This article explores the possibility of Critical Security Studies (CSS) in the geopolitical context of modern Asia. Following the end of the Cold War, CSS emerged and developed by broadening and deepening the contested concept of ‘security’ while focusing on people rather than states. Borrowing critical perspectives fromthe Frankfurt School, including critical social constructivism, feminism, the post-colonial theory, and the post-structural theory, CSS tries to deepen the concept of security by prioritizing both the ontological and epistemic emancipation (or liberation) of oppressed people, and by resisting the realistic theory of the powerful, by the powerful, for the powerful.

However, the world’s political reality is again becoming harsh. For example, ‘the war on terror’ following 9/11 has enforced a security state by securitizing every sector. In addition, state-centrism, which still remains hegemonic in Asian geo-politics, suppresses the separatist dissidents by utilizing the excuse that it is part of ‘the war on terror.’ The irony of this excuse is that post-colonial Asian states use the discourse of national liberation against imperialistic colonialism in order to legitimize its human rights abuses against minorities, which is an internal enemy for the states. We can call this kind of phenomena the “emancipation dilemma.” If an emancipatory project or movement becomes hegemonic and is institutionalized in accordance with state-centrism, that regime may bring about another oppression.

We need to go beyond this kind of state-centrism by bringing the CSS perspective into an Asian context, too. Here, we focus upon the bio-politics of a geo-body that manages the operations of the technology of territorial sovereignty, which creates nationhood spatially by strengthening the performative aspects of borders between the inside (friend) and the outside (enemy). In order to liberate the people suppressed by the security states, we need to overcome the politics of a geo-body and go beyond border thinking derived fromnationalistic essentialism.

Discussions around the concept of the security guarantee have increased in recent years. One of the main points of these discussions concerns the issue of so-called “Redefining Security:” modern security is so complicated that it cannot be reduced to the traditional military-centric national security model. Areas outside of military affairs need to be examined as security challenges. The range of security activities and the rapid manifestation of new threats in recent decades need revising. In a multipolar world, the subject matter encompassed by the field of Security Studies is substantial.

As the “New Security Agenda” becomes more prevalent, the concept of national sovereignty, which is at the core of the security guarantee, and the limitations of military force now receive greater recognition. However, the military-centric conception of a national security policy remains deeply rooted. Particularly since 9/11, because of the muddled status of the ideas of “Old Wars” and “New Wars,” there is a need for a theoretical framework that captures the conceptual perspectives characterizing the relationship between military and non-military security policy.

This paper will reevaluate the theoretical debate, and the symbolic struggle for the political legitimacy surrounding the concept of the security guarantee, against the backdrop of the globalization of security policy. The majority of the discussions concerning the concept of the security guarantee since the end of the Cold War have tended to address the problems of the “Security Dilemma.” The divergence between the concept of security itself and national security policy is now treated as a genuine theoretical problem. Furthermore, this paper examines the theoretical significance of Critical Security Studies in recent years and the limitations of this field, while focusing on the impact of the historical structure and the discursive meta-structure surrounding the concept of security.

This article introduces and analyzes the activities of the International Women’s Network Against Militarism (IWNAM), a transnational network of feminists living in communities that host US troops or military bases in Okinawa, mainland Japan, Korea, the Philippines, Puerto Rico, Guam, Hawai’i and the continental United States. It was launched in 1997, inspired by Okinawa Women Act Against Military Violence, who has stressed the need for a redefinition of security and has challenged the current militarized security systemfroma gender perspective, that problematizes the gender hierarchy of patriarchal structures.

Through network activities that have built transnational solidarity, IWNAM members have identified common problems faced by host communities that are often trivialized in militarized security discourse and policies. The negative impacts of militarism are wide ranging but can be summarized in three categories: sexual violence, destruction of livelihood, and disrespect for the identities of people in host communities. These are manifestations of violence inherent in militarized security systems that impose a disproportionately heavy burden on marginalized and less politically-powerful groups of people such as those in former colonized areas and women in host communities.

Sexual violence committed by US soldiers includes sexual crimes as well as the system of sex industries around US bases established mainly in Okinawa, Korea, and the Philippines. For IWNAM members, sexual violence is central to their analytical framework regarding militarized security that is deeply gendered. In recent years, IWNAM members, particularly those in Puerto Rico, Guam, Hawai’i, and Okinawa, which were colonized by the United States and/or Japan, have increasingly maintained that the current militarized security is supported by continuing colonialismand racismthat deny the dignity of people of the host communities and continue to oppress them.

The article concludes by stating that IWNAM calls for a feminist perspective of peace and security.

Realists often criticize pacifism for its overly idealistic security model and the fact that it does not reflect the reality of international society, thus concluding that it does more harm than good. To ensure the security of a state, so these critics say, pacifists rely on the utopian ideas of cooperation and dialogue, whereas realists give much more weight to realistic means, such as balance and power. Pacifists, however, do not think of their own security model as being too optimistic. Rather, in their view, the realist security model of the balance of power rests on a controversial premise that simply assumes the practice of rational self-restraint by those who actually manipulate political and military power.

Both pacifists and realists appear to assert that their opponent’s theory is just a fantasy, and that their own theory truly captures the reality of the world. In my opinion, however, such a controversy, in which each side competes to be less idealistic and more realistic than the other, seems to be off the point, because theorizing in general cannot help but inevitably contain some idealized abstraction of our reality. What should be asked instead is, what the purpose of the idealization is, and whether it is accompanied with some viable options for dealing with a notalways-ideal reality.

This paper makes reference to recent methodological studies in contemporary political philosophy concerning the ideal/non-ideal theory distinction, with an aim to correct the nature and purpose of the above-mentioned (and somewhat misleading) realist-pacifist dispute. After making clear that realists are not different frompacifists in that they, too, idealize part of our reality through the process of theorizing, I suggest that a non-ideal reality be incorporated into the theory again to meet the requirements of practical feasibility. Lastly, I emphasize that our attempt to depict a utopian ideal nevertheless continues to play an important constitutive role in the entire theoretical enterprise.

This paper aims to shed some light on women’s engagement in the processes of peace building after armed conflicts. United Nations Security Council Resolution 1325 (SCR 1325) seeks to mainstream gender perspectives and achieve gender equality. In order to do this, it encourages the member states to include women fromboth public institutions and civil society in the policy-making processes of peace building. The expectation is that the increase of women’s involvement will prompt states to reform their traditionally male-dominated classical security frameworks. Scholars and institutions that advocate the promotion of gender mainstreaming expect that the participation of women will serve to not only bring gender perspectives into peace building, but also democratize the policy-making processes.

However, it is necessary to recognize that such expectations depend on the following dichotomized views: (1) The basis for differentiating civil society from the state rests on the fact that civil society has nothing to do with the exercise of power and the practice of governance; and, (2) The basis for differentiating women from men is that women are peaceful and men are not. These essentialized dichotomies tend to overlook the fact that the purpose of including women from civil society is to maintain, rather than reform, the classical frameworks of security. In this respect, by drawing on the Foucauldian perspective of Governmentality, this paper attempts to make the relationship between civil society and governance visible. More specifically, it explores how the Canadian Committee on Women, Peace and Security, which consists of civil society representatives, government officials, and parliamentarians, aims at the full implementation of SCR 1325, and transforms women into feminized subjects in the form of “peacemakers.”

The purpose of this paper lies in clarifying why the increasingly dire humanitarian situation did not necessarily improve, despite the initiatives taken by the international community, after the end of the Cold War. Much of the existing research argues that the international community did not have a sufficient desire, nor did it take sufficient actions to improve the humanitarian situation during the two decades after the end of the Cold War. This paper first demonstrates that this explanation alone is not complete, and then raises the issue of the “paradox of humanitarianism.” There was a succession of new policies relating to preventing and reacting to humanitarian issues, as well as rebuilding following the rise of these issues, that were created based on previous lessons learned when a humanitarian crisis took place, escalated, or was unable to be prevented from reoccurring. One of the results of these policies was the expansion of the content of the actions taken through rebuilding policies, known as post-conflict peace building, and a lengthening of these policies’ timetables. It has become difficult to implement these rebuilding policies without constraining the sovereignty of the nation where the humanitarian crisis is taking place, and without arousing anxieties in the leadership of that nation. Due to this anxiety about the future, even if the international community requests improvements to the humanitarian situation during the reaction phase in the form of a peacekeeping force or humanitarian assistance force, it is not easy to have the country in question give their consent to such interventions. This could potentially lead to even creating obstructions to the improvement of certain humanitarian situations. This paper identifies a total of four situations in which these types of paradoxes can occur.

This article explores the possibility of Critical Security Studies (CSS) in the geopolitical context of modern Asia. Following the end of the Cold War, CSS emerged and developed by broadening and deepening the contested concept of ‘security’ while focusing on people rather than states. Borrowing critical perspectives fromthe Frankfurt School, including critical social constructivism, feminism, the post-colonial theory, and the post-structural theory, CSS tries to deepen the concept of security by prioritizing both the ontological and epistemic emancipation (or liberation) of oppressed people, and by resisting the realistic theory of the powerful, by the powerful, for the powerful.

However, the world’s political reality is again becoming harsh. For example, ‘the war on terror’ following 9/11 has enforced a security state by securitizing every sector. In addition, state-centrism, which still remains hegemonic in Asian geo-politics, suppresses the separatist dissidents by utilizing the excuse that it is part of ‘the war on terror.’ The irony of this excuse is that post-colonial Asian states use the discourse of national liberation against imperialistic colonialism in order to legitimize its human rights abuses against minorities, which is an internal enemy for the states. We can call this kind of phenomena the “emancipation dilemma.” If an emancipatory project or movement becomes hegemonic and is institutionalized in accordance with state-centrism, that regime may bring about another oppression.

We need to go beyond this kind of state-centrismby bringing the CSS perspective into an Asian context, too. Here, we focus upon the bio-politics of a geo-body that manages the operations of the technology of territorial sovereignty, which creates nationhood spatially by strengthening the performative aspects of borders between the inside (friend) and the outside (enemy). In order to liberate the people suppressed by the security states, we need to overcome the politics of a geo-body and go beyond border thinking derived fromnationalistic essentialism.

Discussions around the concept of the security guarantee have increased in recent years. One of the main points of these discussions concerns the issue of so-called “Redefining Security:” modern security is so complicated that it cannot be reduced to the traditional military-centric national security model. Areas outside of military affairs need to be examined as security challenges. The range of security activities and the rapid manifestation of new threats in recent decades need revising. In a multipolar world, the subject matter encompassed by the field of Security Studies is substantial.

As the “New Security Agenda” becomes more prevalent, the concept of national sovereignty, which is at the core of the security guarantee, and the limitations of military force now receive greater recognition. However, the military-centric conception of a national security policy remains deeply rooted. Particularly since 9/11, because of the muddled status of the ideas of “Old Wars” and “New Wars,” there is a need for a theoretical framework that captures the conceptual perspectives characterizing the relationship between military and non-military security policy.

This paper will reevaluate the theoretical debate, and the symbolic struggle for the political legitimacy surrounding the concept of the security guarantee, against the backdrop of the globalization of security policy. The majority of the discussions concerning the concept of the security guarantee since the end of the Cold War have tended to address the problems of the “Security Dilemma.” The divergence between the concept of security itself and national security policy is now treated as a genuine theoretical problem. Furthermore, this paper examines the theoretical significance of Critical Security Studies in recent years and the limitations of this field, while focusing on the impact of the historical structure and the discursive meta-structure surrounding the concept of security.

This article introduces and analyzes the activities of the International Women’s Network Against Militarism (IWNAM), a transnational network of feminists living in communities that host US troops or military bases in Okinawa, mainland Japan, Korea, the Philippines, Puerto Rico, Guam, Hawai’i and the continental United States. It was launched in 1997, inspired by Okinawa Women Act Against Military Violence, who has stressed the need for a redefinition of security and has challenged the current militarized security systemfroma gender perspective, that problematizes the gender hierarchy of patriarchal structures.

Through network activities that have built transnational solidarity, IWNAM members have identified common problems faced by host communities that are often trivialized in militarized security discourse and policies. The negative impacts of militarism are wide ranging but can be summarized in three categories: sexual violence, destruction of livelihood, and disrespect for the identities of people in host communities. These are manifestations of violence inherent in militarized security systems that impose a disproportionately heavy burden on marginalized and less politically-powerful groups of people such as those in former colonized areas and women in host communities.

Sexual violence committed by US soldiers includes sexual crimes as well as the system of sex industries around US bases established mainly in Okinawa, Korea, and the Philippines. For IWNAM members, sexual violence is central to their analytical framework regarding militarized security that is deeply gendered. In recent years, IWNAM members, particularly those in Puerto Rico, Guam, Hawai’i, and Okinawa, which were colonized by the United States and/or Japan, have increasingly maintained that the current militarized security is supported by continuing colonialismand racismthat deny the dignity of people of the host communities and continue to oppress them.

The article concludes by stating that IWNAM calls for a feminist perspective of peace and security.

Realists often criticize pacifism for its overly idealistic security model and the fact that it does not reflect the reality of international society, thus concluding that it does more harm than good. To ensure the security of a state, so these critics say, pacifists rely on the utopian ideas of cooperation and dialogue, whereas realists give much more weight to realistic means, such as balance and power. Pacifists, however, do not think of their own security model as being too optimistic. Rather, in their view, the realist security model of the balance of power rests on a controversial premise that simply assumes the practice of rational self-restraint by those who actually manipulate political and military power.

Both pacifists and realists appear to assert that their opponent’s theory is just a fantasy, and that their own theory truly captures the reality of the world. In my opinion, however, such a controversy, in which each side competes to be less idealistic and more realistic than the other, seems to be off the point, because theorizing in general cannot help but inevitably contain some idealized abstraction of our reality. What should be asked instead is, what the purpose of the idealization is, and whether it is accompanied with some viable options for dealing with a notalways-ideal reality.

This paper makes reference to recent methodological studies in contemporary political philosophy concerning the ideal/non-ideal theory distinction, with an aim to correct the nature and purpose of the above-mentioned (and somewhat misleading) realist-pacifist dispute. After making clear that realists are not different frompacifists in that they, too, idealize part of our reality through the process of theorizing, I suggest that a non-ideal reality be incorporated into the theory again to meet the requirements of practical feasibility. Lastly, I emphasize that our attempt to depict a utopian ideal nevertheless continues to play an important constitutive role in the entire theoretical enterprise.

This paper aims to shed some light on women’s engagement in the processes of peace building after armed conflicts. United Nations Security Council Resolution 1325 (SCR 1325) seeks to mainstream gender perspectives and achieve gender equality. In order to do this, it encourages the member states to include women fromboth public institutions and civil society in the policy-making processes of peace building. The expectation is that the increase of women’s involvement will prompt states to reform their traditionally male-dominated classical security frameworks. Scholars and institutions that advocate the promotion of gender mainstreaming expect that the participation of women will serve to not only bring gender perspectives into peace building, but also democratize the policy-making processes.

However, it is necessary to recognize that such expectations depend on the following dichotomized views: (1) The basis for differentiating civil society from the state rests on the fact that civil society has nothing to do with the exercise of power and the practice of governance; and, (2) The basis for differentiating women from men is that women are peaceful and men are not. These essentialized dichotomies tend to overlook the fact that the purpose of including women from civil society is to maintain, rather than reform, the classical frameworks of security. In this respect, by drawing on the Foucauldian perspective of Governmentality, this paper attempts to make the relationship between civil society and governance visible. More specifically, it explores how the Canadian Committee on Women, Peace and Security, which consists of civil society representatives, government officials, and parliamentarians, aims at the full implementation of SCR 1325, and transforms women into feminized subjects in the form of “peacemakers.”

The purpose of this paper lies in clarifying why the increasingly dire humanitarian situation did not necessarily improve, despite the initiatives taken by the international community, after the end of the Cold War. Much of the existing research argues that the international community did not have a sufficient desire, nor did it take sufficient actions to improve the humanitarian situation during the two decades after the end of the Cold War. This paper first demonstrates that this explanation alone is not complete, and then raises the issue of the “paradox of humanitarianism.” There was a succession of new policies relating to preventing and reacting to humanitarian issues, as well as rebuilding following the rise of these issues, that were created based on previous lessons learned when a humanitarian crisis took place, escalated, or was unable to be prevented from reoccurring. One of the results of these policies was the expansion of the content of the actions taken through rebuilding policies, known as post-conflict peace building, and a lengthening of these policies’ timetables. It has become difficult to implement these rebuilding policies without constraining the sovereignty of the nation where the humanitarian crisis is taking place, and without arousing anxieties in the leadership of that nation. Due to this anxiety about the future, even if the international community requests improvements to the humanitarian situation during the reaction phase in the form of a peacekeeping force or humanitarian assistance force, it is not easy to have the country in question give their consent to such interventions. This could potentially lead to even creating obstructions to the improvement of certain humanitarian situations. This paper identifies a total of four situations in which these types of paradoxes can occur.