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Ole Wver Security Dialogue 2011 42: 465 DOI: 10.1177/0967010611418718 The online version of this article can be found at: http://sdi.sagepub.com/content/42/4-5/465

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424-510.1177/0967010611418718Wver: Politics, security, theorySecurity Dialogue

Special issue on The Politics of Securitization

Politics, security, theory

Ole Wver

Security Dialogue 42(4-5) 465480 The Author(s) 2011 Reprints and permission: sagepub. co.uk/journalsPermissions.nav DOI: 10.1177/0967010611418718 sdi.sagepub.com

Centre for Advanced Security Theory, Department of Political Science, University of Copenhagen, Denmark

Abstract
This article outlines three ways of analysing the politics of securitization, emphasizing an often-overlooked form of politics practised through theory design. The structure and nature of a theory can have systematic political implications. Analysis of this politics of securitization is distinct from both the study of political practices of securitization and explorations of competing concepts of politics among security theories. It means tracking what kinds of analysis the theory can produce and whether such analysis systematically impacts real-life political struggles. Securitization theory is found to act politically through three structural features that systematically shape the political effects of using the theory. The article further discusses on the basis of the preceding articles in the special issue three emerging debates around securitization theory: ethics, transformations and post-Western analyses. The article finally suggests one possible way forward for securitization theory: a route built on first clarifying its concept of theory, then specifying more clearly the place of political theory and causal mechanisms in different parts of the analysis. The politics of securitization accordingly becomes sharpened. Instead of deducing the political quality of the theory from various empirical statements by its proponents, this approach zooms in on the very core of the theory: how does it structurally condition work done with it in systematically political ways?

Keywords
securitization, security, Copenhagen School, critical theory, politics, theory-building

Introduction
I am genuinely grateful to the conference organizers-cum-editors, to the authors of the articles in this special issue and to all the other participants at the September 2010 conference for this very inspiring and comprehensive stocktaking on securitization theory in general and its politics in particular. Even now, when the contextual value of helping me past a difficult date is no longer present, it is intellectually enjoyable to be challenged to reconsider and develop so many interesting questions related to the theory of securitization. In these closing reflections, I will try to be well behaved and stick to the questions put on the first page by the editors: to focus in a forward-looking manner on future debates and developments within or without securitization theory and to pay particular attention to the politics of securitization.
Corresponding author: Ole Wver Email: ow@ifs.ku.dk
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The first section of this article outlines three different kinds of politics of securitization, arguing the importance of an often overlooked aspect of politics that is practised through theory design that is, how the structure and nature of a theory have systematic political implications. This kind of politics is distinct both from the study of political practices of securitization and from explorations of competing concepts of politics among security theories. A theory is political primarily through the way it conditions analyses, because a theory is a construct that enables particular observations about cases. However, theories are all too often discussed as though their function were to truthfully reproduce reality, and among progressive scholars are similarly assessed politically in terms of how authentically they depict truly political politics. Following this first section, a brief section presents a particular conception of theory. The middle part of the article then discusses three debates that can be seen emerging around securitization theory: on responsibility, ethics and desecuritization; on transformations in modern society; and on post-Western security theories. The discussion of these three debates draws on the other articles in this special issue, where they are mostly phrased in terms of the two other forms of the politics of securitization that is, as questions about empirical securitization politics or the implied concept of politics. Each of the three debates is then moved towards the third form of politics, where the question of the political choices involved in theory construction is examined. The article finishes with some reflections on one possible way forward for securitization theory. This route was enabled by the earlier sections clarification of a particular concept of theory to adopt, and the route is then in the final section charted by specifying more clearly the place of political theory and causal mechanisms in different parts of securitization analysis, before setting out some of the forms of usage that are opening up with the version of securitization theory propagated here, including the research project pursued at the Centre for Advanced Security Theory (CAST), along with the possibilities for combining securitization theory with other new security theories.

Politics of securitization (theory)

The politics of securitization points to at least three different research questions. First, it might be used to refer to empirical studies of political processes of securitization and desecuritization (knowledge about politics). Second, it can headline research that explores the concept of politics implied in securitization theory (how to define politics). Finally, it might refer to the political moves invested in the theory, i.e. the political act involved in designing and/or employing securitization theory (how to theorize politically). Briefly: political securitization practices, the political in securitization analysis and the politics of securitization theory. The first sense in which the expression is used is obviously important, and almost all of securitization studies is a cumulative effort to explore the phenomena to which it refers. We know more and more about the politics of securitization in this empirical sense: Who does what kind of securitization, how, with how much success and what side-effects, and resisted by whom, and so forth? For (too many) years, the working title of the second edition of the Framework book (Buzan et al., 1998) has been The Politics of Security. In some sense, our ultimate interest revolves entirely around the politics of securitization in this first sense. The reverse side to the comprehensive nature of this concern is that this first sense of politics of securitization does not lend itself to neat conceptual condensations about politics as such. The findings are detailed, differentiated and empirical. The second aspect or meaning has invited most attention among theoretically inclined and often critical scholars discussing securitization theory. People have argued whether the theory is Schmittian (in the sense of, for example, Schmitt, 1932) and hence perhaps includes a problematic, decisionistic bend, or whether it celebrates some kind of normal politics as an idyllized

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contrast to emergency measures. The main body of this article will deal with some of the debates posed at this level. The third sense concerns a kind of politics question that the discipline typically has more difficulty getting into focus, but that I suggest is ultimately crucial and, notably, more strategic. It relates to the question of how a theory can be political. Over the last twenty-five years or so, more and more international relations scholars have acknowledged that all academic work (including theorizing) is political. Such work is not necessarily only political, and it might involve relevant questions about truth and relevance and quality, but it is widely accepted that academic work is not an automatic reflection of reality. Accordingly, even for those who believe reality keeps us in check, it is humans who decide what to say when of the many things we might say, even of the many things we might truthfully say. And, what we do can have implications: it sometimes matters to somebody. For linguistic-turn-inspired people, it is even the case that the stuff produced by academics is continuous with that which we analyse, because we both (analyst and analysed) analyse and (hopefully) produce meaning. So, despite various other disagreements, a relatively large segment of the discipline accepts celebrates, laments or just acknowledges if pressed to do so that one way in which our work can be viewed is in terms of its political implications. For those international relations scholars, political scientists and security analysts that find politics relevant, it must be pertinent to pose the question in relation to work done by others and ourselves, what does a particular theory do politically. Too often, the answer to this question is reduced to one (or both) of two problematic models. One version of the politics of theorizing argues that a particular theory should take a stance on various issues or provide standards of judgement for specific cases. Within new security theories, this is a position most strongly associated with critical security studies (Booth, 2005, 2007), where the aspiration is to produce in terms of emancipation a standard for measuring various concrete policies and actions. Such an approach is problematic for at least two reasons: First, it reduces politics to outcomes. It is an exercise in comparative statics. What can be judged with the kinds of criteria proposed are aspirations, outcomes or states of being (is this imagined or real society a good one?), whereas policies are always relational, their effects and implications contingent on other actors and the overall constellation of actors, and therefore not amenable to such types of assessment (Arendt, 1958); a policy is not good per se and for all times; the quality of a policy depends on who else is involved, doing what (Arendt, 1968: 1138). Accordingly, the Boothian approach can at best compare societies, but not political acts. Second, with this approach, theory becomes dependent on a prior political programme. It is only after a vision of how to improve the human lot has been constructed that the political stance of the theory is derived (for such a political programme a very attractive one, I might add see Booth, 2007: 1136, 395470). As a result, the theorist acquires not the kind of politics appropriate for and peculiar to academic theory but rather a political reflection that really belongs to another kind of actor, a political party this approach does not assess what theory does as theory, but how it relates to a political position. The second version of the politics of theorizing sets out to demonstrate a given theorys dependence on some philosophical premises, which are then shown as being inferior to other, more progressive philosophical positions (see, for example, Aradau, 2004). In this theological or descending approach, empirical analysis can always be trumped by a theoretical argument, and that in turn by a meta-theoretical one, which in turn is put in place by a philosophical argument. Hierarchically, philosophy oversees theory, which is always in control of empirical analysis. The most political thing one can do within such a perspective is to solve a philosophical problem in the politically correct way.1 To the contrary, I would claim that politics is always located in particular human constellations, and that the political impact of a theory is measured there. The politics of a

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theory is thus closely tied to the architecture of that theory, to structural features of the theory that condition what can and cannot be done with it. It is not what the theory says, but what it does. The role of theory is to structure analysis, and its politics is found in the way in which it does this. Theories have political implications but in an academic way. The big advantage of the first approach is its emphasis on real politics in society (not privileging academe), while its drawback is that it does not address intellectual academic work in a manner proper for this particular practice. The second approach has the reverse problem of placing politics in the sphere of philosophy, but is then good at respecting the specificity of intellectual work. A satisfactory conception would have to get both points right. What makes a theory critical? The work it enables one to do with it and this works effect on real-life political struggles, the handling of issues and dynamics. The politics of philosophical debates does not have primacy, politics outside academia does. Yet, the political quality of a theory is not to be assessed as though that theory were a political actor in the normal sense that is, in terms of its view on x and y. We want to know how features of the theory systematically shape the political effects of using this theory. To analyse the politics of a theory is to track the kind of analysis it can produce and whether such analysis will impact in any systematic way on real-life political struggles which are always unique, complicated and open-ended.

What does securitization theory do politically?

First, the structure of securitization theory is organized around securitization as an act, as a productive moment, as a discontinuous reconfiguration of a social state. This is worked out in some presentations of the theory in terms of the particular version of speech-act theory it has adopted (against other possible versions of speech-act theory; see Sbisa, 2007; Wver, forthcoming), but in the present context it is probably more important to point out that the concept of politics is especially at this point Arendtian. Hannah Arendt (1958, 1968, 2005) insisted that politics is productive, irreducible and happens among people as an unpredictable chain of actions. Politics never takes the form of someone capturing power and producing an output from a plan it is always about action that relies on others actions before it generates some result, and therefore the meaning and goodness of a particular act is never known beforehand but only as history is told afterwards. This does not simply reflect a personal penchant on the part of the theorys founder for a particular concept of politics the structure of the theory compels users in such a direction. The theory of securitization is a strictly focused theory with one key idea at its centre: securitization. Its theoretical content comes not from accumulating correlations, but from a tight conceptual core around the key concept (see below on the theory of theory). Therefore, the definition of securitization shapes every usage of the theory and entails this Arendtian concept of politics, because the theory places power in-between humans not least through the central role of the audience and insists on securityness being a quality not of threats but of their handling, that is, the theory places power not with things external to a community but internal to it. Therefore, the theory is constructed so that a user can never reduce away politics by deriving it from objective threats or causal explanations at the particular point of securitization. Where much of political science ironically seems to be devoted to the task of effacing politics, a theory with such a structure serves to insist on responsibility and ultimately to protect politics: The securitization approach points to the inherently political nature of any designation of security issues and thus it puts an ethical question at the feet of analysts, decision-makers and activists alike: why do you call this a security issue? What are the implications of doing this or of not doing it? (Wver, 1999: 334).

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Second, the theory has a bias for desecuritization, although a careful one (more on this below). Desecuritization is not always better than securitization. On this point, the text in the Framework book (Buzan et al., 1998: 29) is actually quite precise: desecuritization is preferable in the abstract, but concrete situations might call for securitization. A vote for desecuritization comes directly from the theory, since key causal mechanisms emphasize the unavoidable negative effects of securitization, but the analytical set-up allows empirical analysis of the possible advantages of handling a particular challenge within the format of both security and non-security. Some inevitable negative effects of any securitization the logic of necessity, the narrowing of choice, the empowerment of a smaller elite are always highlighted whenever this theory is used. The preference for desecuritization is not of the political stance type, but an effect produced by the kinds of analysis that securitization theory spurs: it fosters critical attention to the costs of securitization but allows for the possibility that securitization might help society to deal with important challenges through focusing and mobilizing attention and resources. This political effect follows from the architecture of the theory. As elaborated below, Guzzinis (this issue) suggested focus on causal mechanisms delineates two distinct parts of the theory who does securitization and what securitization does and these are mutually supportive: it is because of these causal mechanisms that it is interesting for people to securitize or desecuritize. Therefore, the theory has systematic political effects, focusing attention on these mechanisms and thereby elevating desecuritization to relevance in any given case. By thus programming a suggestion of desecuritization into every usage, the theory makes a political investment; like all action, it runs a risk due to the unpredictability of outcomes and in this case a particularly big one because the political input is chosen, so to say, at a distance as a general input to numerous concrete situations. This illustrates the challenging politics of theory: Doing specific analysis, one can act analytically from a situational interpretation, but the theorist designs the general tool ignorant of the case analysed, and yet the theory has an impact on it. A theory therefore has its political effects engraved in its structure, and, as with all politics, judgement has to await how chains of actions and interactions unfold in singular instances. Third, and even more ambivalent, is how the theory focuses attention on a particular security rationality (the Huysmans dilemma; see Huysmans 2002, 2006). Security is tied to a particular figure, that of securitization. This was how securitization theory solved the widening impasse. Until the invention of the concept of securitization, widening security had to specify either the actor (the state) or the sector (military), or else risk the everything becomes security trap. Securitization theory handled this problem by fixing form: whenever something took the form of the particular speech act of securitization, with a securitizing actor claiming an existential threat to a valued referent object in order to make the audience tolerate extraordinary measures that otherwise would not have been acceptable, this was a case of securitization; in this way, one could throw the net across all sectors and all actors and still not drag in everything with the catch, only the security part. As a result, however, the fixation of security in definite form became inflexible. Other theories and critics often cheat here, borrowing delineation through the concept of securitization and then positing the importance of new forms of security, while the conceptual moves that keep their extended field together remain mysterious that is, these authors have not replaced securitization with another defining feature. Also securitization theory itself suffers: this fixation of form becomes the essential blind spot that every theory has (Luhmann, 1990: 856). Yet, a contemporary security theory should be able to explore changes to the security form itself. Thinking through the role of theory for analysis might help: even a blind spot brings insight, because only through clearly defined operations does anything emerge with clarity; even the limit of a concept is more informative than the lack of any clear distinction. It is the very attempt at analysis through

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the concept of securitization that establishes what is distinct in new practices that do not immediately conform to normal patterns (e.g. human security; see Philipsen, 2010). However, while securitization theory can be kept analytically afoot by this strategy of explicating the instrument of observation, this only deepens the political problem of entrenching a particular sense of security, a security rationality (Huysmans, 2006). Jef Huysmans has argued convincingly that centring on this form of security necessarily invokes a particular form of politics, namely, exceptionalism. Thus, although it is wrong to claim, as numerous critics have done, that securitization theory involves a Schmittian concept of politics the theory has a Schmittian concept of security and an Arendtian concept of politics,2 if one wishes to use such types of slogans it can have Schmittian effects nevertheless. As Huysmans (2002) pointed out long ago in a famous article on the normative dilemma of writing security, all security studies risks strengthening security, even when intentionally anti-security (see Wver, 1999). Similarly, a theory of the exceptionalist dimension of politics even a theory that challenges exceptionalism from another core meaning of politics can fortify a conceptual universe where exceptionalism is central to the political field, and thereby limit our political imagination (see Walker, 1993). This third effect is ambiguous. On the one hand, highlighting a particular security rationality serves the critical purpose of showing what security speak does rather than what it claims to innocently mirror. On the other hand, however, it can strengthen the exceptionalist end of politics. Only a minimalist politics can be invested in a theory as such, and for securitization theory this means the three effects outlined above.3 A particular piece of research drawing on a particular theory can often carry out a specific political analysis of a given situation, identify the particular constellation of forces and aspirations in that situation, and thus the meaning of what the analyst does (Arendt, 1958, 1968). However, a theory is formulated abstractly to be mobilized in a diversity of situations, and a more structural reflection is thus required if one is to discern the politics of the theory.

Concept of theory
Most theorizing in political science and international relations is caught in an unfruitful dichotomy: mainstream scholars see theory as consisting of propositions to be (dis)confirmed by correlations and regularity (a view largely discarded by philosophy of science over the last forty years), while social constructivists are sceptical about theory any tighter than loose perspectives. Much is gained by introducing philosophys so-called semantic or model-theoretic view.4 Here, a theory is basically a model that can be held against empirical instances to assess structural similarity. We gain insights through bridge-building from this abstraction to specific analytical usages. A theory is not basically a proposition about reality (true or false): it is a model from which one might produce empirical statements. Case studies teach us about both reality and the theory but not about what is missing in the theory. Theory-related insights should be accumulated, while the theory is kept intact as long as it is the best instrument for generating such insights. Securitization theory is intentionally structured as what Holger Strizel (this issue) discusses as an idea theory, one that clearly has one distinct concept at its centre, and in which key concepts form a closely integrated constellation; only necessary relations (not contingent connections) are part of the theory itself. Such a view draws on Kenneth Waltzs (1979, forthcoming) approach to theory, modifies it on some points, and mobilizes the philosophical literature on semantic view (Giere, 1999; Wver, 2011). Some injunctions follow this view of theory:

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Focus on the core idea that defines a theory. Distinguish clearly between the theory itself and its cumulated insights from empirical studies. Discuss empirical cases less in terms of vindicating or falsifying theory, and more as exploring whether a specific case is an instance of and thus what the extension of the model is and through which additional models. Invest in theoretical work when doing empirical analysis. Theories are quite minimalistic and therefore any case study demands a specific set-up possibly with several theories and constructs for the occasion. Theories dont predict, people do (Waltz, 1996: 56).

One of the advantages of this approach (in addition to its philosophical sustainability compared to the dominant view in political science) is that it clarifies what a theory does in a particular analysis and allows for a combination of theories in specific studies. For instance, it enables the establishment of an institution like CAST, which rather than being a centre for the development of securitization theory has a distinct interdisciplinary research agenda that focuses on the mutual translatability of different rationalities of risk, danger and threat between disciplines, where securitization theory can do service precisely because it is not a set of regularities to be tested but a distinct rationality and political operation that can be linked to understandings of other such operations. Also, this conception of theory can underpin the trend these days within the new security studies: younger scholars draw on several of the relatively like-minded theories. This is viable exactly when they are not seen as broad perspectives but as distinct theories. With careful research design, individual studies can place the different theories in distinct roles. However, the key theoretical component of the other main schools must then be spelled out, as it is increasingly in the case of securitization theory. This hardening of the core of the theory can also clarify its limits and enable a more focused analysis of the spatio-temporal contingency of the particular securitization format, as well as subtle changes in the codifications of contemporary societies (cf. pp. 473474 and 477).

Three developing debates on securitization theory Responsibility, ethics and desecuritization

Much of the critical literature on securitization theory during the last fifteen years has focused on the difficulty of basing moral judgements on the theory. This complaint is understandable and gained centrality by unifying critics from both sides: traditionalists puzzled over why a security theory would abstain from talking about actual, real threats and, similarly, many critical theorists yearned for the opportunity to counter dominant security talk with a discourse about more important threats. Over time, the immediate surprise and frustration over the way in which securitization theory rephrased the questions gave way to a more constructive but more challenging engagement with those new ethical questions that emerge when security analysis is shifted from being solely about attributes of threats to an examination of security as a specific way of addressing issues. In recent years, this discussion has unfolded most intensely as reflections on desecuritization, probably because desecuritization was the theorys most programmatic concept. If the theory was to provide any guidance, it was sought in this, its most positive concept. This special issue engages these issues energetically. Here, I can only mention some unusual contributions that suggest new directions.

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Vibeke Schou Tjalve (this issue) shifts attention from the previously dominant issue of descuritization of particular issues, towards what she calls desecuritization at the level of polity, rather than policy. Drawing both on the tradition of republicanism, especially in its US version, and on classical realism, she points to the importance of cultivating a contesting public sphere. This is important because critics have worried that the theory prematurely assumed that desecuritization always entails politicization, whereas an issue actually might drift from securitization to any format, including a technocratic risk-management system that depoliticizes at least as much as securitization does (Aradau, 2004). Tjalves vigorous public sphere is a force for desecuritization that pulls in the political direction. Her contribution revitalizes a theme that goes back to the birth of academic reflections on security policy: The classic Wolfers (1952) article argued that societies differ dramatically in terms of their inclinations with respect to securitizing threats (not his exact wording). He emphasized conditioning by historical experience, but implicitly opened for society consciously cultivating its proclivity to panic or to politicize. Closely related to Tjalves article, the one by Mike Williams (this issue) has a characteristic puzzling twist. Intensifying an argument he made previously (see Williams, 1998), he shows how the relative desecuritization implied in a liberal political order rests on a kind of meta-securitization, where society institutionalizes a fear of fear in the form of a political system and culture that constrains the eruption into society of a politics of fear. Judith Shklar (1998) famously argued that to avoid the human worst, cruelty, a liberal society has to constrain the most corrosive force in politics: fear. This is a quintessential American insight. Already many Central European theorists at the middle of the last century perhaps most clearly Hermann Broch ([1948] 1955), but see also Arendt (1968: 11250) wanted politics to be anchored not in positive values but in avoiding the largest negatives. US political history produced a specific, systematic suspicion against forces that sought to impel (the) people to surrender power too willingly, war and fear being the most powerful of these. This suspicion ties into the deep structure of securitization theory, where the causal effects of securitization parallel a logic of war (Wver, 1995). The contributions by Tjalve and Williams raise vexing questions about the ability of contemporary political culture to conduct such principled debates about societys own political vigour when the ever-faster flow of news keeps politics tied to events and single issues. This issue might be explored empirically through comparative analysis of Western societies mobilizing second thoughts a decade after 9/11 in relation to the excessive sacrifices of civil liberties made in the war on terror. In what institutional form is society able to reflect on its own gestation not on issues, threats, scandals or events, but on its own larger shape and condition? The most elaborate, and probably the most surprising and provocative, discussion of securitization theorys normative utility is by Rita Floyd (this issue), who seeks to establish a standard for the normative rightness of a securitization. It is helpful to articulate possible criteria for contesting or discussing an instance of securitization. As noted above, the theory does not claim that desecuritization is always best, only that when all the particular features of a given case are stripped away desecuritization is preferable to securitization, and the theory always suggests desecuritization for consideration, so it surely leaves room for the question of when a securitization will be valuable. Floyd is also correct in guiding our attention back to the threat itself, because debate on a particular securitization will always have a particular threat at the centre. The politics of responsibility outlined above precludes a set-up where what fulfils the criteria for an objective security threat is measured scientifically outside politics. Lots of real threats exist, but they do not come with the security label attached. Securitization ultimately means a particular way of handling a particular issue, processing a threat through the security format. Thus, the security quality does not belong to the threat but to its management. To specify a proper procedure for analysis of threat (by abstract observers?) cannot determine

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the appropriateness of a particular security handling. Yet, a discussion of security is a discussion of a threat, so it makes sense to develop discourse ethics criteria of justification for securitization. Constructive mobilization of securitization theory might clarify what a threat argument must perform to justify extraordinary measures: it must establish (1) that there is a threat; (2) that the threat is potentially existential; and (3) the possibility and relative advantages of security handling compared to non-securitized handling. My disagreement with Floyd ultimately concerns what normative analysis is and should be. Does it imply a philosophical-scientific analysis that can somehow (outside the political struggle) calculate the best policy, as implied in terms such as legitimate and valid? Or must it be anchored in politics, with the role of the academic being to cultivate a better political process, as exemplified by Tjalve and Williams? This clearly parallels just war theory, which for many years developed towards a professionalization of just war as a legal concept, with experts seeking to determine the legality of particular wars and actions. Whereas the legality of war is certainly very important, a war that is legal should be called legal and not just, and a concept like just war is valuable precisely as an inherited tradition for how society can conduct discussions on complex, non-computational issues, such as the legitimacy of particular wars (Rengger, 2002). Therefore, we should protect just war as an ongoing conversation and as evolving criteria for justification. Similarly securitization can help to structure and discipline discussions over threat-defence management of issues. Society should be clearer about Floyds specific criteria, even if I would personally ascribe a different status to them than that set out by Floyd. These reflections on responsibility, ethics and desecuritization point to the importance of theory and the politics of securitization theory: The decisive questions are not whether the theorist likes this or that particular concept of politics or whether publications said too little about some specific actors, but what form of responsibility and ethical intervention securitization theory prompts. A new issue highlighted by the special issue is how society can cultivate a general inclination to securitize, desecuritize or discuss challenges in more or less helpful ways. Securitization theory contributes politically to such a process.

Transformations in modern society: Bureaucracy, risk and rationalization

If normative critique dominated securitization theorys first years, today debate on transformations beyond the age of security (most often: into one of risk) probably shares first place with criticisms of the theorys internal coherence and defects (Balzacq, 2010). The latter debate was briefly addressed in the section on concepts of theory (see also Wver, forthcoming), so here I will instead examine time and change. Did securitization theory maybe appropriately capture only the politics of security of 1995 or 1985? Was it more accurate for 1955 than for 2015? Within this special issue, transformation is suggested strongly by Jef Huysmans. Huysmans sees new forms of security that are less act-based. He is absolutely right to point to the act as an important concept for further exploration one that has been little studied so far. However, his argument that todays security takes other, more routinized and dispersed forms raises a methodological problem, as noted earlier. If the securitization form is the definition that allows us to observe security, how does he then see these new forms of security and know that they are security? I also wonder whether the concept of act is possibly taken in a too subjectivistic sense of actors selfconstituted as such. Ultimately, an act is ascribed responsibility, a way in which society can locate agency (as argued in different ways by Charles Manning, John Austin and Niklas Luhmann; see Wver, 2002: 11719; Sbisa, 2007). Securitization analysis is challenged by Huysmans observed change from clearly pronounced exception and emergency towards less dramatic management drift, but his own attempt to mobilize critical reflections on justification

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implicitly reintroduces a logic of acts. Still, if these acts do not take the form of justifying extreme measures by reference to threats, this does represent a serious challenge to securitization theory. Empirical analysis should investigate in detail whether extreme policies (so named to circumvent the problem of how we can locate securitization if there is no longer a criterion for it) are increasingly (a) decentralized to the point where responsibility disappears; (b) justified by other reasonings than threat and necessity; (c) justified by threat and necessity but recoded in a format other than that of the securitization figure; or (d) actually still dependent on the securitization rationale, although this is for various reasons flagged less explicitly. Most often, claims that securitization theory is spatio-temporally contingent are made through reference to the concept of risk, a theme introduced in the editors article (Gad and Petersen, this issue; see also Rasmussen, 2010; Petersen, 2011; Tjalve, this issue). Did the concept of securitization presuppose a particular package of individual subjectivity, collective identity, political order, rationality and sense of danger one that has since changed into a new constellation? Focusing on theory, however, we would phrase this differently: The question is not whether one practice changes into another (what would that mean?). Rather, the issue is that the utility and power of one theoretical model retracts while another expands. Securitization is securitization, and risk is risk. Society practises many organizing conceptual figures, and it is an empirical question whether larger patterns make one or another more influential. And, since it is hard to measure the overall volume of each, it is probably more helpful to make comparative case studies of particular fields to see whether issues are moving from one coding to another, from one form of regulation to another or to a novel combination of them. This kind of change, therefore, does not challenge the consistency or precision of the theory only its relevance. Does the world go elsewhere? The last section of this article shows how this question can be productively placed at the centre of securitization research. Albert and Buzan (this issue) interestingly interpret securitization theory as a reflection of (or as analytically enabled by) historically evolved differentiation within the political system. On this basis, we might expect increased analytical power for the theory with future societal evolution. Also science might reconfigure securitization. Trine Villumsen Berling (this issue) rightly points to the neglected issue of how scientific arguments and facts are at play in securitization. Change in the nature and place of science in society (Gibbons et al., 1994; Weingart, 2001) could spell systematic changes in securitization. Previously, basic science was produced in discipline-divided academic sanctuaries, while only applied science was getting its hands dirty. Increasingly, the most influential research is developed in the context of application that is, basic science is organized by specific tasks. Science has become too important to be left to scientists, and it is negotiated all the way from priorities to usage by economic, societal, media and political actors. Security expertise of the political science kind was always thus embedded, but securitization often relies not only on security expertise as such, but on more natural science-like technical expertise, typically in relation to specific threats. Such knowledge becomes increasingly entwined with extra-academic processes, yet science usually retains its particular aura, and political discussions of scientific advice are dichotomized, treating science as either pure or tainted. Rarely can public debate simultaneously take into account how science is socially shaped and acknowledge that it provides a particular form of knowledge (Jasanoff, 2005). As Berling points out, science often depoliticizes, and our ironic future seems to be one where science is increasingly politicized yet simultaneously able to depoliticize. This constitutes one more reason to pay increasing attention in the future to the interface of science and securitization. The contributions discussed in this section point to important new forms of politics not easily captured by the traditional version of securitization theory. Yet, they do not challenge the centrality of securitization if it is conceived strictly as the core idea. The task for securitization theory in this context is less to replace theories of one age with theories from another, but rather to work out the

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interfaces between theories. The politics of theory is here as much about checking the structural implications of the new theories one integrates with, notably risk theories.

Post-Western security theories: From the non-West and/or for a post-Western world
This third issue takes up less space in the special issue but is arguably a major emerging debate. Or two: theories articulated from or for the non-West, and the theoretical implications of a postWestern world. Pinar Bilgin (this issue) argues convincingly that Western critical security theories including securitization theory do travel to the non-West, although they are clearly marked by their European origins. She makes sense of this, looking more closely at what is actually being done locally around the world and showing that such theories have highly meaningful roles that are to be understood in the specific situation not as a question of whether the theory fits the situation, but in terms of concrete usage. This is generally a more fruitful approach to analysis of non-Western theorizing than seeing either mindless copying or hopeful novelty (Tickner and Wver, 2009). In line with the present article, Bilgin focuses not on what a specific theory does (in terms of its job description) but what it allows non-Western actors to do in their power struggles vis--vis other actors (quotation taken from an earlier version of Bilgins article in this issue). Even if the core concept of securitization and its few, main accompanying concepts prove relevant, we must systematically develop ways of equipping securitization theory with frames, set-ups and maybe supplementary theories that foster productive analysis in societies that differ systematically from the theorys place of origin. Non-Western theorizing is needed, not necessarily to provide alternatives or corrections to securitization theory, but to offer increased understandings of what it means to use the theory in given situations. Ethno-centrism is probably more at secondary layers of the theory, like the sector specifications. Mona Sheikh (2010) illustrates the non-Western challenge too, showing how securitization theory has developed an understanding of religion that is more geared to the religions at the centre than to those in other parts of the world. She rightly calls for a change to the existing theory, but to the sector theory of religion, not to the conceptualization of securitization as such. Similar examination of other sectors would probably reveal additional ethno-centrism. On the other hand, the argument by Albert and Buzan (this issue) could create expectations that the sector structure as such will gain increasing global relevance. Tarek Barkawi (2010) has argued that security studies makes a major error these years in leaving war to strategic studies, failing to see the pervasive impact of war on society at large. This links to the non-Western or rather post-colonial argument that the centrality of war is much more striking if you view the world from other locales than those that typically form the basis for leading academic writings on security. It is not obvious whether this should be taken as pointing to a distinct social science of war, as Barkawi suggests, or as suggesting that security studies should return to its roots and ensure that all the new security stuff does not lead to a neglect of the military dimension. There is a real danger that security studies will establish a division of labour whereby conventional security studies takes care of war and the new security studies gets the non-military sectors. If this happens, the new security studies will probably stop being critical security studies in the sense of being a critique of security studies, because it will then be about something else. An increasing presence of non-Western voices within the discipline should help to return war and violence to the agenda of critical/new security studies, including securitization theory.

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An observation that on this point related to Barkawis argument emerged from the oral presentation by Kenneth Waltz (2010) at the conference that gave rise to this special issue. Waltz showed how closely the evolution of security as a field was linked to the nuclear era, not only in the sense that security studies emerged as a response to the nuclear challenge (as is widely accepted) but also in the sense that security as a key concept and mode of management of international affairs corresponded to a nuclear world, in which wars had become more political, major war among the leading powers impossible, and disarmament possible. War had moved away from the classical format, where it could trump all other dimensions at all times, and the military sector consequently had to move in as one among many within a wider concept of security. The history of security rationality seems closely tied to the history of war. Following Barkawi and Waltz, we should look out for the changing place of war in the emerging world order if we are to discern the future of security studies. The world becomes post-Western not only because more non-Western voices gain influence, but because the nature of international relations changes and even the West will change. Security is a status quo concept, typically played by those who are privileged under existing conditions and who feel threatened by new powers (Winkler, 1939; Carr, 1939). London and Paris energetically promoted concepts in the period between the 20th centurys two world wars that could align their positions with the stability of the system. In this perspective, we might expect Western conceptual innovations not so much against security but rather escalating or intensifying the concept in order to enable similar moves from the weakening core against rising powers. The structural political suspicions of securitization theory might turn out to be systematically Western-sceptic in the coming age. I suggested above that many of the debates on securitization theory can be furthered by clarifying what a theory is and does. Let me finally suggest a second move to restructure the theory and reorganize the questions around it: separating two elements of the theory and their different explanatory structures.

Causal mechanisms and political moves and politics of theory

Most studies of securitization focus on the process leading up to a particular securitization, and critics often call for stronger causality to predict who will securitize what, and when attempts will succeed or fail. Yet, a non-deterministic, action conception is crucial for keeping the theory political and highlighting moral responsibility. That said, proponents of the theory were wrong to resist causality tout court. In a second part of the theory, the question becomes what difference does securitization make that is, what effects does it have (see Figure 1). Causality in this second part is actually needed if the first (non-causal) part is to work: it is the effects that securitization has that make it attractive (or not) for various actors to pursue. Stefano Guzzinis (this issue) article on causal mechanisms helpfully suggests that we think the second arrow in the figure in terms of causal mechanisms. Thus specifying separate parts of analysis within the theory helps put key questions on a clearer theoretical footing. The first arrow from the left doing security is about actors, acts, politics and preconditions in prior politics. The central circle in the figure is the moment of securitization as such, representing the core of the theory. Its inner structure is clarified through deeper engagement with speech-act theory; in addition, work on images and media sheds light on the semiotics of securitization. Like a quantum jump, securitization is a discontinuous change of state within a social system.

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Figure 1. Action, event and effects in securitization theory

The arrow to the right captures what securitization does. The difference between securitized or not lies in the causal mechanisms. The intersecting arrow is powerful. The theory rests on fixing a particular figure as the centre of investigation: securitization. Fixation on form was the move that freed the theory from a need to privilege particular actors (e.g. states) or means (e.g. military) prior to empirical analysis. The spatiotemporal contingency of securitization is checked by, for example, risk-management practices; changing relations between risk, uncertainty and danger; and non-Western understandings of security. This two-step clarification of theory first identifying what theory is generally and then showing how securitization theory has the distinct parts outlined above supports a more cumulative research programme. The relationship between case studies and theory is clarified in order to prevent fruitless discussions in which case studies overplay their conclusions as general challenges to the theory rather than contributing insights about securitization at the level of patterns and processes. The politics of securitization also becomes sharpened as a result. Instead of deducing the political quality of the theory from various empirical statements by its proponents, we zoom in on the very core of the theory: how does it structurally condition work done with it in systematically political ways? The first part of the present article identified the nature of this kind of political inquiry about the theory; the second part traced such inquiry through some of the debates in this special issue to show how the most important questions pointed towards theory architecture, before the article finally suggested how it might be possible to think the nature of theory and this particular theory in a format that allows precisely for such discussion of the politics of a theory. Despite the impressive comprehensiveness and ambition of the editors and contributors of this state-of-the-art collection on securitization, this closing article suggests that we are far from speaking the last words on a finished theory. On the contrary, discussions on theory-building and the politics thereof have almost just begun.

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478 Notes
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3.

4. 5.

Ken Booth and Claudia Aradau are selected as illustrations here, not because their positions are more problematic than those of others, but because they have laudably engaged directly with this question and spelled out their reasoning on how to evaluate security theory politically. The concept of security is Schmittian, because it defines security in terms of exception, emergency and a decision (although not by a singular will, but among people in a political situation). This does not in itself make securitization theorys concept of politics Schmittian, because the place of security in the theory is as an anti-politics or the politically constituted limit to politics. This general politics is inspired by Hannah Arendt, because that which is narrowed down and constrained in the Schmittian security moment is necessarily a wider and different kind of politics, one where the openness and creativity is defining. I like to think that the theorys fourth effect is a theory of conflict, producing a particular approach to escalation and de-escalation, partly by embedding (the original Butterfield/Herz version of) security dilemma theory, partly from a Clausewitzian generalized concept of war (Wver, 1995). This needs to be worked out more carefully. Hansen (this issue; forthcoming) will prove invaluable for this. This is not a general philosophical position (realism, positivism, analyticism, etc), but cuts across these with a distinct concept of theory. In the reference list for this article, only pieces from this special issue and the 2010 conference that are explicitly discussed are cited, along with a few other texts that are specifically used in my own argument. A stocktaking exercise such as the present generalizes about debates and developments, and ideally a huge amount of securitization literature should have been cited. Much of this, however, is cited elsewhere in this issue by the individual contributors. I apologize to all those authors indirectly discussed in my article whom I have not cited directly.

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Walker RBJ (1993) Inside/Outside: International Relations as Political Theory. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Waltz KN (1979) Theory of International Politics. New York: Random House. Waltz KN (1996) International politics is not foreign policy. Security Studies 6(1): 5457. Waltz KN (2010) What do we do about nuclear weapons? The military context of securitization. Presentation at the conference The Politics of Securitization, Centre for Advanced Security Theory, Copenhagen, 1314 September. Waltz K (forthcoming) The making and testing of theories and what scientists and philosophers of science say about theory. Weingart P (2001) Die Stunde der Wahrheit? Zum Verhltnis der Wissenschaft zu Politik, Wirtschaft und Medien in der Wissensgesellschaft [The Moment of Truth? On the Relation of Science to Politics, Business and Media in the Knowledge Society]. Weilerswist: Velbrck Wissenschaft. Williams MC (1998) Security and the politics of identity. European Journal of International Relations 4(2): 204225. Williams MC (2011) Securitization and the liberalism of fear. Security Dialogue 42(45): 453464. Winkler E (1939) Scurit [Security] in Abhandlungen der Preuische Akademie der Wissenschaften, Philosophisch-historische Klasse Nr. 10 [Dissertations from the Prussian Academy of Sciences, Philosophical and Historical Class No. 10.]. Berlin: Walter de Gruyter. Wolfers A (1952) National security as an ambiguous symbol. Political Science Quarterly 67(4): 481502. Ole Wver is Professor of International Relations at the Department of Political Science, University of Copenhagen, and Director of CAST, the Centre for Advanced Security Theory. Internationally, he is mostly known for coining the concept of securitization within security theory and as one of the main figures in developing what is often referred to as the Copenhagen School in security studies. His most recent writings in relation to securitization theory have applied the theory to religion and to climate change. The second most influential subset of his work is probably writings on the sociology of the discipline of international relations. Among his recent books are (with Barry Buzan) Regions and Powers: The Structure of International Security (Cambridge University Press, 2003; Chinese translation, 2009); and (edited with Arlene B. Tickner) International Relations Scholarship Around the World (Routledge, 2009). He is a member of the team of authors for Katherine Richardson et al., Climate Change: Global Risks, Challenges and Decisions (Cambridge University Press, 2011). Ole Wver was elected to the Royal Danish Academy of Sciences and Letters in 2007. He wishes to express his appreciation for helpful comments and suggestions from reviewers, editors and the participants at a research seminar held at CAST.

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