Interests and Ideas in Global Security

In this module, our activity was to examine the effect of interests and ideas through the lens of global security. We found that overwhelmingly, interests dominate decisions made about global security - whether it is to protect citizens or investments, nations have a vested interest in global security.




This was most apparent in the field of nuclear weapons. In the Gustafson article, he makes a good point that Western nations keep nuclear weapons out of the hands of any nation that they see as an "other", with often questionable motives behind this decision. He argues that this creates an unfair security binary in our world between Western and non-Western nations. While he rightfully addresses the point that expanded nuclear proliferation is dangerous, he glosses over the very concrete political differences in developing nations. Gustafson does address the issue of political stability, and argues that we are buying into a false narrative that third-world political systems are inherently more unstable. While he may not be wrong, it is far easier to cooperate with shared political values (in this case democracy) and the trust necessary for nuclear proliferation is of paramount importance. Finally, even if these nations were politically stable enough for nuclear weapons, the cost of the weapons themselves, and the scientists needed to maintain, is beyond prohibitive for most nations.


In the Blair article, he makes a case for de-alerting nuclear weapons and offers a four-point plan for doing so. While the risks he mentions are very real and certainly compelling reasons to de-alert, the lack of trust among nations is still the strongest reason not to. We couldn't ensure that everyone did their part and de-alerted, so we would need to make sure we were still prepared for anything that could happen. In a perfect world, we would be able to execute this plan, but at this point, we're stuck with our imperfect world - maybe one day in the future, we'll be luckier.