Securitising threats without the State: A case study of misgovernance as a security threat in Bangladesh

Review of International Studies

Volumn 35, Issue 2, 2009, Pages 277-300

  Barthwal Datta, Monika ^a  

^a NONE

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EID: 67749108511     PISSN: 02602105     EISSN: 14699044     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.1017/S0260210509008523     Document Type: Article

References (145)

1. Jef Huysmans, 'Revisiting Copenhagen; or, on the creative development of a security studies agenda in Europe', European Journal of International Relations, 4:4 (December 1998), pp. 479-505;
2. C. Smith, Review of Security: A New Framework for Analysis, by Buzan et al. Royal Institute of International Affairs, 75 (January 1999), pp. 147-8 and Michael Williams, 'Words, Images, Enemies: Securitization and International Politics', International Studies Quarterly, 47:4 (2003), pp. 479-505.
3. It was Bill McSweeney who gave this title to the work being done by Buzan, Wæver and others formerly centred around the Copenhagen Peace Research Institute in the 1990s. For more, see McSweeney, 'Identity and Security: Buzan and the Copenhagen School', Reviewiew of International Studies 22: 1 (1996), pp. 81-93.
4. See Barry Buzan, Ole Wæver and Jaap de Wilde, Security: A New Framework for Analysis (Colorado: Lynne Rienner, 1998).
5. Claire Wilkinson, 'The Copenhagen School on Tour in Kyrgyzstan: Is Securitization Theory Useable Outside Europe?', Security Dialogue, 38:1 (March 2007), p. 7.
6. For more, see Keith Krause and Michael Williams, 'Broadening the Agenda of Security Studies: Politics and Methods' in Mershon International Studies Review, 40:2. (October 1996), p. 299.
7. See Buzan, People, States and Fear: An Agenda for International Security Studies in the Post-Cold War Era, 2nd Edition (Harlow: Pearson Education Limited, 1991);
8. Wæver, 'Securitization and Desecuritization' in Ronnie D. Lipschutz (ed.), On Security (New York: Columbia University Press, 1995), pp. 46-86;
9. Wæver et al, The European Order Recast: Scenarios for the Post-Cold War Era (London: Pinter, 1990) and Identity, Migration and the New Security Agenda in Europe (London: Pinter Publishers, 1993) and Buzan and Wæver, 'Framing Nordic Security: Scenarios for European Security in 1990s and Beyond' in Jan Oberg (ed.), Nordic Security in the 1990s: Options in the Changing Europe (London: Pinter, 1992), pp. 85-104 and Buzan et al, Security: A New Framework for Analysis, (Colorado: Lynn Rienner, 1998).
10. Wæver et al, 1993 in Krause and Williams, 'Broadening the Agenda of Security Studies', p. 243.
11. Buzan et al, Security: A New Framework for Analysis, p. 119.
12. Ibid., p. 21.
13. 'Societal' in this context does not refer to a country's population. Ibid., p. 120.
14. Ibid., p. 121.
15. Lene Hansen, 'The Little Mermaid's Silent Security Dilemma and the Absence of Gender in the Copenhagen School', Millennium, 29: 2 (2000), p. 290.
16. Buzan et al, Security: A New Framework for Analysis, p. 32.
17. Ibid., p. 24.
18. The authors point out that 'accept' 'does not necessarily mean in a civilized, dominance-free discussion; it only means that an order always rests on coercion as well as consent'. Ibid.
19. Ibid., p. 37.
20. Ibid., pp. 37-8.
21. See Olav Knudsen, 'Post-Copenhagen Security Studies: Desecuritizaing Securitization' Security Dialogue, 32:3 (September 2001), pp. 355-68 and Thierry Balzacq, 'The Three Faces of Securitization: Political Agency, Audience and Context', European Journal of International Relations, 11:2 (2005), pp. 171-201.
22. See McSweeney, 'Identity and Security: Buzan and the Copenhagen School';
23. Krause and Williams, 'Broadening the Agenda of Security Studies', p. 245
24. and Huysmans, 'Revisiting Copenhagen'.
25. See Johan Eriksson, 'Observers or Advocates?: On the Political Role of Security Analysts', Cooperation and Conflict 34:3 (1999), pp. 311-30.
26. Knudsen, 'Post-Copenhagen Security Studies', p. 359.
27. Ibid.
28. Balzacq, 'The Three Faces of Securitization', p. 181.
29. Thorsten Gromes and Thorsten Bonacker, 'The Concept of Securitisation as a Tool for Analysing the Role of Human-Rights-Related Civil Society in Ethno-Political Conflicts', SHUR Working Paper Series, Center for Conflict Studies, University of Marburg, March 2007, p. 5.
30. Ibid., p. 359.
31. Bob Hadiwinata, 'Securitizing Poverty: the Role of NGOs in the Protection of Human Security in Indonesia', paper presented at IDSS, Nanyang University-Ford Foundation workshop on 'The Dynamics of Securitization in Asia', Singapore, September 2004, p. 4.
32. McSweeney, 'Identity and Security: Buzan and the Copenhagen School', pp. 81-93.
33. In Krause and Williams, 'Broadening the Agenda of Security Studies', p. 245.
34. Buzan and Wæver, 'Slippery? Contradictory? Sociologically Untenable? The Copenhagen School Replies', Review of International Studies, 23:2 (April 1997), pp. 241-50. Also see Williams, 'Modernity, identity and security: a comment on the 'Copenhagen Controversy', Review of International Studies, 24:3 (July 1998), pp. 435-39.
35. Buzan et al. Security: A New Framework for Analysis, p. 205.
36. See Ibid, p. 119. While the authors clarify that their use of societal is for 'communities with which one identifies' (thereby providing the scope for 'Bangladeshi' to become a societal identity), in a following footnote (p. 139, note 1) they maintain that if 'society' were to mean 'the population of any state' this would 'remove independent judgement from the societal sector and make it derivative of state classification.' This is highly debatable as an identity associated with the state it is contained within may not necessarily be a derivative of it, but could have existed prior to the state coming into existence (for example, in the case of former colonies such as India).
37. Hansen, 'The Little Mermaid's Silent Security Dilemma', pp. 285-306.
38. Ibid., p. 287.
39. Ibid.
40. Williams, 'Words, Images, Enemies', pp. 479-505.
41. Ibid., p. 512.
42. David Skidmore, Book review of Buzan et al., Security, A New Framework for Analysis (1998) in The American Political Science Review American Political Science Review, 93:4 (December, 1999), pp. 1010-11.
43. Ibid., p. 28, emphasis added.
44. Riefqi Muna, 'Securitization of Transnational Crime: Small Arms and Light Weapons & Drug Trafficking in Indonesia', paper published by IDSS-NTS accessed on 5 November 2007.
45. Wilkinson, 'The Copenhagen School on Tour in Kyrgyzstan', p. 12.
46. Buzan et al, Security: A New Framework for Analysis, p. 206.
47. Ibid., p. 32, emphasis added.
48. Ibid., p. 204.
49. There is a host of literature which deals with the concept of governance. For example, see Gary Stoker, 'Governance as theory: five propositions' in International Social Science Journal, 155 (March 1998), pp. 17-28;
50. P. Andell-Mills & I. Seregeldin, Governance and the External Factor: Proceedings of the 1991 World Bank Annual Conference on Development Economic' 1992, and Mahbub ul Haq, 'Human Development in South Asia 1999: The Crisis of Governance', (Karachi: Oxford University Press, 1999), 29, available at accessed on 12 October 2007.
51. See P. R. Chari (ed.), Security and Governance in South Asia (New Delhi: Manohar Publishers, 2001) and Alternative approaches to Security:National Integration, Governance, Non Military Challenges (Dhaka: The University Press Limited, 2000);
52. Caroline Thomas, Global Governance, Development and Human Security (Pluto: London, 2000);
53. Iftikhar H. Malik, 'Pakistan: misgovernance to meltdown', Open Democracy, 19 November 2007, available at
54. and Maxi Schoeman, 'Human security, governance and development in Africa' in Franco-South African Dialogue: Sustainable Security in Africa August 2000, available at accessed on 28 October 2007.
55. For example, see Amena Mohsin, 'Governance and Security: The Experience of Bangladesh' in Chari (ed.), Security and Governance in South Asia, pp. 21-47;
56. Chari and Sonika Gupta, Human Security in South Asia: Gender, Migration and Globalisation (New Delhi: Social Science Press, 2003)
57. and Atiur Rehman et al, 'Bangladesh: The drawbacks of poor governance' in 'Fear and Want: Obstacles to Human Security', Social Watch Annual Report 2004, pp. 132-3, available at accessed on 4 June 2008.
58. For more, see G. B. Pepper, 'A Re-Examination of the Ideal Type Concept' in The American Catholic Sociological Review, 24:3 (Autumn, 1963), pp. 185-201;
59. W. J. Cahnman, 'Ideal Type Theory: Max Weber's Concept and Some of Its Derivations' in Sociological Quarterly, 6:3 (Summer, 1965), pp. 268-80,
60. and Donald McIntosh, 'The Objective Bases of Max Weber's Ideal Types' in History and Theory, 16:3 (October, 1977), pp. 265-79.
61. Weber described an ideal type as a conceptualisation 'formed by the one-sided accentuation of one or more points of view' which combine a variety of 'concrete individual phenomena' to build 'a unified analytical construct'. In Weber, The Methodology of the Social Sciences, (New York: Free Press, 1949), p. 90.
62. As listed by Sobhan in V.A.P. Panandikar (ed.), Problems of Governance in South Asia (University Press Limited: Dhaka, 2000), p. 2.
63. In Mohsin, 'Governance and Security', p. 21.
64. See M. Rashiduzzaman, 'Political Unrest and Democracy in Bangladesh', Asian Survey, 37:3 (March 1997), pp. 254-68;
65. M. Ahmed, Democracy and the Challenge of Development: A Study of Politics and Military Interventions in Bangladesh (Dhaka: University Press Ltd, 1995)
66. and T. Maniruzzaman, Politics and Security of Bangladesh (Dhaka: University Press Ltd., 1994).
67. 'Bangladesh History', Encyclopedia of the Nations, available at accessed on 25 May 2008.
68. For a discussion of the caretaker government system in Bangladesh and what brought it about, see 'Reform of the Caretaker Government', Keynote Paper given by Shah AMS Kibria at a seminar organized by Bangladesh Foundation for Development Research (BFDR), 31 January 2005, available at accessed on 17 November 2007.
69. See Justin Huggler, 'Bangladesh gripped by rioting as political rivalry threatens election', The Independent Online, 8 January 2007, available at accessed on 2 December 2007.
70. 'Army to 'stop election violence'', BBC News Online, 4 January 2007, available at accessed on 4 October 2007,
71. 'Emergency declared; Iajuddin quits as chief adviser', The Daily Star, 12 January 2007, available at accessed on 10 October 2007.
72. 'Bangladesh 'will lift emergency'', BBC News Online, 10 December 2008, available at accessed on 12 January 2009; 'Bangladesh state of emergency lifted', The Age, 18 December 2008, available at accessed on 12 January 2009, and 'Bangladesh emergency laws lifted', Al Jazeera, 17 December 2008, available at accessed on 12 January 2009.
73. Hasina's first stint as PM was between 1996 and 2001.
74. This was despite international monitors declaring the results largely free and fair, and 'accurately [reflecting] the will of Bangladeshi voters'. See 'Bangladesh results seen as fair, though loser disputes results', International Herald Tribune, 30 December 2008, available at
75. and 'Bangladesh election winner urges loser to concede', International Herald Tribune, 31 December 2008, available at accessed on 12 January 2009.
76. Shakhawat Liton and Rashidul Hasan, 'BNP pledges to work with govt for nation's progress', The Daily Star, 2 January 2009, available at accessed on 19 January 2009.
77. For example, see 'Weak Governance, Judiciary Root Cause of Human Insecurity' in The Daily Star, 26 January 2007, available at accessed on 12 November 2007, and Note 46.
78. Mohsin in Chari, Security and Governance in South Asia, p. 22.
79. As pointed out by Nazes Afroz, Executive Editor for South Asia at the BBC World Service Radio, London. Also see Sreeradha Datta, 'Bangladesh's Political Evolution: Growing Uncertainties', Strategic Analysis, 27:2 (April-June 2003) available at accessed on 4 January 2008 and M. Rashiduzzaman, 'Political Unrest and Democracy in Bangladesh', Asian Survey, 37:3 (March 1997), pp. 254-68.
80. Mohsin in Chari, Security and Governance in South Asia, p. 23.
81. Imtiaz Ahmed, 'Bangladesh: Amid Hope and Despair', South Asia Journal, 13 (July-September 2006) available at accessed on 12 November 2007.
82. Ibid. Also see T. Maniruzzaman, 'Bangladesh Politics: Secular and Islamic Trends' in R. Ahmed (ed.), Religion, Nationalism and Politics in Bangladesh (New Delhi: South Asian Publishers, 1990).
83. Syed Aziz-al Hasan and Bhumitra Chakma, 'Problems of National Integration in Bangladesh: The Chittagong Hill Tracts', Asian Survey, 29:10 (October. 1989), p. 960.
84. See Saleem Samad, 'State of Minorities in Bangladesh: From Secular to Islamic Hegemony', Country Paper presented at Regional Consultation on Minority Rights in South Asia August 20-22 1998, Kathmandu, Nepal, available at accessed on 2 November 2008.
85. Aziz-al Hasan and Chakma, 'Problems of National Integration in Bangladesh', pp. 960-61.
86. Freedom House, Freedom in the World - Bangladesh (2007), 16 April 2007, UNHCR Refworld, available at accessed on 10 December 2007.
87. See Jalal Alamgir, 'We need local leaders not national personalities', The Daily Star, 15 February 2007 at accessed on 5 December 2007;
88. N. Rahman, 'A civil war of the soul', Forum, 2:1 (January 2007) at accessed on 10 October 2007;
89. 'Analysis: A tale of Two Women', BBC News, 2 October, 2001 at accessed on 10 December 2007.
90. Taj Hashmi, 'Power Politics in Bangladesh', Countercurrents.org, 16 November 2006, available at accessed on 4 December 2007.
91. Subhash C. Kashyap, Institutions of Governance in South Asia (New Delhi: Konark Publishers, 2000), p. 18.
92. Ibid., p. 10.
93. Off-the-record talk by a senior official of the caretaker government in Bangladesh given at the Institute of Strategic Studies, London, 5 November, 2007.
94. In Endemic Corruption in Bangladesh (Dhaka: News Network, 2003), p. 7
95. 'Corruption in the Public Sector: Its manifestations, causes and suggested remedies', report by Transparency International Bangladesh, available at accessed on 11 November 2007.
96. Endemic Corruption in Bangladesh, p. 13.
97. Mahfuz R. Chowdhury, 'Bangladesh State Emergency an Opportunity', Washington Post online, 7 May 2007, available at accessed on 6 December 2007.
98. Rashed Khan Menon, 'A case for proportional representation', The Daily Star 13th Anniversary Special, 31 January 2004, available at accessed on 6 December 2007.
99. Interview with Mahmud Ali, Senior Editorial Coordinator, Asia and the Pacific Region, BBC World Service Radio, London on 21 January, 2008.
100. Iftekharuzzaman, 'Corruption and Human Insecurity in Bangladesh', Paper presented at the seminar organized by Transparency International Bangladesh to mark the International Anti-corruption on Day, 9 December 2005.
101. Fahreen Alamgir, Tanvir Mahmud and Iftekharuzzaman, 'Corruption and Parliamentary Oversight: Primacy Of The Political Will', paper presented at 'Curbing Corruption in South Asia: A Workshop for Parliamentarians', seminar organized by Global Organization of Parliamentarian Against Corruption (GOPAC), Dhaka, 11 July 2007, available at accessed on 4 June 2008.
102. It is important to note that since the state of emergency was imposed in January 2007, there have been incidences where newspapers critical of the establishment have faced intimidation from the authorities. Consequently, the press in general has exercised a certain amount of caution when criticising the caretaker government's actions and politics. I'm grateful to Nazes Afroz for pointing this out.
103. Buzan et al, Security: A New Framework for Analysis, p. 33.
104. Colin Hay, Political Analysis (New York: Palgrave, 2002), pp. 184-7.
105. Ibid., p. 186.
106. For example, see Brian McNair, An Introduction to Political Communication (Routledge: Oxon, 2003) and Maxwell McCombs, 'The Agenda-Setting Role of the Mass Media in the Shaping of Public Opinion', University of Texas at Austin at the LSE Suntory and Toyota International Centres for Economic and Related Disciplines, pp. 4-5, available at accessed on 21 January 2008.
107. McCombs, 'The Agenda-Setting Role of the Mass Media in the Shaping of Public Opinion', pp. 4-5.
108. Notes from one-day workshop on 'Bangladesh under the caretaker government', Institute of Commonwealth Studies, London, 17 November 2007.
109. For example, see A. M. M. Shawkat Ali, 'What are the signposts of a failed state?', The Daily Star, 11 May 2004, available at accessed on 10 December 2007;
110. Ekram Kabir, 'Why small arms jeopardise human security', The Daily Star, 23 September 2004, available at accessed on 10 December 2007 ;
111. A. Bayes, 'Beyond the Border Basics', The Daily Star, 28 September 2004; 'Strong Democratic Institutions Must To Face External Threats', The Daily Star, 30 March 2005, available at accessed on 10 December 2007
112. and Zafar Sobhan, 'Freedom From Fear', The Daily Star, 4 May 2007, available at accessed on 5 December 2007.
113. These included 'a massive unsolved arms haul in Chittagong . . . the British High Commissioner narrowly [escaping] assassination, . . . virtually the entire opposition leadership [escaping] death by seconds on 21 August, and . . . senior opposition leaders . . . killed by assassins'. Sobhan, 'Tribal Loyalties', The Daily Star, 25 February 2005, available at accessed on 16 May 2008.
114. Ibid.
115. Ibid.
116. For more, see 'Grenades Kill 18 at rally in Bangladesh', CNN.com, 21 August 2004, available at accessed on 20 May 2008, and 'Blasts hit Bangladesh Rally', BBC News Online, 22 August 2004, available at accessed on 20 May 2008.
117. Sobhan, 'Freedom From Fear', The Daily Star, 4 May 2007, available at accessed on 5 December 2007.
118. Ibid.
119. E-mail exchange with Sobhan, 25 November 2007. For more such writings by Sobhan and others in the Daily Star, see M Asadullah Khan 'Poor governance fuels corruption', 17 May 2008, available at ;
120. G. M. Quader, The ultimate target, 22 October 2007, available at ;
121. Sobhan, 'Human Security in Bangladesh', 17 October 2004, available at , and 'More democracy, not less', 29 September 2006, available at , accessed on 19 May 2008.
122. For example, see 'Democracy and state security', 28 January 2007, available at accessed on 21 May 2008;
123. Qazi Kholiquzzaman Ahmad, 'People's freedoms and development in Bangladesh', New Age, 8 January 2005, available at accessed on 18 May 2008;
124. Chaudhury Irad Ahmed Siddiky, 'Coercive stability needs to be transformed into consensual stability', 9 July 2007, available at
125. accessed on 23 May 2008 and Taj Hashmi, 'An Open Letter', 18 September 2007, available at accessed on 23 May 2008.
126. Ahmad, 'People's freedoms and development in Bangladesh'.
127. Ibid.
128. For more, see 'Human Security Now', outline of the report of the Commission on Human Security, available at accessed on 18 May 2008.
129. 'Democracy and state security', New Age.
130. Ibid.
131. Ibid.
132. 'Where is the emergency leading us?', The Bangladesh Today, 12 January 2008, available at accessed on 29 May 2008.
133. Ibid.
134. Bangladesh's Human Development Index, UNDP Human Development Report 2007/08 available at accessed on 21 January 2008.
135. The analysis in this article was limited to the English language as the author is not educated in the vernacular. It must be pointed here that the aim of this exercise is to establish that there are well-informed and influential non-state actors raising issues as threats to security and therefore should be acknowledged as legitimate 'securitizing actors'. The fact a newspaper like Prothom Alo, for example, would have even more of an impact when making such a securitising move reinforces this point.
136. I would like to thank Prof. Mushtaq H. Khan at the School of Oriental and African Studies, University of London, for pointing this out to me.
137. Sobhan, 'Tribal Loyalties', emphasis added.
138. Sobhan, 'Freedom From Fear', emphasis added.
139. 'Where is the emergency leading us?, The Bangladesh Today, emphasis added.
140. Buzan et al, Security: A New Framework for Analysis, p. 25.
141. Ibid., p. 26.
142. Elke Krahmann, 'The Emergence of Security Governance in Post-Cold War Europe', Working Paper 36/01, E S R C "One Europe or Several?" Programme, Sussex European Institute (Sussex: University of Sussex, 2001), p. 1, available at accessed on 12 November 2007.
143. Robert Jervis, 'Security Regimes' in International Organization, 36:2 (1982), p. 357.
144. Huysmans, 'Revisiting Copenhagen', p. 480.
145. Buzan et al, Security: A New Framework for Analysis, p. 120, emphasis added.