Encyclopedia essay on global conflict and security

The Encyclopedia of Global Studies is a recently published reference work for the emerging field of global studies, published by SAGE. In a co-authored lead essay on the field(s) of global conflict and security, Ole Wæver (director of the Centre for Advanced Security Theory) and DIIS researcher Mona K. Sheikh provide an overview of the history [emergence] and main theories of the fields of conflict studies and security studies, and relate this to questions of globalization. The essay also summarizes current pattern of conflicts and security in the world as it is depicted by the two traditions.

From the introduction of the essay:

“In both public debates and academic literature, globalization has often been linked to conflict and security issues. In the early globalization literature, its liberal ancestry often revealed itself in an implicit or explicit optimism about a more globally integrated world being an inherently more peaceful one (in continuation of similar expectations for free trade and interdependence since the late 18th Century). However, since the 1990s, globalization became more contentious and potentially conflict-stimulating mechanisms came into sight - culminating so far in the increasingly widespread view since 2001 that terrorism (and the global War on Terror) are also somehow expressions of globalization; new forms of global conflict embedded in the transnationalisation of economies, religions and migrations.”

The four-volume encyclopedia is edited by Helmut K. Anheier and Mark Juergensmeyer and is available here.