Security Studies

9 min read

Security studies is the sub-discipline of IR concerned with threats to states, societies and individuals — and the strategies used to manage them. CSS aspirants must master both the traditional military-strategic core and the broadened (human, non-traditional) security agenda that has emerged since the Cold War.

Security

The condition of being protected from or not exposed to danger; in international politics, traditionally the absence of military threat to the state, increasingly broadened to encompass economic, environmental, human and societal dimensions.

Traditional security

Realist core

Survival of the state as the supreme goal.
Military force as the principal instrument.
Security dilemma (John Herz, Robert Jervis): one state's defensive measures appear offensive to others, fuelling arms races.
Balance of power as the chief stabilising mechanism.

Strategic studies

Strategy = art of using all instruments of national power to achieve political objectives (Clausewitz).
Grand strategy — long-term, comprehensive vision.
Operational and tactical levels.
Major texts: Clausewitz On War, Sun Tzu Art of War, Mahan Influence of Sea Power upon History, Mackinder's Heartland theory, Spykman's Rimland.

Deterrence theory

The cornerstone of nuclear strategy:

Deterrence = preventing an adversary from doing something by convincing them the costs outweigh the benefits.
Compellence = forcing an adversary to do something.

Conditions for credible deterrence (Schelling, Kahn)

Capability — sufficient force.
Credibility — willingness to use it.
Communication — adversary understands the threat.

Types

Deterrence by denial — preventing the adversary from achieving objectives.
Deterrence by punishment — threatening unacceptable retaliation.
Extended deterrence — protecting allies (US umbrella over Europe, Japan, South Korea).

Nuclear concepts

First strike vs. second strike capability.
Mutually Assured Destruction (MAD) — Cold War standoff.
Counterforce (targeting military) vs. countervalue (targeting cities).
Triad — land, sea, air-based nuclear forces.
No First Use (NFU) — declaratory policy (China, India).
Credible Minimum Deterrence (CMD) — Pakistan's foundational doctrine.
Full Spectrum Deterrence (FSD) — Pakistan's 2013 evolution, covering tactical nuclear weapons.

Key Points

The nuclear taboo (Tannenwald) — no use of nuclear weapons since 1945 — has emerged through normative pressure, not technological constraint alone.
Cold Start (Indian doctrine, 2004) prompted Pakistan's tactical nuclear weapons (Nasr) for sub-conventional deterrence.
Pakistan and India have remained outside the NPT but are de facto nuclear-weapon states.
The stability-instability paradox suggests nuclear deterrence at the strategic level may permit lower-level conflict.

Arms control and disarmament

Treaty	Year	Substance
Limited Test Ban	1963	Banned atmospheric, underwater, space tests
NPT	1968	Non-proliferation framework
SALT I / II	1972 / 1979	US-USSR strategic arms
ABM Treaty	1972	Limit on missile defence (US withdrew 2002)
INF Treaty	1987	Eliminated intermediate-range missiles (US withdrew 2019)
START I / II / New START	1991 / 1993 / 2010	Strategic arms reductions
CTBT	1996	Comprehensive test ban (not yet in force)
BWC	1972	Bans biological weapons
CWC	1993	Bans chemical weapons
TPNW	2017	Treaty on Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons

Broadened security agenda

Copenhagen School (Buzan, Wæver, de Wilde)

Security: A New Framework for Analysis (1998). Five sectors:

Military.
Political.
Economic.
Societal.
Environmental.

Securitisation theory — an issue becomes a security threat when authoritative actors successfully present it as existential. Speech acts matter.

Human security

UNDP Human Development Report 1994 defined seven dimensions:

Economic.
Food.
Health.
Environmental.
Personal.
Community.
Political.

Aberystwyth (Critical) School

Ken Booth — emancipation, not state survival, is the goal of security.

Welsh School and Constructivist security

Norms, identities and discourses constitute security threats.

Terrorism and political violence

Definitions

No universally agreed definition. Common elements: violence, political motivation, civilian targets, intent to spread fear. Major instruments include the UN's piecemeal terrorism conventions and Security Council Resolutions 1373 (post-9/11) and 2178 (foreign fighters).

Waves (David Rapoport)

Anarchist (1880s-1920s).
Anti-colonial (1920s-1960s).
New Left (1960s-1990s).
Religious (1979-present) — Iranian revolution as starting point.

Counter-terrorism approaches

Hard CT — military, law-enforcement, intelligence.
Soft CT (CVE — Countering Violent Extremism) — community engagement, education, narratives.
Whole-of-government / whole-of-society approaches.
National Action Plan (NAP) in Pakistan (2014) — adopted after the Army Public School massacre.

Pakistan's security challenges

External

India — Kashmir, conventional asymmetry, Cold Start, water disputes (Indus Waters Treaty).
Afghanistan — TTP sanctuaries post-2021; refugee burden.
Iran — joint border operations against Jaish al-Adl and Baloch militants.
Maritime security — Arabian Sea, Strait of Hormuz, Gwadar protection.

Internal

TTP and offshoots — resurgent post-2021.
Baloch insurgency — ethno-nationalist; attacks on CPEC and security forces.
Sectarian violence.
ISKP (Islamic State Khorasan Province) — transnational.

Hybrid threats

Cyber threats — banking, government, critical infrastructure.
Information warfare — fake news, social media manipulation.
Climate-induced displacement and food insecurity.

Non-traditional security threats

Pandemics — COVID-19 exposed weaknesses globally.
Climate change — rising sea levels, floods (Pakistan 2022), heatwaves.
Water scarcity — Pakistan is approaching the absolute scarcity threshold (per capita < 1000 m³).
Food security — supply chains, agricultural productivity.
Cyber security — state and non-state actors.
Transnational organised crime — narcotics, human trafficking, arms.
Energy security — import dependence on oil and LNG.

Emerging domains

Cyber security

Stuxnet (2010) — first major state-on-state cyber-physical attack.
NotPetya (2017) — devastating ransomware spillover.
CIA triad — Confidentiality, Integrity, Availability.
Critical infrastructure protection — power grids, financial systems, healthcare.
Pakistan's PECA 2016 (Prevention of Electronic Crimes Act) and NCERT (National Computer Emergency Response Team).

Space security

Anti-satellite (ASAT) tests (US 1985, China 2007, India 2019).
Outer Space Treaty (1967) — bans WMD in orbit but not all weaponisation.
Pakistan's SUPARCO runs satellites; future cooperation with China.

AI and autonomous weapons

Group of Governmental Experts on Lethal Autonomous Weapons Systems (LAWS) at the CCW.
Risks of escalation, accidental war, ethical dilemmas.

For CSS answers, distinguish between threat (a hostile actor with capability), vulnerability (weakness exploitable by a threat) and risk (probability × consequence). A sophisticated security analysis maps all three for a given context — be it Pakistan's IT infrastructure or its food supply.

Pakistan's security architecture

National Security Committee (NSC) — apex civilian-military forum.
Cabinet Committee on National Security.
National Counter Terrorism Authority (NACTA) — coordination.
National Disaster Management Authority (NDMA).
National Centre for Cyber Security (NCCS).
Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI), Intelligence Bureau (IB), Federal Investigation Agency (FIA).

A nuanced grasp of these institutions and their interactions enables CSS aspirants to engage with the multi-dimensional security challenges Pakistan faces in the 2020s.