This book explains what ‘small’ states are and explores their current security challenges, in general terms and through specific examples. It reflects the shift from traditional security definitions emphasizing defence and armaments, to new security concerns such as economic, societal and environmental security where institutional cooperation looms larger. These complex issues, linked with traditional power relations and new types of actors, need to be tackled with due regard to democracy and good governance. Key policy challenges for small states are examined and applied in the regional case studies.
The book deals mainly with the current experience and recent past of such states but also offers insights for their future policies. Although many of the states covered are European, the study also includes African, Caribbean and Asian small states. Their particular interest and relevance is outlined, as is the connection between their security challenges and their smallness. Policy lessons for other states are then sought.
The book is the first in-depth, multi-continent study of security as an aspect of small state governance today. It is novel in placing the security dilemmas of small states in the context of wider ideas on international and institutional change, and in dealing with non-European states and regions.
Table of Contents:
Section I: Small State Security Revisited: History, Concepts, Theory 1. Setting the Scene: Small States and International Security, Anders Wivel, Alyson JK Bailes and Clive Archer, 2. Small states, survival and strategy, Alyson Bailes, Jean-Marc Rickli and Baldur Thorhallsson, 3. Economic Security and Size, Richard Griffiths, 4. Societal Security and Small States, Alyson JK Bailes, 5. Small States and Environmental Security, Auður H. Ingolfsdóttir, Section II: Small State Security in Europe, 6. The Nordic States, Clive Archer, 7. Security Concerns of the Baltic States in the 21st Century, Mindaugas Jurkynas, 8. Security Challenges in the Western Balkans: Building "soft" security after conflict, Višnja Samardžija, 9. Georgia and Moldova: Caught in the Outskirts of Europe? Maria Ruxandra Lupu Dinesen and Anders Wivel, 10. The Security of the European Micro-states, Archie W. Simpson, Section III: Comparative Insights 11. Botswana as a Small Developmental State, Ian Taylor, 12. Small State Security in Asia: Political and Temporal Constructions of Vulnerability, Alan Chong Chia Siong, 13. What Caribbean post-2015: Developmental and/or Fragile? Old versus New Security? Timothy Shaw 14. The Security Concerns of Designed Spaces: Size Matters, Godfrey Baldacchino
About the Author :
Clive Archer was, until 2009, Research Professor in International Relations at Manchester Metropolitan University and was previously a Professor at Aberdeen University. He has researched and published widely on the affairs of the Nordic region, Arctic cooperation, international organizations and the European Union.
Alyson J.K. Bailes is a former British diplomat and Director of the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute, now working as an Adjunct Professor at the University of Iceland and a Visiting Professor at the College of Europe. Security studies are her speciality.
Anders Wivel is an Associate Professor in the Department of Political Science, University of Copenhagen. His most recent books are Explaining Foreign Policy: International Diplomacy and the Russo-Georgian War (Lynne Rienner 2012, co-author Hans Mouritzen) and Denmark and the European Union (Routledge 2013, co-editor Lee Miles).
Review :
This thought provoking book represents a pioneer attempt to advance the research of small state security in contemporary circumstances where economic and environmental challenges often overshadow traditional security concerns.
- Hrvoje Butković, Institute for Development and International Relations
