In their new book, Wreckonomics, David Keen and Ruben Andersson explore the Cold War, and the fights against terrorism, migration and drugs, analysing why disastrous policies live on even when it has become apparent that they do not work. In this written interview, Larry Attree asks the authors to share key insights from this new work.
Reinterpreting Security through Images and Stories
After hearing how well the photovoice methods used by our Alternative Security Review research partners at Coventry University worked, Rethinking security’s Outreach Coordinator ran a similar project called Visualising Security with our supporters and friends. The results are now on our website. Here, Joanna Frew provides a personal reflection on the project and its findings. … Continue reading Reinterpreting Security through Images and Stories
The State of Human Security in the UK
Rethinking Security hosted a series of roundtable discussions with civil society groups throughout 2022. We shared some reflections on the blog during the discussions and we are now publishing the full report. It is available to download and here Joanna Frew share a summary of the discussions.
Security and the Politics of Exclusion
If security is such a broad concept, why does security policy so often seek to exclude the most vulnerable from protection? Leonie Mills-Woanya looks at the UK’s approach to international development, border control and policing and finds it consciously polarising and exclusive, not so much from a lack of resources as a lack of political will.
Visualising Security: Reflecting on the symbols and emotions that define security
Last week we held a launch event for our Visualising Security project. The aim of the project is, over the next 4 months, to build a collection of images and stories that challenge the conventional narrative of ‘security’ and provide evidence for our Alternative Security Review. Joanna Frew shares some reflections on the event
Searching for humane alternatives to the ‘whole society’ approach to security
In the first of a series of blog posts reflecting on our Alternative Security Review, Joanna Frew highlights some of the common themes in the first three of Rethinking Security’s roundtable discussions with civil society on human security issues.
Unthinking Immigration Detention
A decade on from the launch of its Hostile Environment agenda, the UK government is stepping up its campaign against asylum seekers, with indefinite imprisonment of migrants a central component. Fred Ashmore argues that immigration detention is expensive, ineffective and demeans us as a nation. It requires an urgent rethinking beyond the politics of fear.
Physical Security: Borders, Movement and the Fear of Migrants
Migration is a physical process that is used by the government to evoke physical fears of insecurity. A decade into the Hostile Environment, Brian Dikoff argues that the physical reality for many migrants in the UK is being inside but excluded, needed but not wanted, a convenient threat.
Pulling up the Drawbridge on Fortress Britain
Government policy and practice consistently treat asylum and migration as security issues to be tackled via hard borders and military enforcement. Libby Ruffle describes how, in its Nationality and Borders Bill, the government is closing the door on those risking their lives in dangerous channel crossings in a desperate search for safety from war and repression.
Security in Community: Finding a Home in the Hostile Environment
Rethinking Security’s new Outreach Coordinator Joanna Frew and her partner live in Martha House*, a ‘house of hospitality’ in north London with forced migrants who have no other means of support. Here she shares what she’s learnt about the value of a community setting for security over the last seven years.
The Immigration Plan and the ‘Sovereign Borders’ Bill
As the UK Government prepares to announce its new Sovereign Borders Bill in parliament, David Forbes argues that the very idea of ‘sovereign borders’ is false and ignores both the reality of international legal commitments and the disastrous precedent of Australia’s flirtation with the concept.
What Does Security Mean for Refugees?
Refugees seek safety in the UK but what they understand by ‘security’ can be different to the understanding of those who have never had to flee. Alice Herve makes the case for putting refugees’ experience of security at the heart of reformed migration policy.