Security and Citizenship

Abstract

This chapter introduces key concepts and uses a critical framework to explore debates which have emerged in studies on both security and citizenship. I outline and critically assess the relevant literature on security and citizenship as a way of exploring the arguments I present in the remaining sections of this book. Both security and citizenship are contested concepts and their traditional meanings have been challenged by those who support a more critical, place-based understanding of social and political phenomena. New approaches to citizenship have also attempted to move beyond the limits of a juridical, legalistic framework that privileges the nation-state and those whose citizenship is made more readily accessible through institutions of the state. The security of the state, as shown in this chapter, is still the dominant paradigm in studies on security although it has been challenged by human and citizen security approaches.