Researching Security Communities ꟷ Causal and Non-Causal Approaches

Abstract

The security community was a ground-breaking concept coined by Karl W. Deutsch in 1957. It introduced a possibility of an order where war and its expectations are eliminated and states no longer expect to use the force to solve their disputes. Research questions concerning the creation and internal dynamics of existing security communities are thus of the highest importance in nowadays´ era of uncertainty and dramatic changes in international relations. Contributions in this panel scrutinize the concept of security community from various methodological and epistemological standpoints. By analyzing many counterfactual scenarios, Kofroň and Stauber try to answer the questions if members of the security community really do not build armies to deter their neighbors or is there, in fact, a mismatch between pacifist discourse and actual military build-up. Kulkova in her contribution traces the process of the formation of the widely-agreed yet understudies security community in North America. Kučera and Ditrych deploy a model of the constitutive relations between processes of change in an (established) security community and defense integration among the community’s constituent members. Koschut focuses on the peaceful conflict resolution within security communities and argues that reintegrative shaming – shaming, which is followed by efforts to reintegrate the offender back into the community – is central to peaceful conflict resolution in a security community. And Beauregard answers the question of how leadership in a security community emerges, with a focus on the transatlantic community and sanctions against Russia. This panel thus poses crucial questions about the security community as an alternative international order and yields important answer on how the security communities operate and come to life.