Documenti di Didattica
Documenti di Professioni
Documenti di Cultura
EJIR
European Journal of
Abstract
The academic environments of risk analysis and security studies had hardly ‘spoken’ to
one another until recently. The two fields of study were defined within different academic
disciplines: security studies a matter for International Relations (IR), and risk studies a
matter for sociology, economics and the natural sciences. Increased focus on catastrophic
events (terrorism, climate change, etc.) seems to have given the fields of security studies
and risk analysis a common empirical theme and highlighted the need for a common
research agenda. This article explores the intersection between these two fields of study,
as it investigates how the ‘old’ disciplinary debates on risk have been translated ‘into’
security studies — to predict, criticize or evaluate the current political practice of security.
Such analysis provides a much-needed overview of the risk debates within security studies
and brings out the limits of this debate in light of the broader and much more historically
settled risk debates within sociology, economics and anthropology.
Keywords
conceptual history, risk analysis, securitization, security studies, typology
Introduction
Since the emergence of the concept of risk in the 16th century, and especially with the
much later institutionalization and professionalization of the field of risk analysis in the
1970s, companies and governments have increasingly approached prudence and threats
in terms of risk. As a tool for calculation, risk analysis rendered the rationalization of
fears and dangers possible. Although terrorism and war have long been considered cor-
porate risks, the history of the concept of national security has developed largely inde-
pendently of the concept of risk and risk management. While the concept of risk helped
Corresponding author:
Karen Lund Petersen, Centre for Advanced Security Theory, Department of Political Science, University of
Copenhagen, Øster Farimagsgade 5, Building 4, office 4.1.46, DK-1353 Copenhagen K, Denmark.
Email: klp@cast.ku.dk
500
423
Number of citations
400
300
235
200
100 73
0 2 8
0
2004 2005 2006 2007 2008 2009 2010
Year
describe the market of the economic firm, the concept of security has been closely tied to
the survival of the state and national politics.
The divergent histories of the two concepts are outlined in the respective academic
debates on risk and security, which have hardly ‘spoken’ to one another. Until recently,
the two fields of study were defined within different academic disciplines: security
studies a matter for International Relations (IR), risk studies a matter for sociology,
economics and the natural sciences. Nevertheless, an increased focus on terrorism,
climate change and other catastrophic transnational threats appears to have brought the
two fields of study closer together. The general argument is that these threats question
the possibility of calculation and the means–ends rationality considered central to the
concept of risk for centuries (Beck, 2003; Ericson and Doyle, 2004).1 Accordingly, the
focus on catastrophic events has given the fields of security studies and risk analysis a
common empirical theme and highlighted the need for a common research agenda.
The current debate in IR journals outlines this development. As Figures 1 and 2 illus-
trate, there has been an almost explosive increase in published articles in which risk is a
topic2 and in the citations of these ‘risk articles’ within IR journals.
Based on a systematic reading of these articles, it is possible to identify three schools.
One school of thought, which I have termed ‘critical risk studies’, builds on the observa-
tion that ‘Within the academic field of international relations, the concept of risk has
shifted security away from the register of war and violence generally associated with the
concept of security’ (Aradau et al., 2008: 2). The alternative posed is a much broader
study of risk governance and technologies that transcends the former categories of
120
97 100
100
80
60
40
24
20
1
0
2004 2005 2006 2007 2008 2009 2010
Year
To show these differences and to discuss the consequences, the present article explores
the intersection between risk and security studies as it investigates how the disciplinary
concepts on risk have been translated ‘into’ security studies — to predict, criticize or
evaluate the current political practice of security. Not only does such analysis provide the
much-needed overview of the risk debates within security studies, it also discusses and
brings out the claims to knowledge and politics made by each position.4 This will be
done by directing attention to the concepts of risk and the practices of definition involved
in the different approaches to risk. Following British historian Quentin Skinner’s under-
standing of concepts as ‘mediums for shared understanding’ (Skinner, 1989), concepts
not only represent but also constitute meaning and politics. The concept of risk is contin-
gent on political action, and the practices of definition we turn to in our academic life
therefore matter. In terms of security studies, this means that the concept of risk cannot be
reduced to a mere description of a certain empirical political reality; rather, the concept
must also be understood as a medium for defining the possibility of politics.5
By examining the language of risk, I hope to show that the field of risk studies is
broad and that each of the three main approaches to risk within security studies repre-
sents a particular interpretation of particular sociological and economic theories.
Moreover, the article argues that risk studies within security studies cling to the very
generalized descriptions of current social developments and trends; description such as
‘risk society’, ‘culture of fear’ or ‘risk/security dispositifs’ which tends to conceal a pos-
sibly much greater variety of conceptual understandings in the daily practices of security
agents. It argues that we need a much more contextualized approach which is sensitive
to the different uses of the concepts in order to grasp both new developments and poten-
tial for security politics. The relevance of such an approach is not limited to studies on
risk, however, as it also extends to the Copenhagen School understanding of ‘securitiza-
tion’, which suffers from a similar formal understanding of the concept of security.
In terms of structure, the article follows two paths: first, it introduces the broader
academic field of risk studies within economic theory, cultural theory and sociology and
discusses their respective conceptualizations of risk. The second part of the article exam-
ines the current debates on risk and security within security studies; how the traditional
disciplinary debates on risk analysis have been translated and which conditions of knowl-
edge and politics such translation prescribes. In conclusion, the article discusses the
political and scientific limits of the different approaches to risk in security studies, arguing
that how the discipline is currently set up constrains more than it enables the possibili-
ties for recognizing political possibility.
and the past is the mastery of risk: the notion that the future is more than a whim of the
gods and that men and women are not passive before nature’ (Bernstein, 1998: 1). Risk
justifies decisions and political action; it is associated with abandoning old constraints and
entering new and better futures (Douglas and Wildavsky, 1982; Luhmann, 1993). The rise
of statistical methods and probabilistic thinking during the 17th century technified/
formalized the link between progress and risk; and with the rise of insurance, banking
and investment risk became a calculable, quantifiable, classifiable and individualizable
entity (Ewald, 1991; Hacking, 2003).
This understanding of risk as ‘measurable uncertainty’ was highly theorized in the 20th
century when leading economists such as Frank Knight and John Maynard Keynes con-
trasted risk with the uncertainty of an everyday life characterized by events with no statisti-
cal history (Bernstein, 1998; Knight, 1921). Risk management, which was first established
as normal corporate practice in the 1970s, took over the calculative scheme of insurance
and aimed to estimate the probability and present economic value of future events.
Today, many risk scholars agree that ‘risk’ has come to refer to a broader range of
everyday situations of uncertainty involving traffic, health, crimes, pollution and so on
and subject to the regulation by governments, citizens and private companies (Adams,
1995; Beck, 1999; Dean, 1998; Giddens, 2002; Luhmann, 1993).
Although a general consensus exists with regard to the history of ‘risk’, the concept has
been subject to much theorizing within a wide range of social science disciplines in cur-
rent times; all emphasizing different aspects of its function in society and politics. In the
following, I will concentrate on three of the core disciplines of risk. The first discipline of
risk is mainly informed by economic and actuarial theory and represents what we would
normally understand as the mainstream position within risk studies. In this approach, the
argument is that risk can be measured and consequently controlled. The second discipline
is the cultural theory represented by the British anthropologist Mary Douglas. For this
approach, risk is a matter of selections which largely depend on cultural perceptions and
worldviews. Finally, the radical constructivists within sociology argue that risk represents
a modern discursive construction which is ever-changing due to constant political struggle
and decision-making. It is obviously impossible to provide a complete picture of the dis-
ciplinary perspectives on risk.6 The following presentation will also only highlight the
central assumptions and claims about risk made in the literature. In the subsequent analy-
sis of how these disciplinary perspectives have been translated within security studies, the
single tenets and arguments will be thoroughly explained.
This quotation very precisely describes where the contribution of the cultural approach
to risk lies. The cultural approach to risk is first and foremost associated with the works
of British anthropologist Douglas, though Scott, Thomson, Lupton and Wildavsky have
also been authoritative in defining this approach. Building on her earlier work in Purity
and Danger, Douglas argues that risk presents itself as a neural decision-making instru-
ment but works as a moral classification in the modern society that ensures and creates
order and cultural identity. The approach is ‘cultural’ in the sense that how people select
risk is considered to be socially embedded — depending on the world perspectives of
social groupings, identity or institutions.
The object of analysis is culture and the shared meaning of risk and not, as argued in
the economic approaches, some measured high or low probability. The aim is to under-
stand how we select something as an irreversible risk, and the moral and political judge-
ment involved in such selection (Douglas, 1966, 1992; Douglas and Wildavsky, 1982).
According to Douglas, it is the institutional and social structures that shape risk percep-
tions, not any ‘actual’ amount of risk. As indicated by the subtitle of Douglas and
Wildavsky’s book (1982), it is ‘the selection of technological and environmental dangers’
that matters politically — not how probable technical experts assess them to be (Douglas,
1992: 44). Although the claims to knowledge are defined within the paradigm of construc-
tivism, many of the studies on cultural theory aim to explain patterns of risk behaviour. By
creating a typology (a group-grid structure) on how different cultures and social group-
ings act differently towards ‘the same’ risk, for example, nuclear energy, climate change
or GMOs, possibilities for political regulation and management are suggested (Gaskell
and Allum, 2001; Kahan et al., 2010; Wildavsky and Dake, 1990: 42). Thus, unlike the
sociological approaches treated below, cultural analysis explicitly aims to improve and
manage our socially and culturally defined risks. Risk is not primarily a general descrip-
tion of modern society but is rather a description of local political choices and identities.
literature on risk is greatly influenced by the school of thought mainly associated with
the writings of François Ewald, Richard Ericson, Mitchell Dean and Nikolas Rose.10
Here, risk is considered a technology or practice that disciplines behaviour through the
disciplinary means of calculation. Although Ewald’s studies of insurance and precaution
do show how the political rationality of risk analysis has changed in modern times, the
focus of most governmentality studies on risk is the increasing marketization and invidu-
alization of political life (Ewald, 2002). These analyses often critically aim at revealing
the more or less subtle neoliberal power structures at play in practices of risk analysis
and management (Dean, 1999; Ewald, 1991; Rose, 2002).
Although Luhmann is best known for his system theory, his contribution to the socio-
logical field of risk studies is primarily his historical analysis of the modern risk discourse,
which he argues is defined by an economy of control, individualism and progress (Luhmann,
1993). Beck and Giddens are admittedly inspired by Luhmann’s analysis of the modern
concept of risk, but argue that we have moved beyond such modernity and the strong belief
in the opportunity to control, thereby adding a historical dimension to the understanding of
risk. According to Beck, we have moved from a first to a second modernity; from a society
with a perception of risks as calculable and manageable to a society based on uncontrolla-
ble and incalculable dangers that are direct effects of human action and technology (Beck,
1999). Thus, the risk society ‘designates a developmental phase of modern society in which
social, political, economic and individual risks tend to escape the institutions for monitor-
ing and protection in society’ (Beck, 1992: 5). Similarly, Giddens describes the transition
from traditional to manufactured risks. Beck and Giddens argue that contemporary society
acknowledges the limits of knowledge and science and that we have become reflexive in
relation to our own risk production — something that is also envisioned in a precautionary
rather than preventive approach to risk management (Ewald, 2002).
These different academic understandings of risk testify to the fact that risk studies
are not a coherent discipline, but rather a pluralistic debate on the status of the concept
(analytical or descriptive/constituting); on what constitutes the core features of the
concepts of risk (measurable/non-measurable); and on the extent to which it is possible
to grasp new socio-political developments and critically engage with society and poli-
tics without going beyond the ‘traditional’ scheme of management provided by eco-
nomic theory. Within the economic literature, the concept has mainly been approached
as an analytical category as defined by a clear distinction between risk as calculable
events and other non-calculable dangers; risk is an academic or analytical tool for
capturing future threats. In the cultural and sociological literature, on the other hand,
the concept of risk is not an analytical category, but rather a political term used to cap-
ture socio-political developments.
political agenda (Buzan et al., 1998: 2–5; Nye, 1988; Tickner, 1992; Ullman, 1983). As
argued in greater detail later, ‘risk studies’ can be understood as taking place within this
widening debate. However, one must recognize that these risk studies aspire to say some-
thing about social and political life in general — not international relations in particular.
The debate on risk aims to broaden the scope of security studies and to go beyond the
classical lines of division between political science, sociology and economics. Yet such
interdisciplinary aims make it of principal importance to understand how the wider field
of risk studies in the social sciences has been translated into security studies.
The following section will place and discuss how the field of risk studies places itself
within the disciplines of economics, cultural studies and sociology and discuss the claims
to knowledge and politics following from each such conceptual practice. The section is
structured around the three dominant schools of risk in contemporary security studies:
critical risk studies, global risk management and political risk studies.11
engage critically in the risk society debate, they also share Beck’s critical perspective on
the practice of ‘economizing’ risk in their critique of security studies and their attempts
to envision new forms of political power.12 Characteristic for most of this literature is that
it constructs a concept of risk dispositif that works as a yardstick for comparing current
risk practices and discourses. This ‘risk dispositif’ designates certain practices and dis-
cursive elements as fundamental to the modern understanding of risk (see e.g. Salter,
Lobo-Guerrero, Muller, 2008), for example, calculability and present control of future
uncertainties (Foucault, 2007 [1977]). In the descriptions of this dispositif, the authors
draw heavily on Foucault’s (1977) work on security and Ewald’s work on risk (Ewald,
1991, 2002; Foucault, 2007 [1977]).
Such a conception of risk creates some methodological problems. First of all, the
understanding of risk as counter-concept to security renders many of these studies non-
responsive to shifting conceptions of either security or risk in the discourses of practi-
tioners. The aim is not one of studying change in the current perceptions of security, but
rather to explore the expansion of certain kinds of risk thinking (namely, modern risk
thinking or precautionary logics). These predefined concepts of risk become like ‘frame-
works for analysis’ or categories that are prescriptive for any possible envisioning of
politics and change. The price is, however, an analytical blindness towards current politi-
cal struggles, paradoxes and political alternatives. Political potential and alternatives
remain instead an object of philosophical-theoretical judgement and not part of an active
political engagement with current political struggles.13 In the final part of this article, I
argue that we must recognize that the governmentality of risk is not necessarily linked to
neoliberalism as many critical risk studies tend to assume when taking on Foucault’s
notion of security dispositif. By recognizing diversity in conceptual understandings, we
can avoid privileging one discourse on risk and instead recognize the ‘imbrications of
resistance and rule’ and thereby the contradictions and tensions present in any official
neoliberal discourse (O’Malley, 1996: 311). Thus, an alternative way forward for critical
risk studies would be to search for potential and possibility; to go beyond philosophical
criticism and enlarge our horizons to the existence of different concepts, different cul-
tures and different histories of risk (see Skinner, 2002).
A second and related critique of the so-called critical risk approach relates to the
understanding of politics. At a superficial level, these scholars take the not-very-
controversial, well-known standpoint that science is also politics and therefore that noth-
ing is apolitical. Yet the normative aim is not only the post-structuralist aim of opening
up what has already been closed — by, for example, confronting the naturalized distinc-
tions of inside–outside, security–politics (Cochran, 1999). These scholars relate explic-
itly to the political strategy implied in any critical approach to security and point to the
political performativity and responsibility of the security scientist. However, they do
not have the same anti-foundational stance either, as they tend to define a priori the
main political stakes in today’s world (Aradau, Münster, Lobo-Guerrero and Salter in
particular). To declare that we must do away with the dividing line between inside and
outside and the idea of the exceptional is to position oneself as having the authority to
decide where the political stakes lie in today’s world (for a similar critique of Beck, see
Douglas, 1992). By taking such a position, the role of science becomes one of prior
political/philosophical judgement and not one of showing where the political stakes lie.
The argument that the concept of risk has taken over security is somewhat similar to
the concept advanced in ‘critical risk studies’ (treated above). Yet the claims to knowl-
edge are very different. Coker and Rasmussen argue that the concept of security has
become obsolete: that the new reality of global fears has rendered the concept of risk
increasingly relevant to security/strategic studies. It has pushed the concepts of security
and threat into the background (Coker, 2009; Rasmussen, 2006). Such claims rest upon
empirical observations. For the global risk management scholars, research is aimed at
contributing to a better understanding of contemporary threats and thereby assisting
practitioners in their daily risk decisions. Although the main inspiration is undoubtedly
Beck’s thesis on risk society, there are also aspects of the writings that are influenced by
the claims to knowledge made in the economic literature, as the aim of these global man-
agement studies is often to optimize the decision-making process in the military estab-
lishment (see Heng, 2006). Risk studies should aim to ease the management of the risks
that are less quantifiable and identifiable than before. As Rasmussen argues, reflexive
security studies must focus on the management of new and constructed risks that do not
respect state borders and cannot be dealt with by applying the means–ends rationality
normally associated with security policies (Rasmussen, 2004, 2006).
Transformation is the ruling concept designating the concept of risk; the transforma-
tion from known to unknown futures, from measurable to non-measurable threats and
from security to risk. The epistemology expressed in this approach may seem somewhat
paradoxical, as it claims to be social-constructivist while sharing the problem-solving
aim found in the economic approaches. Yet this position may reflect one particular read-
ing of social constructivism — a reading which is also present in the writings of Beck.15
Both Beck and Rasmussen defend a historical interpretation of constructivism, arguing
that ‘we are living in an age of constructivism’ (Beck, 1999: 133). Constructivism not
only represents a philosophy of science, but is also a historical phenomenon that can be
dated (Rasmussen, 2001). Hence, constructivism (and reflexivity) is viewed as a cultural
phenomenon characterizing the late-modern society — a society with a specific rational-
ity differing from earlier and modern society. By applying this interpretation of construc-
tivism, they expose themselves to the same criticism as has been directed at Jean-Francois
Lyotards’ interpretation of post-modernity in particular,16 as they ultimately argue that
the social world is intersubjectively constituted but that they can view this ‘intersubjec-
tive constitution’ from a point outside history. By holding on to such a macro-historical
interpretation of constructivism, however, these scholars are able to observe ‘risk’ as a
social construction that must be solved by participating (politically) in its construction;
for example, by pointing out new tools for management. Reflectivism becomes a matter
of constructing a better security order; the aim of problem-solving can therefore be main-
tained. Thus, constructivism is more than an analytical strategy; it is a political strategy
of engaging in the world of risk.
But there is also a more profound critique to be raised in relation to such a macro-
historical and transformative approach to risk — a critique related to the political conse-
quences of accepting the argument. Such a transformative approach raises the fundamental
question about what (political and critical) role academia plays in this debate on shifting
conceptions of risk and security. To quote Beck: ‘The decision whether to take a realist
or a constructivist approach is for me a rather pragmatic one, a matter of choosing the
appropriate means for a desired goal’ (Beck, 1999: 134). This can obviously be read as
the ultimate consequence of recognizing that the selection of risks is a political affair as
opposed to something to be carried out scientifically or objectively (Douglas and
Wildavsky, 1982). Accordingly, the selection of risk is always an ongoing matter involv-
ing political and moral choices; choices that academics also make.
When adopting such a pragmatic approach to risk, however, we must remind our-
selves that a study on risk and security is hardly ‘innocent business’. As Buzan et al.
warned when considering the methodology behind an analysis of security: ‘Transformation
is one but not always the most reasonable strategy for improving security’ (Buzan et al.,
1998: 204). The transformative element at the core of the claims made by Beck,
Rasmussen, Coker and Heng may (unintentionally) be politically problematic. These
global risk management studies clearly argue that we are living in a risk society in which
the character of the threat (or catastrophe) leaves us with no choice but to dramatically
change how we conceive of security. In making this argument, however, they leave the
normative questions of democracy and authority unanswered and unproblematized.17
The ‘practice of constructivism’, which science ultimately also represents, is not fol-
lowed by reflections on what we are doing in talking risk; or what use it has.
corporate focus on financial crisis and terrorism.19 Yet compared to the global risk
management and critical risk studies, political risk studies are generally occupied with
the spatiality and territorial dimensions of risk and do not — as do the two other
approaches — rest their main argument on temporality and historical change.
Although most political risk scholars acknowledge the difficulty of measuring and
quantifying political risk (Jarvis, 2004, 2007), they do try to fulfil the aim of measure-
ment by suggesting a variety of methods available for assessing these risks: some list all
of the political events which may create imperfect competition or limit the ability of
companies to act as they otherwise would (Hashmin and Guvenli, 1992; Weston and
Sorge, 1972); others regard political risk as directly correlating with the type of regime
in a host country and the level of modernization (Green, 1972); while yet others evaluate
the risk situation in a host country by interviewing experts and subsequently create sce-
narios on the basis of those interviews (Coyle, 2003). As Jarvis and Griffiths argue, there
are two traces of political risk literature in IR: one concerned mostly with corporate strat-
egies, investment and insurance, the other concerned with conflict avoidance and state
failure (intra-state issues).
Yet that which unites these positions is their aim to improve how these risks are
measured and categorized in the risk and scenario models. Due to the problem-solving
aim of the theoretical work, the debate within these deliberations has predominantly
focused on the empirical or theoretical gains of adapting one or the other — more or less
inclusive — concept of political risk. Similar to the economic approaches to risk analy-
sis, these scholars aim to keep the analysis as objective as possible by developing meth-
ods to define the criteria for observation and the classification of risk. These methods are
based on the assumption that observations and reality mirror each other perfectly; and,
consequently, that the reality is unaffected by these analyses (Renn, 1992: 61). Moreover,
the relationship between past and future is generally formulated as a question of reality
versus possibility (Renn, 1992: 56), as political risk management is conceptualized as a
matter of controlling the future by mapping or analysing past political developments.
Hence, although these studies rarely make claims regarding history, the power of such
risk analysis lies in its claims on temporality; in that of ‘making the future present’. The
present insecurity about a future political situation is that which is expressed in the for-
mulation of political risk. It sets out to define the concept of the political in order to
improve practice, earn money or save lives and thereby make progress.
Critics of such an understanding of risk have pointed out the inherent instability of
such a calculable approach to risk. As reasoned by the sociologists (Adams, 1995;
Rayner, 1992), in any modern discourse, risk is something that must be acted upon; every
time a risk level is assessed, action therefore follows (shifts in behaviour, engaging in
public debate, etc.). The basis for the risk calculation therefore also changes in this proc-
ess of action. Thus, risk is not, as assumed in this approach, something that we are pas-
sive in relation to, but every risk communication involves an active agent in the creation
of those risks. One example is if a private security company such as G4S, which makes
risk-level assessments, raises the political risk level of a British corporate investment in
Sierra Leone to 8 from 5 (out of 10), it may possibly alter the behaviour of a number of
companies and possibly alter the risk level of the single company keeping their business
in the country. Hence, risk levels are not static; they are constantly changing due to
continuous action and assessment; the distinction between the observed and the observer
becomes impossible to establish.
A second critique relates to the understanding of political. Politics is not only under-
stood as spatially connected to the foreign nation state, but also intrinsically external
to the actors who run risks, and make decisions and investments. Politics proceeds
outside of the private sphere of the risk-taker, and a clear distinction between the pri-
vate undertaking and political sphere is thereby established. However, such a distinc-
tion discloses the possibility of conceptualizing the risk-taker (company or another
government) as a political actor, for example, when a company or government organi-
zation finds it too politically risky to invest or intervene in new markets or countries
and therefore refrains from doing so, it may contribute to a changing political situation
in the host country. Thus, such an understanding of politics addresses how politics —
as a formal entity — is acted upon, yet these scholars fail to recognize what Mary
Douglas, for example, has repeatedly stated: that political logics (ideologies and
visions) are internalized in the corporate decisions and that the company is therefore a
political player in society in its risk-thinking. Table 1 sums up the main differences in
the three approaches to risk in security studies, showing how these approaches differ
with regard to inspiration, conceptual understanding, method, analytical categories,
conceptual distinctions and scientific aim.
culturally or contextually defined concepts (Campbell, 1992; Hansen, 2001) and address-
ing such diversity is methodologically important if we want to better understand current
security/risk identity practices.21 Nikolas Rose makes a somewhat similar critique in his
evaluation of Ulrich Beck’s risk society thesis. He writes, ‘I think this notion of risk
society, though suggestive, is misleading. It implies something homogenous and all
embracing, an array of effects that are amenable to an epochal sociological explanation’
(Rose, 2002: 213). Yet while Rose urges us to study the spread of a particular risk think-
ing — one associated with calculability and economic control — I propose that we start
with a more conceptually sensitive approach: one which recognizes that other concepts
of risk — than this particular modern liberal concept — also work as governmentality in
political life. One example can be found in the US management of the risk of terrorism
(counterterrorism), where management is not always understood as a matter of calculat-
ing the threat, but also of patriotism and belonging to the ‘homeland’. American counter-
terrorism rests largely on an understanding of risk management as a matter of protecting
vulnerable sectors and values in society — on a valuation of what we have and must
preserve — rather than on the idea of calculable probability and technical control
(Petersen and Tjalve, 2009). An analytical approach sensitive to conceptual change and
diversity would enable us to identify innovations in political language (see Skinner,
2002), and provide us with the ability to grasp new developments in the corporate, gov-
ernmental or organizational conception of risk. A conceptual discourse does not exist by
itself; rather, it will always be defined in interaction with other discourses (e.g. liberalism
versus republicanism, or differences between national discourses). Thus, there will
always be competing language systems in the sense that no single discourse can domi-
nate totally (Pocock, 1975, 1996). Yet such recognition of change, diversity and counter-
discourses would also identify political potential.
Thus, an analytical sensitivity attentive to the constitution of conceptual meaning is
generally missed. I would argue that we should begin elsewhere. The debate should not
focus on whether some philosophically or theoretically defined concepts fit reality or
not, but instead on what kind of reality these concepts convey and prescribe. We should
bring concepts back into a conceptual debate on risk and security; an attempt at taking
concepts seriously and showing how they shape our political reality by constituting
authority, identity, time and function.
there are also arguments against seeing this risk debate as part of the widening debate.
The widening perspective did build in the idea that ‘security’ was increasingly rele-
vant to a broader empirical field as well as disciplines; going beyond the military
domain; and was therefore important to the study of a wider range of sectors (eco-
nomics, environment and society). The widening debate thus aimed at studying what
one roughly speaking could call ‘the expansion of security’. The starting point of risk
studies is not the same.23 Risk studies want to approach threats that do not respect the
‘old’ dividing lines between foreign and international, crime and security, normal and
exceptional political life and so on — threats including terrorism, climate change and
financial crises that often cannot be considered to be solely a matter of security in the
traditional sense of the word (as a securitization).
This brings me to the question of why securitization theory cannot fill the gap and
the need for an approach which is sensitive to concepts while taking new and emerging
threats into account. The answer is straightforward: because securitization theory is
not sensitive enough to conceptual change. As Wæver indicates in his conceptual anal-
ysis of security, securitization as a speech act is closely tied to modern understandings
of necessity, state and raison d’état. Most studies on risk in security studies argue that
such an understanding of security is under pressure, which can be observed by study-
ing the security/risk thinking of emergency agencies, insurance companies, intelli-
gence agencies and so on.
The problem is not solved by calling a speech act on risk ‘a riskification’, as some
have suggested (see Corry, 2009; and supported by Ole Wæver).24 An understanding of
risk practices as riskification may sound appealing but encounters the same problem of
discursive fixation as securitization theory (Huysmans, 2006), as such an analytical con-
cept would require a description of the exact character of such a speech act. Instead of
seeking to reach a better understanding of how security influences risk management
practices, for example, such a position would simply close the debate — make the pos-
sibility of grasping current changes in the meaning of risk and security (e.g. due to new
understandings of crime, intelligence police, etc.) not viable.
One could of course argue that suggesting a wider perspective of risk and security
comes with a price, as it opens up the possibility that everything can be constructed as
a security issue; a route which we, following Wæver, for normative/democratic reasons
do not want to take. Such a position, however, shows very little trust in democracy and
tends to conceal the place of normativity/democracy in a widening approach. A concep-
tual analysis can point out the possible emancipatory strategies; may help us to consider
and find promise, without assuming prior superior knowledge about the political stakes.
As O’Malley argues: ‘Risk may take a wide diversity of forms’, some of which may not
be as oppressive, individualist and polarizing as often assumed in the critical risk litera-
ture (O’Malley, 2008: 453–454). Risk studies (science) should be experimental and
aimed at rewriting old vocabularies, thereby opening up critique by suggesting new
forms of social and political practice (see Cochran, 1999; Murphy and Rorty, 1990).
And the exact same can be said about security. In similar terms, there is no reason to
assume that the political rationality of security cannot be inclusive or democratic.25 One
way to treat such potential, however, would be the sensitive study of the changing con-
ceptual understandings.
Acknowledgement
I would like to thank Barry Buzan, Anna Leander, Rens van Münster, Vibeke Schou Tjalve, Trine
Villumsen and Ole Wæver for their comments on earlier versions of this article.
Notes
1. Questioning the possibility of calculating risks is hardly new. Many scholars have done so
(and from different perspectives), including Dean (1998), Adams (1995) and Beck (2002).
What is new, however, is that scholars and practitioners, persons who otherwise firmly
believed in the possibility of measuring risks prior to 9/11, now question this measurement;
for example, in the economic literature on risk analysis, terrorism is often mentioned as a risk
that hardly can be comprehended within an economic logic due to the lack of measurability
and controllability. Michael Huber argues that ‘[l]acking any kind of experience, insurance
activities are left with “gut-feelings” about the insurance aspects’ (Huber, 2002: 1). He thus
concludes that the industry is therefore very reluctant to offer terrorism insurance. (for other
examples of similar problems with risk analysis on terrorism, see Knunreuther and Heal,
2003; Schneier, 2003; Viscusi and Zeckhauser, 2003).
2. According to Web of Science, risk is a ‘topic’ in the article if the article includes the word risk
in the title, abstract or as an author keyword (www.iisknowledge.com).
3. Mikkel Vedby Rasmussen makes a similar observation in his essay on risk and security
(Rasmussen, 2010).
4. Rasmussen (2010) also sets out to review the risk literature in security studies. Contrary
to the present article, however, he does not map the entire field of risk studies in IR and
does not show what the disciplinary roots of this debate are and what claims to the political
are implied in the different conceptions of risk. Rather, Rasmussen presents some important
themes (management, temporality and reflexivity) in the current debate which he believes
should be further explored.
5. German historian Reinhart Koselleck has a very similar understanding of concepts, as he
argues that concepts are ‘concentrates of meaning’ (Koselleck, 1985: 84). For more about
Skinner’s methodological position, see Skinner (2002). See Bartelson (2000) for a similar
attempt to use conceptual history/analysis in IR.
6. Most noticeably, I do not treat the technical approaches to risk separately (e.g. engi-
neering and medicine). However, the concept of risk applied in those analyses is very
close to the one found in the economic approaches (for more on technical approaches,
see Adams, 1995; Renn, 1992). Likewise, I have not included the many approaches to
Science Technology — some of which come very close to the cultural position on risk
(cf. Jasanoff, 2002, 2009). ‘Risk communication’ could also be included as an approach
to risk, yet risk communication has become synonymous with a wide range of studies on
the conditions for communicating information and scientific knowledge that also tend
to work with a concept of risk close to the ones found in either the economic or cultural
approaches (Gutteling and Wiegman, 1996; Sublet et al., 1996). Not only would an inclu-
sion of these other perspectives on risk have required much more space, it would also not
have made a major difference to the conclusion as the concepts of risk expressed in these
other approaches are very close — and often linked — to the concepts expressed in the three
disciplines treated here.
7. These two logics are obviously related, as the insurance aspect is often a calculable ele-
ment in any investment strategy, for example, it (ceteris paribus) becomes more expensive
to insure against terrorism if the company operates in nations perceived to be more prone
to terrorism.
8. The term ‘independent event’ refers to the fact that two similar risk events/incidents do not
directly depend on each other. Independent events are, for example, traffic accidents, which
are considered more or less coincidental. Independence is in many ways impossible; however,
when linked to large-size populations, some risks are considered more independent than others.
9. See Bernstein (1998) for a presentation of this reasoning.
10. The works of Nikolas Rose (1993, 2002), Ian Hacking (1990, 2003) and David Garland
(2001, 2003) have also been influential for the governmentality studies on risk.
11. The ambiguity of the concept of ‘risk’ will be illuminated by focusing on the constitution
of concepts and counter-concepts. A counter-concept is in many respects the concept’s radi-
cal Other — as the concept that is discursively constituted as different from the concept
and which is inescapable from a description of the concept. In other words, the unity of
the conceptual constellations is formed by the distinctions made in the articulations of
self-reference.
12. Yet these scholars are often critical towards Beck’s more or less materialistic or realist
interpretation of today’s risk society (Aradau and van Münster, 2007); a society of risk
which Beck argues is qualitatively different in terms of threats and knowledge.
13. For a similar critique of Critical security studies (especially the works of Ken Booth), see
Wæver (2009).
14. Giddens has a similar periodization of modernity versus late modernity. In the late-modern
society, he differentiates between two types of risks — external risks and manufactured
risks (Giddens, 1990, 1991, 2002).
15. Mitchell Dean has raised a similar criticism of Beck, arguing that Beck treats risk as ontologi-
cally given and fails to recognize that risks are socially constructed (Dean, 1998: 218).
16. See, for example, Luhmann (1998: 16ff.).
17. Likewise, Zarkada-Fraser and Fraser define political risk as ‘the aggregate negative effect
of governmental and societal actions and/or inertia on a select group or all foreign concerns
operating in or wishing to penetrate a country’s market’ (Zarkada-Fraser and Fraser, 2002:
99). For a discussion of the various definitions, see Jarvis (2004) and Krobin (1979).
18. The subjects of concern under the name of ‘political risk’ have proven to depend on the gen-
eral international political developments, for example, expropriation as the dominant concern
in the post-war period of decolonization. See Haufler (1997) for a brilliant analysis of how the
concept of political risk has developed historically as a ‘business norm’.
19. Coker also uses Furedi’s term ‘Cultures of fear’ to describe the late-modern risk society
(Coker, 2009; Furedi, 2006).
20. This is especially striking because critical studies on risk within security studies are largely
formed by scholars who are highly conscious and articulate about the identity issues at play
in a modern discourse of security.
21. For an account of the disciplinary developments in security studies, see Walt (1991). For a
history of the concept of security (especially looking at the international aspect of the con-
cept), see Wæver (2003).
22. Thanks to Ole Wæver for raising this point.
23. In his article, Olaf Corry refers to ‘riskization’ as a pendant to securitization and
defines its main rhetorical elements as being about general harm, potential futures and
manageability.
24. Rita Floyd and Paul Roe are probably the authors who have most directly raised this point in
security studies in their attempt to show how securitization might not be negative and repres-
sive. However, I will not go as far as Floyd and argue that we must make universal criteria
for normative judgement, but rather show potential by critically investigating different risk
practices and concepts in today’s political struggles (Floyd, 2007; Roe, 2006).
References
Adams J (1995) Risk. London: UCL Press.
Amoore L (2004) Risk, reward and discipline at work. Economy and Society 33(2): 174–196.
Amoore L and De Goede M (2005) Governance, risk and dataveillance in the war on terror. Crime,
Law and Social Change 43(2): 149–173.
Aradau C and van Münster RV (2007) Governing terrorism through risk: Taking precautions,
(un)knowing the future. European Journal of International Relations 30(1): 89–115.
Aradau C and van Münster RV (2008) Insuring terrorism, assuring subjects, ensuring normality:
The politics of risk after 9/11. Alternatives: Global, Local, Political 33(2): 191–210.
Aradau C, Lobo-Guerrero L and Münster RV (2008) Security, technologies of risk, and the political:
Guest editors’ introduction. Security Dialogue 39(2–3): 147–154.
Bartelson J (2000) Three concepts of globalization. International Sociology 15(2): 181–197.
Beck U (1992) Risk Society: Towards a New Modernity. London: Sage.
Beck U (1996) World risk society as cosmopolitan society. Theory, Culture & Society 13(4): 1–32.
Beck U (1999) World Risk Society. Cambridge: Polity.
Beck U (2002) The terrorist threat: World risk society revisited. Theory, Culture & Society 19(4):
39–55.
Beck U (2003) The silence of words: On terror and war. Security Dialogue 34(3): 255–268.
Bernstein PL (1998) Against the Gods. New York: John Wiley & Sons.
Buzan B and Hansen L (2009) The Evolution of International Security Studies. Cambridge:
Cambridge University Press.
Buzan B Wæver O and de Wilde J (1998) Security: A New Framework for Analysis. Boulder, CO:
Lynne Rienner.
Campbell D (1992) Writing Security: United States Foreign Policy and the Policy of Identity.
Manchester: Manchester University Press.
Cochran M (1999) Normative Theory in International Relations: A Pragmatic Approach. Cambridge
and New York: Cambridge University Press.
Cohen AV (1996) Quantitative risk assessment and decision about risk: An essential input into
the decision process. In: Hood C and Jones DKC (eds) Accident and Design: Contemporary
Debates in Risk Management. London: UCL Press, 87–98.
Coker C (2002) Globalisation and Insecurity in the Twenty-first Century: NATO and the Manage-
ment of Risk. London: International Institute for Strategic Studies, Adelphi Paper 345.
Coker C (2009) War in an Age of Risk. Cambridge: Polity.
Corry O (2009) Two logics of security: Securitization and ‘riskization’. Paper presented at the
Staff and PhD Colloquium, Centre of International Studies, University of Cambridge, 27
January 2008.
Covello VT (1983) The Analysis of Actual versus Perceived Risks. New York: Plenum Press.
Coyle G (2003) Scenario thinking and strategic modelling. In: Campbell A (ed.) The Oxford Hand-
book of Strategy: A Strategy Overview and Competitive Strategy. vol. 1. Oxford: Oxford Uni-
versity Press.
Dean M (1998) Risk, calculable and incalculable. Soziale Welt 49: 25–42.
Dean M (1999) Governmentality, Power and Rule in Modern Society. London: Sage.
Douglas M (1966) Purity and Danger: Concepts of Pollution and Taboo. London: Routledge.
Douglas M (1990) Risk as forensic resource. Dædalus 119(4): 1–16.
Douglas M (1992) Risk and Blame. New York: Routledge.
Douglas M and Wildavsky A (1982) Risk and Culture: An Essay on the Selection of Technical and
Environmental Dangers. Berkeley, CA: University of California Press.
Ericson R and Doyle A (2004) Catastrophe risk, insurance and terrorism. Economy and Society
33(2): 135–173.
Ewald F (1991) Insurance and risk. In: Burchell G, Gordon C and Miller P (eds) The Foucault
Effect: Studies in Governmentality. Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press, 197–210.
Ewald F (2002) The return of Descartes’s malicious demon: An outline of a philosophy of precau-
tion. In: Baker T and Simon J (eds) Embracing Risk. Chicago, IL and London: University of
Chicago Press, 273–302.
Fisher E (2001) Is the precautionary principle justiciable? Journal of Environmental Law 13(3):
315–334.
Floyd R (2007) Towards a consequentialist evaluation of security: Bringing together the Copenha-
gen and the Welsh Schools of security studies. Review of International Studies 33(2): 327–350.
Foucault M (1991) Governmentality. In: Burchell G, Gordon C and Miller P (eds) The Foucault
Effect: Studies in Governmentality. Chicago, IL: The University of Chicago Press, 87–104.
Foucault M (2007 [1977]) Security, Territory, Population: Lectures at the College de France,
1977–78. Basingstoke and New York: Palgrave Macmillan.
Furedi F (2006) Culture of Fear: Risk-taking and the Morality of Low Expectation, 4th edn. London:
Continuum.
Garland D (2001) The Culture of Control. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Garland D (2003) The rise of risk. In: Doyle A and Ericson RV (eds) Risk and Morality. Toronto,
Buffalo and London: University of Toronto Press, 48–86.
Gaskell G and Allum NC (2001) Two Cultures of Risk. London: Centre for the Analysis of Risk
and Regulation, London School of Economics and Political Science.
Giddens A (1990) The Consequences of Modernity. Cambridge: Polity in association with
Blackwell.
Giddens A (1991) Modernity and Self-Identity: Self and Society in the Late Modern Age.
Cambridge: Polity.
Giddens A (2002) Runaway World. How Globalisation is Reshaping Our Lives. London: Profile
Books.
Green R (1972) Political Instability as a Determinant of US Foreign Investment. Austin, TX:
Bureau of Business Research, University of Austin.
Gutteling JM and Wiegman O (1996) Exploring Risk Communication. Dordrecht and Boston, MA:
Kluwer Academic.
Hacking I (1990) The Taming of Chance. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Hacking I (2003) Risk and dirt. In: Doyle A and Ericson RV (eds) Risk and Moralíty. Toronto:
University of Toronto Press, 22–47.
Hansen L (2001) Gender, nation, rape: Bosnia and the construction of security. International Fem-
inist Journal of Politics 3(1): 55–75.
Hashmin MA and Guvenli T (1992) Importance of political risk assessment function in US multi-
national corporations. Global Finance Journal 3(2): 137–144.
Haufler V (1997) Dangerous Commerce. Ithaca, NY and London: Cornell University Press.
Haufler V (1999) Self-regulation and buisness norms: Political risk, political activism. In: Cutler
AC, Haufler V and Porter T (eds) Private Authority and International Affairs. Albany, NY:
State University of New York Press, 199–222.
Heng Y (2006) War as Risk Management: Strategy and Conflict in an Age of Globalised Risks.
New York: Routledge.
Huber M (2002) Managing the unknown future: Different rationales for insuring against terrorism.
World Trade Bulletin 10.
Huysmans J (2006) The Politics of Insecurity: Fear, Migration and Asylum in the EU. London and
New York: Routledge.
Jarvis D (2004) International relations and international risk: Method and technique in political
risk analysis. Paper presented at the International Studies Association, Montreal, 17 March.
Jarvis D (2007) Risk, globalization and the nation state: A critical appraisal of Ulrich Beck and the
world risk society thesis. Global Society: Interdisciplinary Journal of International Relations
21(1): 23–46.
Jarvis D and Griffiths M (2007) Learning to fly: The evolution of political risk analysis. Global
Society 21(1): 5–21.
Jasanoff S (2002) Citizens at risk: Cultures of modernity in the US and EU. Science as Culture
11(3): 363–380.
Jasanoff S (2009) Judgment under siege: The three-body problem of expert legitimacy. In: Maasen S
and Weingart P (eds) Democratization of Expertise? Exploring Novel Forms of Scientific Advice
in Political Decision-Making. Dordrecht: Springer, 209–224.
Kahan DM, Jenkins-Smith H and Brama D (2010) Cultural cognition of scientific consensus.
Journal of Risk Research September: 1–28.
Kessler O and Werner W (2008) Extrajudicial killing as risk management. Security Dialogue
39(2–3): 289–308.
Knight FH (1921) Risk, Uncertainty and Profit. Boston, MA and New York: Houghton Mifflin.
Knunreuther H and Heal G (2003) Interdependent security. Journal of Risk and Uncertainty
26(2/3): 231–249.
Koselleck R (1985) Futures Past. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.
Kolluru RV (1995) Risk assessment and management: A unified approach. In: Kolluru RV, Bartell
S, Pitblado R et al. (eds) Risk Assessment and Management Handbook for Environmental,
Health, and Safety Professionals. New York: McGraw-Hill, 1.3–1.41.
Krobin S (1979) Political risk: A review and reconsideration. Journal of International Business
Studies 10(1): 67–80.
Lobo-Guerrero L (2006) Biopolitics of specialized risk: An analysis of kidnap and ransom insur-
ance. Security Dialogue 38(3): 315–334.
Lobo-Guerrero L (2008) ‘Pirates’, stewards, and the securitization of global circulation. Interna-
tional Political Sociology 2(3): 219–235.
Luhmann N (1993) Risk: A Sociological Theory. New York: Walter de Gruyter.
Luhmann N (1998) Observations on Modernity. Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press.
Muller, B. J. 2008. “Securing the political imagination: Popular culture, the security dispositif and
the biometric state.” Security Dialogue 39 (2–3):199–220.
Murphy JP and Rorty R (1990) Pragmatism: From Peirce to Davidson. Boulder, CO: Westview
Press.
Nye JL-J (1988) International security studies: A report of a conference on the state of the field.
International Security 12(4): 5–27.
O’Malley P (1996) Indigenous governance. Economy & Society 25(3): 310–326.
O’Malley P (2008) Experiments in risk and criminal justice. Theoretical Criminology 12(4): 451–469.
Petersen KL and Tjalve VS (2009) Counterterrorism and the Return of republican patriotism.
Paper presented at the Liberal Internationalism seminar, Danish Institute for International
Studies, 10 September.
Pocock JGA (1975) The Machiavellian Moment: Florentine Political Theory and the Atlantic
Republican Tradition. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press.
Pocock JGA (1996) Concepts and Discourses: A Difference in Culture? Comments on a paper
by Melvin Richter, Occasional Paper no. 15. Washington, DC: German Historical Institute,
47–58.
Rasmussen MV (2001) Reflective security: NATO and international risk society. Millennium
30(2): 285–309.
Rasmussen MV (2004) ‘It sounds like a riddle’: Security studies, the war on terror and risk. Mil-
lenium 33(2): 381–395.
Rasmussen MV (2006) The Risk Society at War: Terror, Technology and Strategy in the Twenty-
First Century. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Rasmussen MV (2010) Risk and security. International Studies Compendium. Oxford: Blackwell
Publishing. Available at: www.isacompendium.com
Rayner S (1992) Cultural theory and risk analysis. In: Krimsky S and Golding D (eds) Social
Theories of Risk. London: Praeger, 83–116.
Renn O (1992) Concepts of risk: A classification. In: Krimsky S and Golding D (eds) Social Theo-
ries of Risk. London: Praeger, 53–82.
Renn O (2008) Concepts of risk: An interdisciplinary review — Part 1: Disciplinary risk concepts.
Gaia-Ecological Perspectives for Science and Society 17(1): 50–66.
Roe P (2006) Reconstructing identities or managing minorities? Desecuritizing minority rights: A
response to Jutila. Security Dialogue 37(3): 425–438.
Rose N (1993) Government, authority and expertise in advanced liberalism. Economy and Society
22(3): 283–299.
Rose N (2002) A risk of madness. In: Baker T and Simon J (eds) Embracing Risk: The Changing
Culture of Insurance and Responsibility. Chicago, IL and London: The University of Chicago
Press, 209–237.
Rowe WD (1979) What is an acceptable risk and how can it be determined. In: Goodman GT and
Rowe WD (eds) Energy Risk Management. London: Academic Press, 327–344.
Rowe WD (1980) Risk assessment approaches and methods. In: Conrad J (ed.) Society, Technol-
ogy and Risk Assessment. New York and London: Academic Press, 3–29.
Salter MB (2008) Imagining numbers: Risk, quantification, and aviation security. Security Dia-
logue 39(2–3): 243–266.
Sand PH (2000) The precautionary principle: A European perspective. Human and Ecological
Risk Assessment 6(3): 445–458.
Schneier B (2003) Beyond Fear: Thinking Sensibly about Security in an Uncertain World.
New York: Copernicus Books.
Skinner Q (1989) The state. In: Ball T, Farr J and Hanson RL (eds) Political Innovation and Con-
ceptual Change. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 90–131.
Skinner Q (2002) Visions of Politics. Volume I. Regarding Method. Cambridge: Cambridge
University Press.
Sublet VH, Covello VT, Tinker TL et al. (1996) Scientific Uncertainty and its Influence on the
Public Communication Process. Dordrecht and London: Kluwer Academic Publishers.
Taleb NN (2008) The Black Swan. London: Penguin Books.
Tickner A (1992) Gender in International Relations: Feminist Perspectives on Achieving Global
Security. New York: Columbia University Press.
Ullman R (1983) Redefining security. International Security 8(1): 129–153.
Viscusi WK and Zeckhauser RJ (2003) Sacrificing civil liberties to reduce terrorism risks. Journal
of Risk and Uncertainty 26(2/3): 99–120.
Wæver O (2003) Security: A conceptual history for international relations. Paper presented at the
Meeting of the Nordic Political Science Association, August.
Wæver O (2009) Theorising security politically: Theories of securitisation between socio-linguistic
pragmatics and prescriptive philosophy. Unpublished draft manuscript presented to the Interna-
tional Relations group, Department of Political Science, University of Copenhagen.
Walt SM (1991) The renaissance of security studies. International Studies Quarterly 35(2):
211–239.
Weston FW and Sorge BW (1972) International Managerial Finance. Homewood, IL: Richard D.
Irwin.
Wildavsky A and Dake K (1990) Theories of risk perception — Who fears what and why. Dae-
dalus 119(4): 41–60.
Williams MJ (2008) (In) Security studies, reflexive modernization and the risk society. Coopera-
tion and Conflict 43(1): 57–79.
Zarkada-Fraser A and Fraser C (2002) Risk perception of UK firms towards the Russian market.
International Journal of Project Management 20: 99–105.
Biographical note
Karen Lund Petersen is Researcher and Deputy Director at the Centre for Advanced
Security Theory, University of Copenhagen, Denmark. She holds a PhD in Political
Science from the University of Copenhagen, and has taught and published on International
Relations theory, conceptual history, risk management and security studies.