic and foreign scholars’ papers point to the lack of universality and their fluid nature. These variations are partly considered to be the consequence of the complexity of these new concepts, but they also may be caused by too much latitude in interpretation of their meaning. This deprives these concepts of the stable and common meaning and poses an obstacle for their use in common academic discourse. Therefore, the aim of this paper is to find some standards in the use of these concepts and to link them with the dominant and prevailing meanings that are attached to them in academic use. In order to give an answer to the question of whether are they different concepts or the multiplication of the same concept, the meanings of the term individual security will firstly be presented when considered as a level of analysis in security studies, and then when it is considered as part of a broader political concept of human security.

Savremene studije bezbednosti otvorile su polje za mnoštvo novih termina i koncepata. Obogaćivanje jezika savremenih studija bezbednosti logična je posledica širenja njihovog istraživačkog polja, koje nastaje kao odgovor akademske zajednice na novonastale bezbednosne izazove i pretnje, kao i nove subjekte i objekte studija i prakse bezbednosti. Posthladnoratovski period u studijama bezbednosti obeležen je i preispitivanjem dominantnog državocentričnog shvatanja pojma bezbednosti koje je rezultiralo produbljivanjem pojma i njegovom širenju ka individualnom nivou analize. Pored termina državna i nacionalna bezbednost, u diskursu savremenih studija bezbednosti javljaju se termini kao što su individualna bezbednost, lična bezbednost, bezbednost pojedinca i ljudska bezbednost. Međutim, u literaturi su ovi termini često nejasno određeni, pa se u akademskom diskursu koriste na različite načine. Nedoslednost u definisanju pojmova kao što su ljudska bezbednost, individualna bezbednost i lična (personalna) bezbednost kod domaćih i stranih autora neminovno ukazuje na njihovu fluidnu prirodu i nedovoljnu preciznost. Ona je posledica složenosti ovih novonastalih pojmova, ali i slobode u interpretaciji njihovih značenja koja sprečava da se sadržaj ovih pojmova učvrsti i postane deo zajedničkog, ustaljenog akademskog diskursa. Stoga, cilj rada je da ukaže na pravilnosti u upotrebi navedenih pojmova i poveže ih sa dominantnim, preovlađujućim značenjem za koje se u akademskoj upotrebi najčešće vezuju. Kako bi se dao odgovor na pitanje da li se radi o različitim pojmovima ili multiplikaciji istog pojma, u radu će se najprije izložiti sama upotreba termina individualna bezbednost, kao nivoa analize u studijama bezbednosti, a potom njegova upotreba kao dela jednog šireg političkog koncepta kakva je ljudska bezbednost.