Since “Human Development Report, 1994,” a new sort of language has emerged as a way of highlighting the policy issues that most directly affect the lives of people in the world. Human security, as the condition entailing “freedom from threats and freedom from want,” has gradually occupied many organizations, GO and NGO alike, dealing with a broad range of policy issues. Where does this new perspective come from and take us? We will examine the normative foundation of human security.

Human Insecurity: the Need for Micro Perspectives in International Relations

The purpose of this course is to help students advance along the lines of their specific interests in the policy issues of International Relations. These issues include, among others, conflict-resolution, regional cooperation, poverty-reduction, and environmental protection. Equally important for students, however, is the establishment of firm theoretical footings. As in many other policy-related fields of inquiry, theories in International Relations are not context-free. The constraints of time often dictate theory formulation as they profoundly influence the theorists’ normative commitments. Given these, the course consists of three major components. 1) A firm historical background, a common prerequisite for all issue-specific perspectives. 2) Critical examinations of selected empirical and normative theories. 3) Examinations of specific policy issues in light of normative perspectives. The course fuses these three major components into a narrative flow moving from “High Politics” to “Low Politics.” Along the way, the course discusses a new framework for defining policy issues in need of solution, Human Security.