ISBN 327.36 (100)-027.21
Securitization in favor of Developing Hybrid Orwell-Huxley world
Natalija Krstova
Center for intercultural studies and research, Skopje, Macedonia.
Abstract
With globalization, the number of security threats increases. Which security issues will be prioritized and how the laws passed and actions taken to minimize them may reflect on citizen’s liberties? In light of the global war on terror necessity to protect the sovereignty of world countries have emerged and with that the need for surveillance of civilians. Are the laws like the Patriot Act one step further to creating a dystopian future of the likes of Orwell’s 1984, or because of our technological advances we are willingly participating in the World State of Mustafa Mond where we are flooded with information, marginalizing the political and economic issues? The state of today’s securitization practices effect on creating a supersurvailed information flooded world similar to a “1984” and “Brave new World” hybrid society is discussed in this paper.
Keywords: securitization; 1984, international security; Brave New World; security threats.
I. Introduction
Globalization has long ago stopped being phenomenon of any kind. The NCCR North-South (Backhaus 2003) defines it very broadly as “increasing interlinking of political, economic, institutional, social, cultural, technical, and ecological issues at the global level.” And that is absolutely one of the most non-polarized definitions of Globalization. Because most of the theoretical discourse regarding it has tendency to take pro or contra stand. In example “According to Collins Dictionary it represents the process enabling financial and investment markets to operate internationally, as a result of improved communication, and it is contradicted by the fact that very few trends and phenomena are literally global - most are regional or express some form of western or American hegemony, or both. Visions of the world as a single marketplace in which transnational corporations dominate are denied by the continued importance of national institutions in the regulation of trade and production” (Hirst, Thompson, and Bromley 2009)
Represented in one way or another, it can be claimed that the different technological, social, economic and cultural development surpass the imagination of many sci-fi authors of the 20th century. Globally connected, the expectations of technology are not just high but set the bar of what limits are - higher every day. Security is the main issue around which every country sovereignty bases and relies upon, or, in theory “Security- Insecurity is defined in relation to vulnerabilities-both internal and external-that threaten or have the potential to bring down and weaken state structures both territorial and institutional and governing regimes”(Ayoob 1995) and also the claim that “A nation is secure to the extent to which it is not in danger of having to sacrifice core values if it wishes to avoid war, and is able, if challenged to maintain them by victory in such a war” (Buzan 2007). In this globalization frenzy world, Security has remained priority, now more than ever, but its changes have been directly and primarily affected by the developed technological society, and therefore remarkable. This paper tries to find, if any, the co-relation between the worst prognosis in the dystopian novel by George Orwell, “1984”, and the dystopian “Brave New World” by Aldous Huxley and the Securitization processes in this, without a doubt, global society. Backed up by the research and theory that applies in securitization in international relations today in the 21st century (Charrett 2009; Guzzini 2011; Buzan 2007), the subject of this essay is to, with as many facts as possible explain how the actions of the countries after the post-Cold War period, have created both mixture of the over secured and super watched upon everyone world of the “Big Brother”[1], and the world of Mustapha Mond and his world government[2]. And also, how those two fictional worlds, have intertwined in today’s securitization practices and the society’s response to it.
The reason and the necessity of this comparison, it is not to add up to the vilification of securitization as such, but to point out how the globalized society gives connectivity to the world, but on the flipside, the bigger and more open society is, it is more probable to become subject of over-securitization and to become highly controlled through the means that provided that connection and openness in the first place (Hirst, Thompson, and Bromley 2009; Waever 1993). The examples and logic behind this fear are justified by political events and actions as a perfect examples everywhere around us. The Patriot Act[3] in the USA that makes a distinctive parallel with the Thought Police in “1984” that is authorized to read your thoughts and arrest you for Thoughtcrime, with consent directly given by the people. The NATO’s relevance in today’s collective security the principle “an attack against one it’s attack against all”(NATO 2015), that was founded as an opposition to the Warsaw Pact during the Cold War, by still existing as a military block actually strengthens the notion of creating only couple of states that are continuously either in a war like state with each other or in a shaky truce and they form alliances (e.g. Russia, USA, China and the EU, forming different coalitions). The Wikileaks affair (Van Cleave 2015; Rees 2012; McGreal 2010) and the immediate arrest warrant for it's founder, Julian Assange[4] incidentally places him in the role of the misfortunate Winston Smith in Orwell’s novel, that one day starts questioning himself about the society he lives in, only to discover that even the people that he considers to represent the resistance and the opposition of the society, represent the Big Brother too. Also, the Edward Snowden[5] case, that revealed information to the world about the clandestine global surveillance (Van Cleave 2015; Greenwald 2015), even on the pretext of people’s own security, reminds us, that our smartphones, computers, tablets and even TV’s could be watching us back (Orwell 2002). In this context, it is essential to mention the social networks and the online-depersonalization of the masses as one of the perks and at the same time, disadvantages of today’s society. Our civilization behavior, overwhelmingly resembles “Brave New World” citizens distraction by triviality and the superficial connections to one another, depicted in today’s marginalization of Africa’s many civil war victims by the Global Media (Comolli 2015; Fessy 2015). The ISIS beheadings on videos that are posted online easily reach global audiences, sidelining the value of human life and justifying the use of violence and suffering by turning it in entertainment on social media. The lack of real demonstrations and movements that will result in global change outlines the connection and provides basis for one to identify with Bernard Marx’s behavior when faced with the conundrum whether to help John the Savage[6], choosing not to act from fear of what involvement might cost (Lindsay 2015). These traits of today’s society, described in Huxley’s novel unavoidably lead to imposing measures of securitization that closely resemble Orwell’s fictive society.
Who is to blame? Are the times of great heroes and great sacrifices long gone? Is securitization of non-security issues the state’s way of covering the real security issues in the world like poverty and access to clean water?(Institute for Water 2013; Ferraro and others 2003) The thesis in the introduction of this topic is closely related with Buzan, Waever and Wilde’s explication that “Issues that become securitized do not necessarily represent issues that are essential to the objective survival of a state, but rather represent issues where someone was successful in constructing an issue into an existential problem.”[7] In this paper, I’ll try to answer some of the questions that surface when exploring the trends of 21st century securitization processes (Charrett 2009; Backhaus 2003; Buzan, Wæver, and Wilde 1998; Waever 1993), but my main subject of interest will be: Is over-securitizing a result of fear (of terrorism, war, poverty) implanted in today’s society (Orwell’s logic), or a result of apathetic, depersonalized society’s decision to leave the control to someone eager to control, while staying uninterested to participate in the decision making as long as it’s hedonistic needs are met (Huxley’s logic), or maybe a hybrid of both?
Social critic Neil Postman contrasted this worlds states: “What Orwell feared were those who would ban books. What Huxley feared was that there would be no reason to ban a book, for there would be no one who wanted to read one. Orwell feared those who would deprive us of information. Huxley feared those who would give us so much that we would be reduced to passivity and egotism. Orwell feared that the truth would be concealed from us. Huxley feared the truth would be drowned in a sea of irrelevance. Orwell feared we would become a captive culture. Huxley feared we would become a trivial culture, preoccupied with some equivalent of the feelies, the orgy porgy, and the centrifugal bumblepuppy. In 1984, Huxley added, people are controlled by inflicting pain. In Brave New World, they are controlled by inflicting pleasure. In short, Orwell feared that what we fear will ruin us. Huxley feared that our desire will ruin us.”[8](Lindsay 2015)
II. Securitization – Is it all in perception?
The Securitization theory as a trademark of the Copenhagen school explains that every issue can be transformed from non-political to political -“politicized,” and then to a security issue-“securitized”(McDonald 2008). Although this is relatively new and provocative theory that largely broadens the horizons about what can represent a security issue, because the notion of identity is connected to understanding of securitization, rather than the notion of state security, (part of what makes it so revolutionary), there are some authors that criticize the fact that the securitization theory has left a subjectivist security concept behind, where security is whatever significant actors may regard as such. “If all is in the eye of the beholder, then anything could in principle be a threat. Yet, ripe tomatoes, which visitors to Valencia can experience as a weapon once a year, never appear as a general security threat in our intelligence statistics “ and “Why is it, for instance, that the foreign policies of some countries are ‘historically’ more paranoid than those of others” (Guzzini 2011) So, which are these states whose foreign policies are more “paranoid” than others that we can take in consideration for a perfect example of securitizing fear, and with that will represent the society of over-securitizing as in Orwell’s 1984?
The USA’s highly controversial Patriot Act (Mailman 2002) passed in October 26, 2001 is a perfect match. The 9/11 Attack on the World trade center, is the textbook example of how implanting fear into one country’s nation by a terrorist attack provides the perfect ground for the citizens not only to lose sense of security in their own country, but to allow the government to pass a law which deprives them from some of their basic civil rights and liberties with the pretext of protecting them. Securitization of the terrorism issue was unavoidable, but the law that was passed and now it’s part of the US legislation, gives numerous, otherwise unthinkable rights to the state over its citizens liberties.(Buzan 2007) In such a liberal and democratic western society, if this was any other case, the Patriot Act would be considered a deep intrusion and attack on civil rights. But in this specific case, supported by the majority of the US citizens the law was quickly passed in the US Senate. Basically the Patriot Act largely facilitated many activities that the government agencies could undertake in order to fight terrorism, from surveillance to detaining citizens without previous investigation.(Mailman 2002) That makes the creepy parallel with Orwell’s Telescreens in every building along with hidden microphones and cameras, enabling the Thought Police to identify anyone who might endanger the Party's régime[9] more viable.
The Global War on Terror that George W. Bush announced around that time, reminds very much of the wars that Oceania proclaims on its neighbors in 1984[10]. A Vague notion, the people don’t know what exactly is, what is the cause, the identity of the enemy, or how long it is going to last ,very often compared to the Cold War period. Regarding this “War on Terror” Buzan explains: “This ‘long war’ is explicitly compared to the Cold War as a similar sort of zero-sum, global-scale, generational struggle against anti-liberal ideological extremists who want to rule the world. Both have been staged as a defense of the West, or western civilization, against those who would seek to destroy it”.[11]
The irony in these examples and it’s comparison to Orwell’s fictional totalitarian society is the political regime in which it occurs. Namely, in the time when the book was written (1949) it was emphasized that is about future dystopian English Socialism of some sort, which he imagined it would end up with global “Big Brother”, that would watch upon everyone and the citizens will be forced into obedience and ”love” for him. But this kind of dystopian reality occurred in the cradle of democracy where „All Men Are Created Equal”[12] and with libertarian past and present. The question that arises from such irony is whether Huxley’s prediction about the demise and triviality of western culture that will lead to global society that will be so self-consumed, pleasure-seeking and self-absorbed, that it won’t mind being watched upon and told what to do, but in fact it would find it rather welcoming, came true? The Global Society today has the possibility of connecting the human kind in a way that was not imaginable only 20 years ago. The Global Village that Marshall McLuhan was talking about (Luhan 1964) is unveiling in front of us with the global overtaking of the Internet. Is the empathy between people disappearing, as a side effect? Is this society really as trivial and hedonist as Huxley in his “Brave New World” predicted? As an example for such behavior we can easily take above mentioned Wikileaks (Rees 2012) and also the Snowden case (Van Cleave 2015; Greenwald 2015), which revealed to the world massive affairs in the political world and security issues that according to all Security Studies Theory should concern the common citizen. These immense political and security affairs and their implications, were drowned in the media chatter, among the vast amount of information pouring in on a daily basis. To be noted, the person that is held responsible is Chelsea (Bradley) Manning[13] who helped leak the information that proves major political and security incrimination, and was sentenced on a 35 year imprisonment for releasing classified U.S. government documents to Wikileaks (Cavaliere 2015; Van Cleave 2015; McGreal 2010). While Assange is in exile, residing in the Ecuadorian Embassy in London, being wanted for extradition in Sweden under the allegations of sexual assault (Rees 2012), Edward Snowden fled to Russia after releasing the incriminating evidence about the global surveillance that NSA was conducting (Greenwald 2015). Both, if caught, will be prosecuted for espionage and releasing classified government documents. But, the peculiar thing in both Snowden case and Wikileaks (Manning, Assange) case, was that, apart of the initial shock that the news caused, no one was held responsible for the content of the material itself (Van Cleave 2015). The Media coverage was satisfactory, for example the Snowden article in The Guardian was the most read story of 2014 , with 3.9 million views (Greenwald, MacAskill, and Poitras 2013), but obviously not provoking enough for the society to act upon. These two highlighted cases give us clear picture about how close the global society started resembling Huxley’s feared dystopian society in his “World State”.(Huxley 2006)