October 8, 2021 — No Comments

The great contemporary human security crises of South Asia: Kashmir and Afghanistan

Authors: Esther Brito Ruiz, Arslan Sheikh and Ludovica Brambilla

Source: https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/3/39/C-17_carrying_passengers_out_of_Afghanistan.jpg

The last two years have been the site of unexpected human security crises -  ranging from a global pandemic to the collapse of states. South Asia particularly has been subjected to important crises that have echoed across the region and had global consequences. Maybe the two most significant of these crises have been the Taliban takeover of Afghanistan and the enduring crises in Kashmir. Both these situations have seen human security determine the broader trajectory of national security, and can serve as examples of why to promote any kind of stability, the wellbeing of the people must come first. 

Afghanistan: the consequences of setting human security aside

​​The Afghanistan crisis clearly represents the consequence of failing to centralize and protect human security. In the wake of the United States’ invasion of Afghanistan, which was originally deployed under the justification of anti-terrorist efforts – seeking the capture of Bin Laden and the countering of Al Qaeda – little good has remained after the end to two decades of occupation and trillions of dollars of investment. With the Taliban back in power and a looming humanitarian catastrophe – in the words of UN Secretary-General António Guterres – this crisis is one of the most severe threats to human security today.

But the real impact we can expect on the lives of Afghans remains multifaceted. Firstly, we have seen the weeks since the US withdrawal marked by a resurgence of terrorism in the state - as evidenced by the Daesh-K August 26 attack on the Kabul airport. Secondly, as a result of the war and widespread violence, the country now has over four million Internally Displaced People (IDPs), contending not only with overcrowded camps and a lack of access to basic services - like clean water - but also with the increase of COVID-19 cases. Afghans are facing a possible famine, collapsing health services, and a paralyzed economy in the wake of the seizing of most of the country’s reserves. In fact, the country’s Central Bank has been expelled from the international banking system and refused access to both the states’ foreign reserves and any international credit and assets assistance – including that which it had been previously granted to combat the rise of COVID. As a result of this economic paralysis, prices of food and essential goods have experienced an exponential rise and most financial services and banks have been left unable to operate or provide money to residents. This compromises the survival of local populations – especially those already most vulnerable. As this situation worsens, over 40% of the Afghan population faces acute food insecurity. Beyond these circumstances, the behaviour itself from Taliban authorities  is a core threat to the rights and security of its citizens – especially for women and minorities. Massacres of ethnic and religious minorities – specifically of Hazara men in recent weeks – and retribution killings to collaborators of the US army set a worrying precedent to what opposition groups will experience in coming months, as the Taliban secure their rule and repress revolts. Indeed,  Deborah Lyons, the Special Representative and Head of the United Nations Assistance Mission in Afghanistan (UNAMA), has affirmed that “the lives of millions of Afghans will depend on how the Taliban choose to govern”. With little response from recent UN Human Rights Council sessions and assistance on the ground from United Nations agencies and aid organizations being scaled back due to security concerns, prospects are not positive.

Marines assigned to the 24th Marine Expeditionary Unit (MEU) await a flight at Al Udeied Air Base, Qatar August 17. Marines are assisting the Department of State with an orderly drawdown of designated personnel in Afghanistan. (U.S. Marine Corps photo by 1st Lt. Mark Andries). Source: US Military

The severe human crisis in Afghanistan we see today is a consequence of an erroneous and militaristic view of what national security and peace requires. Peace begins with the security not of broad governments or the promotion of abstract values, but with the security of the people – established and maintained through access to the basic tenants of a dignified life; including education, food, healthcare, and jobs. By choosing not to center human security, the US acted more as an empire than as an ally for the Afghan people - and in their retreat, little care has been given to the wellbeing of locals and the crises left behind for them to endure. We can wonder what the situation would be today if the focus of the international community’s involvement in this state was for its communities to thrive – rather than the imposition of strategic goals for external parties. In the words of Ibrahim Al Marashi, “America’s failure to address human security ended up harming its national security”. 

With the world facing one of the worst humanitarian crises of the last decades, Afghanistan’s people have been left to contend with the human crisis of a pandemic and a state collapse simultaneously. While proposals to extend the UN mission in Afghanistan (UNAMA) have been put forth, the likelihood of this engagement in the long term is minimal. Afghanistan now faces a human security crisis in almost every of its expressions - combining a political and economic crisis, a compromised food and healthcare system, and personal and communal threats to life. The way this crisis develops over the next few months will profoundly impact not only Afghans and their future, but the trajectory of all of South Asia. 

Kashmir: the forgotten crisis of water security

Water Security is sometimes considered the most important component of human security - since the very basic survival of life is dependent on it. Additionally, water insecurity effectively compromises all other expressions of human security; thus putting the very continued existence of human communities at grave risk. Despite this, it has often become sidelined in conversations regarding international security and humanitarian crises. Specifically, the water-security nexus over transboundary river basins among riparian countries is a growing concern, which will need to be dealt with increased urgency in the wake of the escalating consequences of climate change.

Among such various transboundary river basins, the Indus River Basin (IRB) in South Asia represents a peculiar case. The IRB flows through the erstwhile princely State of Jammu and Kashmir, which is now divided through a Line-of-Control - a de facto border between India and Pakistan. While this area has a relatively successful water management framework - in the form of Indus Water Treaty - there is no institutional and legal framework which addresses the effects of climate change on water availability in the IRB. This is a delicate situation, as the IRB has become the second ‘most overstressed aquifer’ in the world because of the area’s growing population and the development pressures of both shoreline countries. 

The issue of water security in the region is a potential future source of state conflict and a prime human security issue. The territorial conflict over the erstwhile princely state of Jammu and Kashmir has led India and Pakistan into three conventional wars in 1947, 1965 and 1999 respectively. Both these countries have built major dam infrastructures on the IRB for irrigation and hydroelectricity. In India, it is one of the two main river systems supporting the country’s water deficient areas of the north-west. In fact, according to NITI Aayog, a public policy think-tank of the Government of India, “India is suffering from the worst water crisis in its history, with around six-hundred million people facing high to extreme water stress and about two-hundred thousand people dying every year due to inadequate access to safe water’’. However, even this report mentions no data on water management and composition of the Union Territory of Jammu & Kashmir - still a delicately trodden political issue. In turn, Pakistan is exclusively dependent on IRB for irrigation and hydropower. Thus, this basin represents a vital source for their national food, water, and energy security. This dependency is worsened by the severe water shortages and declining water per capita availability that Pakistan has been facing in recent years. As such, hydro-politics over the IRB have put the growing population of both countries at an extreme risk - both in terms of human security and with regards to broader state conflict. With the perennial tensions between India and Pakistan, and the frequent indication of IRB being used as a geopolitical weapon, the water security of South Asia’s most populated region remains an imminent threat.

Conclusion

Both the cases presented evidence a simple truth - security, at any level, lays its foundations on the wellbeing of the people. In the absence of this, there can be no sense of stability or continuity. Afghanistan and Kashmir serve to remind us that even with vested national security interests, state and military involvement, and capital investment, those endeavours  that forgo human security will eventually face violence, conflict,  and possible internal collapse.

July 15, 2021 — 1 Comment

Housing: An Unspoken Challenge of Human Security

By: Ludovica Brambilla, Arslan Sheikh and Esther Brito Ruiz

Share of people living in urban areas

The Urban World 

The world is becoming increasingly urban. For the first time in history, most of the world population resides in cities – and the challenges of human security have evolved accordingly. Human security is generally considered to encompass economic, food, health, environmental, personal, community, and political security. In line with urbanization, issues of lack of access to health or education centers have tended to decrease, but problems associated with social stratification, urban segregation, and unaffordability have become more prominent. Nowhere is this more evident – or pressing – in modern cities than in the primordial problem of access to housing. 

As city centers become denser, competition for space has becomes fiercer and through it the struggle for housing supply and conditions of tenant protection worsens. This drives up prices, making housing unaffordable for many. In turn, this acts as a facilitator of socio-economic segregation and a core driver of urban inequality. In the world’s megacities – those with more than 10 million inhabitants – this has often become especially dire. Currently, 20% of the world population – about 1.6 billion people – lack access to adequate housing. While not often discussed in political science, access to housing stands as a foundational element – and a precondition for – human security. 

Human Security Implications of Housing 

The local governments of different countries are trying to implement innovative solutions to tackle the housing problem ranging from mandatory social housing quotas in Helsinki to creating backyard homes in Los Angeles. However, when these initiatives are unsuccessful in managing the problem, housing creates multilevel human security crises. These often include the proliferation of slums, the advance of gentrification, and both increased evictions and homelessness. With the COVID-19 pandemic driving forth a new global housing crisis and compromising the economic security of millions, we see the fault lines within our cities and societies widen further. 

Slums 

Slums are mainly the product of unplanned urbanization and can represent the most common form of housing in many expanding cities of the developing world – such as Kibera, New Delhi, Mumbai, or Manila. They are a form of informal housing – often illegal – which can be defined as having the following characteristics: unsafe or inadequate infrastructure; overcrowding; limited or no access to basic services – such as running water or electricity; and no secure tenure, due to having no land-rights on the property. 

Slums emerge and continue to proliferate in less developed countries due to the the inability to meet the demands of a growing population; nearly about one billion people occupy slums. The key challenge of slums is their large size and magnitude. The total number of slum inhabitants has grown, even as the proportion of slum population has declined. The people living in worst slum conditions are found in Sub-Saharan Africa and Southern Asia – regions with a low Human Development Index and persistent poverty challenges. Asian cities host sixty-one percent of the global slum population, with India and China alone having  153 and 171 million slum dwellers respectively. The causes of concern for slum dwellers are manifold. They not only are at risk of being the victims of forceful evictions, but are also prone to various environmental risks such as steep slopes, river and canal beds, marshes and near polluted areas like garbage dumps. Besides that, they often lack the conditions required to live a dignified life. The low-income residents living in slums are also displaced from their neighborhood because of gentrification.

Gentrification 

Gentrification underlines the ocial and economic divisions that exists within the world'cities. It is a powerful force capable of mutating cities and bringing new private and public capital and services into neighborhoods that have suffered from prolonged disinvestments. But gentrification strongly differs from urban renewal, in fact, the rising of property value and the lack of affordable housing cause exclusionary displacement. The pandemic has further exposed and worsened these dynamics which has ultimately led to the displacement of low-income and minority residents. 

As a result, the long-term residents that have created the unique social fabric of the neighborhood are forced to move. Minority groups are most often damaged by this process. For instance, in large American cites, displacement of minorities has followed gentrification and impacted significant percentages of black and hispanic residents that can no longer benefit from the new services that come with new local investments. This results in the erosion of the social networks on which families rely on, fostering isolation. As areas have gentrified, low-income families face severe housing crises which sometimes even push them into homelessness. More often, poorer residents move on the fringes of cities further increasing pockets of poverty, urban decay and ultimately, segregation. 

Once we recognize the impacts of gentrification on social justice and human security, we cannot separate this problem from the urge of adequate policies. The possible solutions lay on rent control policies and progressive land tax combined with the restriction of predatorial investment schemes that can prevent evictions and homelessness.

Evictions & Homelessness  

As mentioned, dynamics like gentrification can drive forced evictions, which only increases in times of crisis. In 2020, the UN's special rapporteur on the right to housing issued an official call to governments requesting they halt all evictions until the end of the pandemic. That year, in the United States alone around 30 to 40 million people were identified to be facing or at risk of eviction. Similar trends and forced evictions manifested globally – with cases in South African, Brazil and Kenya being notable.  The fear of eviction threatens core rights of urban residents and reflects trends of social disparities – affecting LGBT+ youth, mono-parental families, and people of color disproportionately. When eviction occurs, it often implies the loss of access to other basic services.

Derived from evictions and urban inequality is homelessness. This phenomenon is conditioned by issues as varied as racism and discrimination, gendered violence, and mental health, among others.  Currently, around 2% of the global population is homeless – which is set to continue to increase in line with urbanization. Homelessness is an expression of failures in governance and has turned into a global human rights crisis. It is important to note that local governments can worsen the crisis by taking stances of criminalization or imposing harsh conditions that seek to drive the homeless away to other areas. A visible example of these policies is the installation of hostile architecture. By virtue of an absence of housing, homelessness compromises every aspect of human security. 

Conclusion

To address the issue of housing insecurity, political leaders should look beyond the affordability of basic shelters. Instead, possible solutions need to focus on improving services in critical neighborhoods, taking advantage of public land to build new social housing in parts of the city suffering under market pressure. In order to get to a new reality of accessible, inclusive and sustainable cities, a strong collaboration between the public-private and nonprofit sectors is needed. Effective solutions also require the inclusion of representative local social actors and community-based organizations in decision-making processes, which will be fundamental in preserving and enhancing the city’s cultural identity. There exist viable solutions, what remains wanting is the political will for implementation. 

April 4, 2021 — No Comments

Dr Simon Rushton on Human Security, Globalisation, COVID-19, Self-interest, & Cooperation

Dr Simon Rushton (Sheffield University, Chatham House) discusses politics of human security and global health in relation to globalisation, state self interest during the COVID-19 crisis, and international cooperation.

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