Resolving protracted civil conflict is arguably the key issue in international security. Its magnitude is reflected in the estimated two billion people living in conflict-affected areas, often the poorest and most vulnerable (World Bank 2017). The impacts of these conflicts are far-reaching across national boundaries and across time, impacting on the future life chances of those affected by conflict. The last two decades have seen increasing efforts to address these conflicts through a coordinated approach involving military, foreign policy and development actors, leading to the expansion of development into matters of conflict. The efforts of development aid to resolve existing conflict and prevent future conflict have provided a renewed purpose for development as a concept and a practice at a time when its purpose has been called into question. With this expanded purpose of development aid come greater responsibilities and expectations of what development aid should achieve. This now includes not just resolving existing conflict and preventing future conflict but also ensuring greater national security for donor countries. The process of merging security and development is the subject of much contention among both scholars and practitioners, with advocates arguing that it represents a common sense means of addressing the root causes of conflict and insecurity and critics arguing that development has become a tool to further military and foreign policy objectives. As a result, it is essential to better understand the processes involved in merging security and development, the arguments behind these processes and how they operate in certain contexts. This book illuminates the workings of the merging of security and development in specific donor policy.
While the merging of security and development has a long history, the form it has taken during the War on Terror (WoT) is distinct from its previous incarnation during the Cold War (Duffield 2010; Hettne 2010). Following the mantra âno security without development, no development without securityâ, the interests of both security and development were seen to overlap significantly. Conflict and insecurity can wipe out hard-won development gains and hold back future progress. In turn conflict is often caused by long-term development problems. A further dimension of the national security of Western states has been added to this relationship since 9/11 and the WoT. From this view, due to the interconnectedness that globalisation has brought, instability in the developing world can impact directly on the security of the developed world through problems such as terrorism. The identification of the failed state of Afghanistan as the source of the attacks of 9/ 11 resurrected the idea of chronic development problems being a security risk for Western states. Following this logic, spending on development is seen as contributing to the national security of donors, and a closer coordination between security and development actors is necessary to resolve conflict in the long term. This chapter outlines the main aspects of the security -development nexus and argues that a case study approach focusing on multiple donors will lead to a greater understanding of this complex research area. The first section highlights the complexities and multiple dimensions of the security -development nexus. The second section argues that this research area has relevance for a number of different fields of research, especially international relations, security studies and development. The third section outlines how the merging of security and development has gained prominence in the WoT . The fourth section outlines the approach of this dissertation. The final section is an outline of the structure of this book.
The Complexities of the Security-Development Nexus
The âsecurity-development nexusâ, as it is often referred to, is the subject of much contention. Whilst the term âsecurity-development nexusâ may suggest a singular phenomenon, this is certainly not the case. Individually, both security and development are contested concepts, and so there is even further complexity when they are brought together, resulting in a web of possible connections and interactions. For example, Spear and Williams (2012: 9â19) identify four different functions that both security and development serve in addition to 11 different characteristics of security and development. Similarly, Stern and Ăjendal (2010: 9) outline six different narratives through which the security-development nexus can be understood. Each of these six narratives applies to both security and development separately, and they can all be connected to each other to form several contrasting and competing ideas of what the security-development nexus means. This demonstrates the complexity of the field in which the research on security and development operates. The security-development nexus is a research area at the intersection of a number of different disciplines and has implications for international relations, security studies and development studies.
In the area of international relations, the post-9/11 international system means that the inner workings of developing states and local-level conflict are now of interest to Western states. Similarly, security studies are concerned with ideas about the broadening and deepening of security and the concept of human security. This is viewed from many different perspectives. For some it is an acceptance of the importance of human security and a greater prioritisation of long-term development challenges that impact on the security needs of ordinary individuals. Connected with this is the idea of changing conceptions of the role of militaries and the expectation that they must now engage with âsoft securityâ through development projects. From different ends of the security studies perspective, this is seen as either a necessary step for a comprehensive approach to resolving insecurity or as a diminishing of military power which will undermine combat capabilities. From a development perspective, some are concerned about the possible militarisation of development and the subversion of development goals by hard security concerns. Others see it as a necessary step to resolve development problems through greater resources and a greater range of expertise harnessing the best of diplomatic, development and military skill. This book examines the issue primarily from the perspective of development policy, but it also takes into consideration changes in both security and foreign policy in order to best understand this phenomenon.
The Renewed Purpose of Security and Development Aid Post-9/11
Spear and Williams (2012: 1) assert that âSecurity and development matter; they often involve issues of life and death, and they determine the allocation of truly staggering amounts of the worldâs resources.â However, when studying the security -development nexus it is important to remember that this was not always the case. The origins of the current incarnation of the security-development nexus are in the post-Cold War world of the 1990s, and during this time security and development did not âmatterâ as they do now. During the early 1990s, official development assistance (ODA) flows had fallen and remained low, and there were doubts about whether aid still had a purpose, having failed to bring development over the previous decades (Abrahamsen 2000: i; Howell and Lind 2009: 285). Similarly, the security environment in the post -Cold War world had moved from a bipolar international system based on military competition to one where civil conflict proliferated in the developing world (Buzan and Hansen 2009; Kaldor 2013). Conventional military means were inadequate for addressing these conflicts, highlighted by the withdrawal of the US from Somalia following the âBlack Hawk Downâ incident in Mogadishu in October 1993. However, the events of 9/11 and the subsequent WoT changed this view of both security and development. If security and development âmatterâ, as Spear and Williams (2012) assert, it is because of their elevated importance in the post-9/11 environment. Security once again involved increased military spending to facilitate land wars, airstrikes and the military occupation of countries. The realisation that poverty and instability in the developing world could be a source of insecurity for the developed world through terrorist attacks originating from failed states provided a renewed purpose for development aid in addressing the root causes of conflic...