Evolução dos Estudos de Segurança Internacional

by Barry Buzan, Lene Hansen

Este livro trata de uma das subáreas mais importantes da matéria Relações Internacionais, os ESI, sigla para Estudos de Segurança Internacional. Situa o tema desde antes da Segunda Guerra Mundial, mas foca o período posterior, apresentando as transformações das concepções de segurança provocadas pelo conflito e, em seguida, pelo longo período caracterizado pela Guerra Fria.

Durante a maior parte dessa trajetória, os ESI continuaram sendo definidos por meio de uma agenda consideravelmente militar. Segundo os autores, somente a partir dos anos 1970, quando as relações entre as superpotências já estavam mais amadurecidas, o termo segurança voltou a seu significado original e a agenda de segurança internacional se estendeu, aos poucos, para além do enfoque político-militar.

O conceito-chave dos ESI, assim, migrou de defesa ou guerra para segurança, o que significou uma guinada crucial. Os estudos passaram a abranger um conjunto maior de questões políticas, incluindo a relação entre ameaças e vulnerabilidades militares e não militares. As complexidades decorrentes impuseram novos campos de pesquisa e novas perguntas definidoras do campo contemporâneo de RI, consubstanciadas em questões como: quando implantar, utilizar e não utilizar meios militares no novo contexto geopolítico?

Exemplo ainda da complexidade crescente enfrentada pelos estudos da área é atestado pelo fato de a segurança internacional ter se tornado um empreendimento muito mais civil do que fora no período anterior à Grande Guerra, pois bombardeios estratégicos e armas nucleares transcendem a expertise tradicional de combate militar, que passou a envolver também especialistas civis - de físicos e economistas a sociólogos e psicólogos.

Atentos a esse panorama multifacetado, Buzan e Hansen estabelecem neste livro um texto clássico, imprescindível para o desenvolvimento desse campo.

Genres: International Relations, Politics, Nonfiction, History, Academic

576 pages, Paperback

First published April 1, 2008

About the author

Barry Buzan is Emeritus Professor of International Relations at the London School of Economics and Political Science (formerly Montague Burton Professor), and honorary professor at Copenhagen and Jilin Universities. In 1998 he was elected a Fellow of the British Academy. He has written, co-authored or edited over twenty books, written or co-authored more than one hundred and thirty articles and chapters, and lectured, broadcast or presented papers in over twenty countries. Among his books are: People, States and Fear: The National Security Problem in International Relations (1983, revised 2nd edition 1991); The Logic of Anarchy: Neorealism to Structural Realism (1993, with Charles Jones and Richard Little); Security: A New Framework for Analysis (1998, with Ole Wæver and Jaap de Wilde); International Systems in World History: Remaking the Study of International Relations (2000, with Richard Little); Regions and Powers: The Structure of International Security (2003, with Ole Wæver); From International to World Society? English School Theory and the Social Structure of Globalisation (2004); The Evolution of International Security Studies (2009, with Lene Hansen) and Non-Western International Relations Theory (2010, co-edited with Amitav Acharya). Work in progress includes The Global Transformation: The 19th Century and the Making of Modern International Relations (2013, with George Lawson).

Reviews

[Mayim de Vries · Rating 4 out of 5]

I'd say that this book is exceptionally dry for Buzan.

[Gustavo Sénéchal · Rating 4 out of 5]

I read this book on and off for months, intercalating with shorter texts on some subject matters it also addresses. Some of those texts were referred to in the book. Just for this reason the book accomplishes its main objective, which is do a "tour d'horizon" of International Security Studies (ISS) and outline different arguments, present fields of research and suggest bibliography to further reading. Two interrelated aspects make me give four stars, in fact I think it deserves 3 1/2 stars rather than 4. One is the perhaps excessive weight it gives to Western Europe as a security actor in the world. Western Europe, be it the EU or specific countries such as Germany, UK or France, has been for more than a decade now shying of playing a bolder role in the international security agenda. At the same time, I acknowledge that European academic institutions still undertake a lot of research on security issues. This is also to say that I missed a more comprehensive analysis of Russia, both government and academia, in ISS. The same applies to China and India for that matter. The other aspect I would mention is the, in my view, excessive importance the authors give to 9/11 as a game-changer in ISS. Their analysis of the event and of the so called global war on terrorism overlooks the impact of other significant international events or crises, particularly in Africa and in the Middle East, in ISS. No matter how overwhelming 9/11 was and despite its multifaceted consequences, in 2016, its weight to ISS should be reassessed. Something that could be done perhaps in an updated edition of the book.

[Alexander Lyngstad · Rating 4 out of 5]

A good introduction to the field

[Alyssa · Rating 1 out of 5]

Undoubtedly, this was one of the more painful books to get through for this semester.

[Vaughn · Rating 3 out of 5]

Good textbook but hard to read because of the unnecessary terminology. True this is a book more for people in the field of International Security Studies, but it would be nice if the authors had more accessible language. I'm glad that they took to analyze important subjects of International Relations theory and to define them according to pivotal times in global history, like the Cold War, 9/11, the Rise of China and so forth.