National Insecurity And Human Rights

Abstract:

"Mel Goodman has spent the last few decades telling us what's gone wrong with American intelligence and the American military, and now, in National Insecurity, he tells us what we must do to change the way the system works, and how to fix it. Goodman is not only telling us how to save wasted billions—he is also telling us how to save ourselves."—Seymour M. Hersh, The New Yorker Upon leaving the White House in 1961, President Eisenhower famously warned Americans about the dangers of a "military industrial complex," and was clearly worried about the destabilizing effects of a national economy based on outsized investments in military spending. As more and more Americans fall into poverty and the global economy spirals downward, the United States is spending more on the military than ever before. What are the consequences and what can be done? Melvin A. Goodman, a twenty-four-year veteran of the CIA, brings peerless authority to his argument that US military spending is indeed making Americans poorer and less secure while undermining our political standing in the world. Drawing from his firsthand experience with war planners and intelligence strategists, Goodman offers an insider's critique of the US military economy from President's Eisenhower's farewell warning to Barack Obama's expansion of the military's power. He outlines a much needed vision for how to alter our military policy, practices and spending in order to better position the United States globally and enhance prosperity and security at home. Melvin A. Goodman is the Director of the National Security Project at the Center for International Policy. A former professor of international security at the National War College and an intelligence adviser to strategic disarmament talks in the 1970s, he is the author of several books, including the critically acclaimed The Failure of Intelligence.

This text provides a thorough overview of how states pursue security against violence, and how this pursuit paradoxically creates greater insecurity at the national, international, and individual levels. The traditional insistence that states are the primary and most important actors makes security, ultimately, elusive. This argument provides a compelling framework for students to understand the breadth and nuance of security at each level. Case studies throughout the text bring life to the concepts. This fully revised third edition includes discussion of the Russian invasion of Ukraine, China and the Uyghurs, the Covid-19 pandemic, the January 6th Capitol insurrection, Trump’s attempt to overturn the 2020 election; Mexico’s use of its military in internal security, the coup in Myanmar, Orbán’s Hungary, China and Taiwan, India and Pakistan, US-China competition, China’s Belt and Road Initiative, Russia’s Wagner Group, North Korea’s missile testing, refugees in Poland, and numerous other examples, large and small. The third edition features: Highlighted cases to illustrate new security threats across the globe, now listed at the start of each chapter Beginning-of-chapter Learning Objectives and End-of-chapter Discussion Questions that reinforce student learning and engagement The unique framework arguing that security remains elusive because of the ethic insisting that states are the most important actors.

For over a century, deportation and exclusion have defined eligibility for citizenship in the United States and, in turn, have shaped what it means to be American. In this broad analysis of policy from 1882 to present, Deirdre Moloney places current debates about immigration issues in historical context. Focusing on several ethnic groups, Moloney closely examines how gender and race led to differences in the implementation of U.S. immigration policy as well as how poverty, sexuality, health, and ideologies were regulated at the borders. Emphasizing the perspectives of immigrants and their advocates, Moloney weaves in details from case files that illustrate the impact policy decisions had on individual lives. She explores the role of immigration policy in diplomatic relations between the U.S. and other nations, and shows how federal, state, and local agencies had often conflicting priorities and approaches to immigration control. Throughout, Moloney traces the ways that these policy debates contributed to a modern understanding of citizenship and human rights in the twentieth century and even today.

There is a visible change in the outlook towards security all over the world-probably because of the increasing complexity of global problems and their repercussions for millions of people all over the world. Insecurity is not just all pervasive but is reiterating its alarming overtones more forcefully than during the cold war era. There are now threats very different from a military attack on a nation's territory. The concept of National Security hence needs to be redefined. The gamut of its perceptions has undergone a paradigm shift. The context against which the policy makers seek to establish national security is undergoing tumultuous changes. While not downplaying the relevance of strategic means of maintaining national security, this book explores the emerging non-strategic threats to national security, with the obvious grave consequences on human security. This book attempts to address several questions: Can the concepts of National Security and Human Security be reconciled meaningfully? Can their approaches and objectives be inter-twined so that we can live a fuller life? Can the nations and citizenry-both feel equally secure at the same time?

The mass violence of the twentieth century’s two world wars—followed more recently by decentralized and privatized warfare, manifested in terrorism, ethnic cleansing, and other localized forms of killing—has led to a heightened awareness of human beings’ vulnerability and the precarious nature of the institutions they create to protect themselves from violence and exploitation. This vulnerability, something humans share amid the diversity of cultural beliefs and values that mark their differences, provides solid ground on which to construct a framework of human rights. Bryan Turner undertakes this task here, developing a sociology of rights from a sociology of the human body. His blending of empirical research with normative analysis constitutes an important step forward for the discipline of sociology. Like anthropology, sociology has traditionally eschewed the study of justice as beyond the limits of a discipline that pays homage to cultural relativism and the “value neutrality” of positivistic science. Turner’s expanded approach accordingly involves a truly interdisciplinary dialogue with the literature of economics, law, medicine, philosophy, political science, and religion.

This book is a study of the future of international law as well as the future of the United Nations. It is the first study ever bringing together the laws, policies and practices of the UN for the protection of the earth, the oceans, outer space, human rights, victims of armed conflicts and of humanitarian emergencies, the poor, the vulnerable and the disadvantaged world-wide. It reviews unprecedented dangers and challenges facing humanity such as climate change and weapons of mass destruction, and argues that the international law of the future must become an international law of security and of protection. It submits that the concept of international security in the UN Charter can no longer be restricted to situations of armed conflict but must be given its natural meaning: whatever threatens the security of humanity. It calls for the Security Council to perform its role as the guardian of the security of humankind and sees a leadership role for the UN Secretary-General in analysing and presenting challenges of international security and protection to the Security Council for its attention. Written by a seasoned scholar / practitioner of international law and the United Nations, who has served in key policy, peacemaking, peacekeeping and human rights positions in the United Nations, this book offers indispensable new vistas of international law and policy, and the future role of the United Nations.

A transformative model for community social work rooted in basic social and economic rights is the basis of this timely Brief. With specific chapters spotlighting the rights to health care, nutritious food, and adequate and affordable housing, the book describes in depth the role of community practice in securing rights for underserved and vulnerable groups and models key aspects of rights-based work such as empowerment, participation, and collaboration. Case examples relate local struggles to larger regional and statewide campaigns, illustrating ways the book's framework can inform policymakers and improve social structures in the larger community. This rights-based perspective contrasts sharply with the deficits-based approach commonly employed in community social work, and has the potential to inspire new strategies for addressing systemic social inequality. Features of Human Rights-Based Community Practice in the United States: A conceptual basis for a rights-based approach to community practice. Detailed analysis of legal and social barriers to health care, housing, and food. Examples of effective and emerging rights-based community interventions. Methods for assessing the state of human rights at the community level. Documents, discussion questions, resource lists, and other valuable tools.

Provides critical evidenced based assessements and tools with which to investigate the role of rights abrogation in the health of populations.