Security in the Contemporary World Class 12 Solutions

Concept used. This is a matching question on the four cooperative tools of traditional security. Each term has one precise meaning in the chapter. Define each term, then attach the description that fits it exactly.

1. Confidence Building Measures (CBMs): a process in which rival countries regularly share ideas and information about their military intentions and forces, so neither side fears a surprise attack. This matches (b) a process of exchanging information on defence matters between nations on a regular basis.
2. Arms Control: it does not ask states to give up weapons; it regulates how weapons may be acquired or developed (for example the ABM Treaty and the NPT). This matches (d) regulates the acquisition or development of weapons.
3. Alliance: a coalition of states that coordinate their actions to deter or defend against a military attack (for example NATO). This matches (c) a coalition of nations meant to deter or defend against military attacks.
4. Disarmament: it requires states to give up certain kinds of weapons altogether (for example the BWC banned biological weapons and the CWC banned chemical weapons). This matches (a) giving up certain types of weapons.

i–b, ii–d, iii–c, iv–a. (CBMs: exchanging defence information; Arms Control: regulates acquisition or development of weapons; Alliance: a coalition to deter or defend; Disarmament: giving up certain types of weapons.)

Concept used. You must sort each item into one of three boxes. A traditional security concern is a military threat to the state's sovereignty or territory, from outside or from within (separatism counts). A non-traditional security concern is a non-military threat to human existence (disease, migration, poverty, environment). Not a threat covers normal democratic activity that does not endanger the state's core values.

1. (a) Spread of chikungunya / dengue fever: non-traditional security concern. Health epidemics are a named non-traditional (human security) threat in the chapter.
2. (b) Inflow of workers from a neighbouring nation: non-traditional security concern. The chapter treats migration as a non-traditional threat that can create social and political friction in the host country.
3. (c) Group demanding nationhood for their region: traditional security concern. A demand for a separate nation is secession; it threatens the country's territorial integrity, which is an internal traditional threat.
4. (d) Group demanding autonomy for their region: not a threat. Asking for autonomy within the country is a legitimate democratic demand for self-rule, not a bid to break away.
5. (e) Newspaper critical of the armed forces: not a threat. A free, critical press is a normal democratic right and does not endanger the state's existence.

Note for editor: some answer keys read (b) as "not a threat" and (d) as a traditional concern. The categories above follow the chapter's own treatment of migration as a non-traditional threat and of autonomy as a within-system democratic demand, which is the most widely accepted key.

(a) non-traditional; (b) non-traditional; (c) traditional; (d) not a threat; (e) not a threat.

Concept used. The question has two parts: contrast the two notions of security, then place alliance building in the right box. A good contrast names what each notion treats as the threat, who it tries to protect, and how.

The two notions differ on three points:

1. Nature of the threat. Traditional security treats military threats as the main danger: armed attack on a country's sovereignty, independence and territory. Non-traditional security goes beyond the military to include threats to human existence such as terrorism, hunger, disease, migration and environmental harm.
2. Who is protected (the referent). In traditional security the referent is the state, with its territory and institutions. In non-traditional security the referent widens to the individual, the community and all of humankind, hence the names "human security" and "global security".
3. The response. Traditional security relies on force: deterrence, defence, balance of power and alliances. Non-traditional security relies mainly on cooperation, because force can rarely solve poverty, migration or epidemics.

Where alliances belong. The creation and sustenance of alliances belongs to traditional security. An alliance is a coalition of states that coordinate their military actions to deter or defend against an attack, which is a classic military, force-based tool.

Traditional security focuses on military threats to the state and answers them with force (deterrence, defence, balance of power, alliances). Non-traditional security widens the threat to non-military dangers (terrorism, poverty, disease, migration, environment) and protects individuals and humankind, mainly through cooperation. The creation and sustenance of alliances belongs to traditional security.

Concept used. First World here means the powerful, mostly Western developed countries; Third World means the newly-independent, less-developed countries of Asia, Africa and Latin America. The chapter shows their security threats differ in both kind and source. Lay them out side by side.

1. First World: mainly external, mainly military. After the Second World War the powerful Western states felt their internal security was largely assured. They worried chiefly about threats from outside their borders: above all a military attack from the rival Cold War alliance.
2. Third World: external and internal together. The new states faced the prospect of war with neighbours and internal military conflict at the same time. They often feared their neighbours even more than they feared the superpowers, quarrelling over borders, territories and control of people.
3. Third World: separatism and internal wars. Internally, the new states worried about separatist movements wanting to form independent countries. Internal wars now make up more than 95 per cent of all armed conflicts, and a neighbour could instigate an internal movement, merging the external and internal threats.
4. Third World: non-traditional threats bite harder. Poverty, disease and refugee flows weigh far more heavily on the Third World. The world's poorest region, sub-Saharan Africa, also sees the most armed conflict, and epidemics like HIV-AIDS drive poor regions deeper into poverty.

First World (developed) countries faced threats mainly from outside their borders, chiefly a military attack from the rival Cold War alliance, with internal security largely assured. Third World (newly-independent) countries faced threats from both outside (war with neighbours, sometimes feared more than the superpowers) and inside (separatist movements and internal wars), and they also bore the heaviest burden of non-traditional threats such as poverty, disease and refugee flows.

Concept used. Recall the dividing line. A traditional threat is military force used by one state against another. A non-traditional threat is a non-military danger to human existence. Then define terrorism and see which box it fits.

1. What terrorism is. Terrorism is political violence that targets civilians deliberately and indiscriminately. Terrorist groups use force or the threat of force to change a political condition they dislike, choosing civilian targets to terrorise the public.
2. Why it is non-traditional. The threat does not come from another state's army; it comes from non-state groups and harms ordinary people directly. International terrorism crosses borders and affects the citizens or territory of more than one country. These are the marks of a non-traditional threat.
3. Its place in the chapter. Terrorism is listed under "New Sources of Threats", alongside human rights, poverty, migration and epidemics, all of which are non-traditional. Attention to it grew after the 11 September 2001 attacks, though terrorism itself is not new.

Terrorism is a non-traditional threat to security. It is political violence by non-state groups that deliberately targets civilians, often across national borders, rather than a military attack by one state on another, and the chapter places it among the new, non-traditional sources of threat.

Concept used. In the traditional security perspective, the greatest danger to a country is a military threat, usually from another country. When war threatens, the chapter says a government has three basic choices. Name and explain each.

When its security is threatened by war, a state can choose to:

1. Surrender. The government can give in to the attacker. The chapter notes that governments may surrender when actually confronted by war, but they never announce surrender as the official policy of the country.
2. Deter the attacker (prevent war). The state can stop the other side from attacking by promising to raise the costs of war to an unacceptable level. Preventing war this way is called deterrence.
3. Defend itself. If war actually breaks out, the state can defend itself: it fights to deny the attacker its objectives and to turn back or defeat the attacking forces. Limiting or ending a war once it has begun is called defence.

Under the traditional security perspective a threatened state has three basic choices: to surrender; to prevent the attack by deterrence (threatening to raise the cost of war to an unacceptable level); and to defend itself if war breaks out, so as to deny the attacker its aims and turn it back. Preventing war is called deterrence and limiting or ending war is called defence.

Concept used. Balance of power is a component of traditional security policy. It is a state's effort to keep its own power at least equal to that of stronger or potentially hostile countries, so that no single country becomes strong enough to dominate or attack it safely. Define it, then explain how a state builds and keeps it.

What balance of power means. When countries look around, they see that some are bigger and stronger. A very powerful neighbour is a clue to who might be a threat in future, even if it gives no obvious reason for attack. Governments are therefore very sensitive to the balance of power between themselves and other countries, especially close-by countries and old rivals, and they work hard to maintain a favourable balance.

How a state can achieve it:

1. Build up military power. A good part of keeping a favourable balance is strengthening one's own armed forces, so as to match or exceed the power of a likely rival.
2. Build economic and technological power. Economic and technological strength matter too, because they are the very basis on which military power is built. A strong economy can sustain a strong military.
3. Build alliances. A state can form alliances with other countries to add their strength to its own, increasing its effective power relative to a rival or a rival alliance.

Balance of power is a state's effort to keep its own power equal to or greater than that of stronger or potentially hostile countries, so none can safely dominate it. A state achieves it mainly by building up its military power, and by developing the economic and technological strength that underpins military power, often supported by alliances with other states.

Concept used. A military alliance is a coalition of states that coordinate their military actions. Its purpose flows from the definition in the chapter: alliances exist to deter or defend against military attack and to increase a country's effective power. Explain the objectives, then give one real example.

Objectives of military alliances:

1. To deter or defend against attack. The core aim is to deter or defend against a military attack. By joining forces, members make an attack on any one of them too costly for an aggressor to risk.
2. To increase effective power. Countries form alliances to increase their effective power relative to another country or alliance, pooling strength they could not muster alone.
3. To serve national interests. Alliances are based on national interests and are usually formalised in written treaties, with a fairly clear identification of who the threat is. They can change when national interests change.

Example: NATO. The North Atlantic Treaty Organisation is a functioning military alliance of the US and its Western allies. Its specific objective during the Cold War was collective defence: an attack on one member would be treated as an attack on all, so as to deter and, if needed, defend against a military attack from the rival Soviet-led bloc. The chapter notes how alliances can shift with interests: for example, the US backed Islamic militants in Afghanistan against the Soviet Union in the 1980s but later attacked them after the 11 September 2001 strikes.

The objectives of military alliances are to deter or defend against a military attack, to increase members' effective power against a rival, and to serve their national interests, usually under a written treaty. A functioning example is NATO, whose specific objective is collective defence: an attack on one member is treated as an attack on all, deterring and defending against attack from a rival bloc.

Concept used. This is an argumentative question: take a stand and back it with evidence. Environmental degradation is a non-traditional (global) security threat, because it endangers human existence without any army being involved. A reasoned "yes, I agree" is strongly supported by the chapter.

Stand: Yes, I agree. Rapid environmental degradation is a serious, non-traditional threat to security. The arguments:

1. It threatens the very survival of some states. Due to global warming, a sea-level rise of 1.5 to 2.0 metres would flood 20 per cent of Bangladesh, inundate most of the Maldives, and threaten nearly half the population of Thailand. For a low-lying country, this is a threat to its existence, the test for any security problem.
2. No country can solve it alone. Environmental problems are global in nature, so one country may have to bear the brunt of a problem it did not cause. This makes international cooperation vital, even though it is hard to achieve.
3. It links to other security threats. Degradation and resource scarcity feed conflict and migration. Poverty in the South and pressure on resources push people to migrate and can sharpen tensions, so environmental harm rarely stays a purely "green" issue.

Yes. Rapid environmental degradation is a serious non-traditional security threat. Global warming and a 1.5 to 2.0 metre sea-level rise could flood 20 per cent of Bangladesh, most of the Maldives and threaten half of Thailand's people, endangering the very existence of low-lying states. Because such problems are global, no country can solve them alone, and they feed conflict and migration, so they clearly threaten security.

Concept used. Deterrence means preventing war by threatening unacceptable costs; defence means limiting or ending a war once it starts. The statement argues that nuclear weapons, designed for a state-versus-state world, are of limited use against today's non-traditional threats. Explain why, threat by threat.

Nuclear weapons have limited usage against contemporary security threats because:

1. Today's threats are often non-state and non-military. Many contemporary threats, terrorism, global poverty, refugee movements, epidemics and environmental harm, do not come from another state's army. A nuclear weapon, which deters or defeats a state, has no target to threaten among these.
2. Force barely helps with non-traditional threats. Military force may have a limited role in fighting terrorism or enforcing human rights, but it is hard to see how force could alleviate poverty, manage migration and refugees, or control epidemics. In most such cases, using force would only make matters worse, and a nuclear weapon least of all.
3. Deterrence assumes a rational state opponent. Deterrence works only against an enemy that can be threatened and that fears retaliation. A terrorist group with no territory or population to lose cannot be deterred by the threat of nuclear retaliation the way a state can.
4. Cooperation, not weapons, is the real answer. Dealing with these threats requires international cooperation, bilateral, regional or global, rather than military confrontation. The tools that work are treaties, institutions and shared action, not the bomb.

Agreed. Nuclear weapons are built to deter or defeat another state's army, but most contemporary threats, terrorism, poverty, refugees, epidemics and environmental harm, are non-state or non-military and cannot be addressed by force. Force often makes such problems worse, and groups with nothing to lose cannot be deterred. These threats need international cooperation, so nuclear weapons have only limited usage against them.

Concept used. India's security strategy has four broad components, used in varying combinations over time. The key point is that India has not chosen one type of security over the other: it has given priority to both traditional and non-traditional security, because it has faced both military and non-military threats from within and outside its borders. Set out the four components, sorting them by type.

India has given priority to both traditional and non-traditional security. Its four-component strategy shows the balance:

1. Traditional: strengthening military capabilities. Because India has fought wars with its neighbours, with Pakistan in 1947–48, 1965, 1971 and 1999, and with China in 1962, and is surrounded by nuclear-armed countries in South Asia, it strengthened its forces. It first tested a nuclear device in 1974 and conducted nuclear tests in 1998, justified as safeguarding national security.
2. Traditional and cooperative: strengthening international norms and institutions. Under Nehru, India backed Asian solidarity, decolonisation, disarmament and the UN. It pushed for a universal, non-discriminatory non-proliferation regime and a New International Economic Order (NIEO), used non-alignment to stay outside bloc politics, signed the 1997 Kyoto Protocol, and sent troops on UN peacekeeping missions.
3. Internal (traditional): meeting internal security challenges. Several militant groups, in Nagaland, Mizoram, Punjab and Kashmir, have sought to break away from India. India has tried to preserve national unity through a democratic political system that lets different communities voice grievances and share power.
4. Non-traditional: economic development. India has tried to develop its economy so that the vast mass of citizens are lifted out of poverty and misery and huge inequalities are not allowed to exist. Democratic politics gives the poor a voice and pressures governments to combine growth with human development, so democracy itself becomes a source of security.

India has given priority to both traditional and non-traditional security through a four-component strategy: (1) building military capability (wars with Pakistan and China; nuclear tests in 1974 and 1998); (2) strengthening international norms and institutions (Nehru's support for the UN and disarmament, non-alignment, the Kyoto Protocol, UN peacekeeping); (3) meeting internal security challenges (separatist movements in Nagaland, Mizoram, Punjab and Kashmir, met through democracy); and (4) economic development to lift the masses out of poverty. The first three are largely traditional, the fourth non-traditional, so India prioritises both.

Concept used. A political cartoon makes an argument through an image. Here the artist draws a huge green beast labelled WAR with three small blue creatures labelled TERRORISM emerging from behind it, like offspring. The visual claim is that war gives birth to terrorism: terrorism grows out of, and is the product of, war. Read the message, then take a clear stand.

What the cartoon depicts. The terrorism creatures are small but multiplying, and they come from the body of the war beast. The cartoonist is saying that wars do not bring security; instead they breed terrorism. The destruction, anger and chaos left by war create the conditions in which terrorist groups are born and grow.

Stand: In favour of the connection. I agree with the link the cartoon draws, for these reasons:

1. War creates the soil for terrorism. War leaves behind insecurity, destruction and death. The resentment, displacement and breakdown of order that follow can push people towards violence and give terrorist groups recruits and a cause.
2. The chapter's own example fits. The US backed Islamic militants in Afghanistan against the Soviet Union in the 1980s; some of those militants later turned into Al Qaeda, which struck America on 11 September 2001. A war-time alliance helped create the very terrorism it later faced.
3. Force often makes it worse. The chapter notes that using military force against non-traditional threats can make matters worse. Fighting terrorism with more war can multiply the small blue creatures rather than removing them.

The cartoon shows a large beast labelled WAR with small creatures labelled TERRORISM hatching from it, arguing that war breeds terrorism. I am in favour of this connection: war leaves insecurity, destruction and resentment that create the conditions for terrorist groups to be born and grow. The chapter's own example fits, the US-backed militants in 1980s Afghanistan later became Al Qaeda, and using more force against terrorism often only multiplies it.