This year is the 20th anniversary of the release of the 1994 United Nations Development Programme’s (UNDP) Human Development Report, which defined the concept of human security and brought it to international attention. It is thus timely to ask: where is human security today? The following is the fourth part of a series exploring the evolution of the concept and its impact on security thinking and practice.

20 Years of Human Security:
A special focus on community security

By Centre for Non-Traditional Security (NTS) Studies
S. Rajaratnam School of International Studies (RSIS)
Singapore

Community security is rooted in international human rights and humanitarian laws such as the 1948 Genocide Convention and the 1992 UN Declaration on Minorities, which define basic expectations for mutual respect and peaceful relations, and the consequences for targeted abuse of these. In 1994, the Human Development Report (HDR) defined community security as the security of a group that share a cultural identity and common values. Its definition has consolidated efforts to guide and enforce group protection.

As communities include extended families, or race and ethnic group-based organizations for example, this vision is people-centered with an emphasis on inter-group relations. As noted in the 1994 Report, a focus on community support of their members adds an important dynamic to the holistic view of security.

Community insecurity and consequences

There are cases where the distinct identity of certain communities becomes a source of insecurity. Insecurities may arise from political inequality, physical abuse, inequality of opportunities, and social and cultural discrimination. For instance, in Malaysia, the Bumiputra policy since the 1960s favours Malays in education, employment and social services and causes tension with other ethnic groups. The decades-old pro-Bamar policies in Myanmar marginalise ethnic minority languages in education and side-line the role of ethnic minorities in the military, which are two root causes among many for its protracted internal conflict along ethnic lines. Hence, community insecurity threatens the group itself, inter-communal relationships and social stability within states.

Community security as an approach

Since 2009, the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) has conceptualised community security as an approach to operationalize and triangulate human security, human development and state-building. This comprehensive approach emphasizes community involvement with state authorities and international organisations in conflict prevention and peace-building. The World Bank has supported the National Program for Community Empowerment in Indonesia and engages local leaders in decision-making. Thus a community-based approach such as this empowers the grassroots to address human insecurity.

Core readings

• UN Development Programme (UNDP), 1994, Human development report 1994: New dimensions of human security, New York, Chapter 2.
• UN Development Programme (UNDP), 2009, Community security and social cohesion: Towards a UNDP approach, New York.
• Saferworld, 2013, Community security: Rethinking policy and strategy for modern security challenges, Briefing, Washington.

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CLIMATE CHANGE, ENVIRONMENTAL SECURITY AND NATURAL DISASTERS

News & Commentaries

• Zubaidah Nazeer, Indonesia risks losing up to 1,500 islands by 2050, The Straits Times, 26 February 2014.
• Tom Revell, China blames climate change for £41bn natural disaster bill, Blue and Green Tomorrow, 26 February 2014.
• Mariel Grazella, Thousands of palm oil firms to miss certification, The Jakarta Post, 3 March 2014.
• Chester Davis, Global warming could lead to shortages of food and water, Guardian Liberty Voice, 23 March 2014.
• Four in 10 S'poreans think govt is responsible for taking action on climate change, Channel NewsAsia, 23 March 2014.
• 7 million premature deaths annually linked to air pollution, World Health Organization, 25 March 2014.
• David McNeill, Scientists to issue starkest climate warning yet at Japan conference, The Irish Times, 26 March 2014.
• Tadateru Konoe, IPCC climate report sounds humanitarian ‘clarion call’, Thomson Reuters Foundation, 31 March 2014.
• Graham Readfearn, The hellish monotony of 25 years of IPCC climate change warnings, The Guardian, 31 March 2014.

Selected Publications

• Nicole Laframboise and Sebastian Acevedo, 2014, Man versus human nature, Washington: International Monetary Fund.
• US Department of State, 2014, US climate action report to the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change, Washington.
• Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) Working Group II, 2014, Climate change 2014: Impacts, adaptation, and vulnerability.

Events & Announcements

• Integrated Disaster Risk Management: Small Grant Projects on Community-based Disaster Risk Management – Call for Proposals, deadline 30 April 2014.
• Forests Asia Conference: Sustainable Landscapes for Green Growth in ASEAN, 5–6 May 2014, Jakarta.

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ENERGY AND HUMAN SECURITY

News & Commentaries

• Govt to boost solar and wind power generation in remote areas, The Jakarta Post, 3 March 2014.
• Michael Levi, An energy weapon vs. Russia?, CFR, 5 March 2014.
• George Lerner, An ASEAN intra-energy market?, The Diplomat, 11 March 2014.
• Bjorn Lomborg, Germany’s energy policy is expensive, harmful and short-sighted, Financial Times, 16 March 2014.
• Christina Nunez, The big energy question: Can natural gas be a bridge to clean energy?, National Geographic, 18 March 2014.
• Nikos Tsafos, The missing shale miracle, Foreign Affairs, 23 March 2014.
• Gawdat Bahgat, The geopolitics of energy security, The International Relations and Security Network, 24 March 2014.
• ADB supports renewable energy by investing in Indonesian geothermal plant, ADB, 31 March 2014.

Selected Publications

• John R. Deni, 2014, New realities: Energy security in the 2010s and implications for the U.S. Military, Carlisle: United States Army War College Press.
• Vlado Vivoda, 2014, LNG import diversification in Asia, Energy Strategy Reviews, Vol. 2, No. 3–4, pp. 289–297.

Events & Announcements

• Global Energy Security Conference – The Way Forward, 12–13 May 2014, London, United Kingdom.
• Decentralised Energy ’14 Supporting Community Energy Community Generation, 13 May 2014, London, United Kingdom.

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FOOD SECURITY

News & Commentaries

• Alister Doyle, Global diets gets more similar in threat to food security – study, Trust.org, 3 March 2014.
• Ronnel W. Domingo, Asia close to cutting hunger incidence by half, says FAO, Philippine Daily Inquirer, 6 March 2014.
• Rice wealth fantasy turns to nightmare, Bangkok Post, 6 March 2014.
• Naomi O’Leary, U.N. world food price index jumps 2.6 pct in February, Trust.org, 6 March 2014.
• Andy Sharpless, Want to feed the world? First you need to save the oceans, 7 March 2014.
• Zaw Htike and Su Phyo Win, Poor rice price sees traders snub China, Myanmar Times, 10 March 2014.
• Kennial Caroline Laia, Food security for Indonesia should be top priority, experts warn, The Jakarta Globe, 10 March 2014.
• Mark Tran, Food system that fails poor countries need urgent reform, says UN expert, The Guardian, 10 March 2014.

Selected Publications

• Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO), 2014, Food and agriculture policy decisions: Trends, emerging issues and policy alignments since the 2007/08 food security crisis, Rome: FAO.
• International Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI), 2014, 2013 Global food policy report, Washington: IFPRI.

Events & Announcements

• Sustainable Agriculture Development Seminar, 12 May 2014, Cambridge, UK.
• Livestock, Climate Change and Food Security, 19–20 May 2014, Madrid, Spain.

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HEALTH SECURITY

News & Commentaries

• New Cambodian bird flu cases highlight regional risk, IRIN News, 14 March 2014.
• Rude health – fear and violence in Nepal’s medical system, IRIN News, 21 March 2014.
• Progress in diagnosing multidrug-resistant tuberculosis, WHO, 24 March 2014.
• Seven million premature deaths annually linked to air pollution, WHO, 25 March 2014.
• China halves TB prevalence in just twenty years, Asian Scientist, 25 March 2014.
• Gennie Gebhart, Transboundary pollution in Northern Thailand causes dangerous levels of smog, Asia: Weekly Insight and Analysis (The Asia Foundation), 26 March 2014.
• Kirsten Han, A small step forward for ASEAN LGBT rights, The Diplomat, 28 March 2014.
• Curbing Myanmar’s spread of drug–resistant malaria, IRIN News, 28 March 2014.
• Lisa Schnirring, More deaths reported in Guinea Ebola outbreak, Center for Infectious Disease Research and Policy, 1 April 2014.
• Seoul, Beijing to cooperate in fighting air pollution, The Chosunilbo, 2 April 2014.

Selected Publications

• Sarah E. Wakeman, Traci C. Green and Josiah D. Rich, 2014, From documenting death to comprehensive care: Applying lessons from the HIV/AIDS epidemic to addiction, The American Journal of Medicine, published online, 13 January 2014.
• Sebastian Vollmer, Kenneth Harttgen, Malavika Subramanyam, Jocelyn Finlay, Stephan Klasen and SV Subramanian, 2014, Association between economic growth and early childhood undernutrition: Evidence from 121 demographic and health surveys from 36 low-income and middle-income countries, The Lancet Global Health, Vol. 2, No. 4, pp. e225–e234

Events & Announcements

• Sixty-seventh World Health Assembly, 19–24 May 2014, Geneva, Switzerland.
• World No Tobacco Day: Raise Taxes on Tobacco, 31 May 2014.
• Third Annual Global Healthcare Conference (GHC 2014), 23–24 June 2014, Singapore.

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INTERNAL AND CROSS-BORDER CONFLICT

News & Commentaries

• Internal Displacement Monitoring Centre (IDMC), Girl, disrupted, Briefing Paper, 7 March 2014.
• Prospects for peace in Mindanao, IRIN, 19 March 2014.
• There are at least 500 child soldiers fighting in northeast India, and the world hasn’t noticed, Time, 24 March 2014.
• Ranga Sirilal and Shihar Aneez, UN rights boss urges international war crimes probe for Sri Lanka, Reuters, 26 March 2014.
• Religious tensions cloud Myanmar census, The Associated Press, 30 March 2014.
• Thailand: Separatists targeting teachers in South, Human Rights Watch, 30 March 2014.
• UN: Atrocities fuelled by inaction on arms trade treaty promises, Amnesty International, 1 April 2014.

Selected Publications

• Bruce Jones, Thomas Wright and et al., 2014, The state of the international order, Policy Paper, No.33, Washington: The Brookings Institution.
• Silvia Atanassova Croydon, 2014, Towards a regional human rights mechanism in the Asia Pacific?: Exploring the potential of the Asia Pacific Forum, The Pacific Review, Vol.27, No.2, pp.289–306.

Events & Announcements

• Seminar on Preventing Conflict-related Sexual and Gender-based Violence with Early Warning Analysis, 24 April 2014, Brisbane, Australia.
• Short Courses on Statelessness and International Law, 17 May 2014, Oxford, UK.
• World Refugee Day, 20 June.

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TRANSNATIONAL CRIME

News & Commentaries

• Randal Archibold, Vast web hides Mexican drug profits in plain sight, U.S. authorities say, The International New York Times, 25 March 2014.
• Sharon Chen, Interpol urges tighter airport checks amid lapse: Southeast Asia, Bloomberg, 27 March 2014.
• Kimberly Spykerman, Seven arrested, over 2kg of drugs seized at Woodlands Checkpoint, 27 March 2014.
• Rare turtle trafficking rampant in Southeast Asia, Malay Mail Online, 31 March 2014.
• New synthetic drugs emerging in Asia, with law officers playing catch up, US drug agent says, Fox News, 1 April 2014.
• Rachel Louise Ensign and Max Colchester, U.S. monitor says HSBC anti-money-laundering systems need upgrade, The Wall Street Journal, 1 April 2014.

Selected Publications

• United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC), 2014, The illicit drug trade through south-eastern Europe, New York: United Nations.
• UNODC, 2014, Impacts of drug use on users and their families in Afghanistan, New York: United Nations.

Events & Announcements

• Second Session of the Working Group on Firearms, 26–28 May 2014, Vienna, Austria.
• Seventh Session of the Conference of the Parties to the United Nations Convention against Transnational Organized Crime, 6–10 October 2014, Vienna, Austria.

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WATER SECURITY

News & Commentaries

• Tatyana Lisina, Crimea could face acute water, electricity shortages, Russia & India Report, 17 March 2014.
• Robert McMillan, Why does the NSA want to keep its water usage a secret?, Wired, 19 March 2014.
• Chua Chin Wei and Simon Tay, Dry spell drives home need for water solutions, Today, 21 March 2014.
• Egypt gets muscular over Nile dam, Independent European Daily Express, 21 March 2014.
• Magda Mis, Q&A: Beyond 2015 – what are the next water and sanitation challenges?, Thomson Reuters Foundation, 21 March 2014.
• Susmita Baral, World Water Day 2014: Quotes, facts and statistics about UN’s campaign, Latin Times, 21 March 2014.
• Matt Birkinshaw, Why water could decide the Indian elections, The Guardian, 22 March 2014.
• Sharon Udasin, East Jerusalem residents petition High Court over lack of water, The Jerusalem Post, 26 March 2014.
• Zhang Hongzhou, Confronting China’s water insecurity, RSIS Commentaries No. 057/2014, 27 March 2014.

Selected Publications

• Jeremy Josephs, 2014, Money money money: Tackling water’s thorny issue of cost, Water & Wastewater International, Vol. 29, No. 1.
• United Nations World Water Assessment Programme (WWAP), 2014, The United Nations world water development report 2014: Water and energy, Paris: UNESCO.

Events & Announcements

• The Global Water Investment Summit, 7–8 May 2014, London, United Kingdom.
• The IWA Water, Energy and Climate Conference 2014: Solutions for Future Water Security, 21–23 May 2014, Mexico City, Mexico.

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About the Centre:

The Centre for Non-Traditional Security (NTS) Studies, based in the S. Rajaratnam School of International Studies (RSIS), was inaugurated by Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) Secretary-General Dr Surin Pitsuwan in May 2008. The Centre maintains research in the fields of Climate Change, Food Security, Energy Security, Health Security, as well as Internal and Cross-border Conflict. It produces policy-relevant analyses aimed at furthering awareness and building capacity to address NTS issues and challenges in the Asia Pacific region and beyond. The Centre also provides a platform for scholars and policymakers within and outside Asia to discuss and analyse NTS issues in the region.

The Centre is the Coordinator of the ASEAN-Canada Research Partnership (2012–2015) supported by the International Development Research Centre (IDRC), Canada. It also serves as the Secretariat of the initiative.

In 2009, the Centre was chosen by the MacArthur Foundation as a lead institution for its three-year Asia Security Initiative (2009–2012), to develop policy research capacity and recommend policies on the critical security challenges facing the Asia-Pacific. It is also a founding member and the Secretariat for the Consortium of Non-Traditional Security Studies in Asia (NTS-Asia).

More information on the Centre can be found at www.rsis.edu.sg/nts.

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