Transformations of Security Studies ─ Dialogues, Diversity and Discipline

This book offers an overview of the many strands of contemporary security studies and a path towards a dialogue about the theoretical, empirical, and methodological identity of this important research field.

We think that the described silence between different schools of thought, theories and methodologies is fundamentally unproductive. It furthers isolated debates on the same issue—‘security’—by using idiosyncratic vocabularies. Thus, theoretical insights and empirical advances are not shared. This is truly paradoxical: while security becomes all-encompassing and its various extensions become more and more interdependent in the social and political world, the academic world locks itself into many boxes, falling once more into the trap of being irrelevant to real world problems. How security is actuallydone is thus much different from how it is studied.

To overcome this situation, a multifaceted dialogue is necessary. However, a dialogue on security not only brings politics back in; it also enables a self-reflection of a scientific community on its ‘proper’ research objects, approaches and methods. As mentioned above, though scholars do relate to a wide concept of security, the very meaning of ‘security’ remains contested. This contestedness, however, is not problematicper se. Rather it brings to mind that any political concept is essentially contested—and should be because it opens up the possibility of critical engagement.

In any case, there is a growing literature on the field itself, its history, structure and sociology. But why read another volume on the state of art in security studies? This book serves three goals: first, it intends to move beyond the fragmentation of the field. This does not mean that the authors of the book do not recognize this fragmentation, but that they reflect on the contribution of diverse sub-fields (theoretically, methodologically and empirically) to the whole field of security studies. Second, it provides a forum for critical debate between different approaches to security—including oft-neglected methodological advances. Third, it sheds light on very recent new developments in all sub-fields of security studies, even if they might not fit into common categories and dichotomies.

Along these lines, this book starts a dialogue between what we identify as some of the most prominent and promising approaches to security and security politics in IR. A dialogue presupposes different perspectives. It also presupposes that there is something important and valuable we should discuss. A dialogue, however, also implies that after all these debates authors might stick totheir approaches, defending them against critique but also rethinking theoretical claims and empirical results. Thus, this dialogue is not intended to outline a new grand theory, but rather to strengthen the ability to talk to each other. We think that a comprehensive and critical understanding of security policy and security studies requires no less. Our last chapter is thus designed to engage all authors of the volume in a "live" dialogue.

The main goal of this edited volume is thus bringing together scholars with different perspectives on security. It intends to foster both an intra- and interdisciplinary dialogue between various communities of security studies, helping to further the mutual understanding and enrichment of both self-proclaimed ‘mainstream’ and heterodox perspectives on security. This dialogue is sadly lacking in the current literature. While taking stock of the immense variety within the field of security, we also identify new conceptual, methodological, and empirical aspects of how security is conceptualized and analyzed which have been largely untouched or unconnected in recent years.