Subject Area: Politics and International Relations

In this course, you will examine the key international security issues since the end of the Cold War. The end of the Cold War and ‘globalisation’ have coincided with the emergence of a host of "new" security challenges to the state. These include the proliferation of conventional weapons and of weapons of mass destruction, international crime, international terrorism, environmental degradation, civil wars and ethnic violence. At the same time, traditional notions of security centered around the state have been challenged by advocates of human security, leading the emergence of the human security agenda which focuses on the human individual as the referent for security. To add to these, there remain traditional security concerns centred around war and conflict, geostrategic rivalries and arms races. You will examine the key security challenges of our times, both traditional and non-traditional, how they are manifested and how the state and the global community have attempted to cope with them.