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59. Fen Osler Hampson, Chester A. Crocker, and Pamela Aall, “If the World’s Getting More Peaceful, Why Are We Still inDanger?” Globe and Mail, 20 October 2005, A25. The authors were responding to the findings of the 2005 Human SecurityReport. The claim that today’s wars are more intractable than those of earlier years is supported by the findings of a 2004study of the duration of 122 civil wars between 1945 and 1999 by James Fearon. Fearon found that the average length ofongoing wars had increased from some two years in 1946 to 15 years in 1999—suggesting that they were indeed becomingmore intractable. See James Fearon, “Why Do Some Civil Wars Last So Much Longer Than Others?” Journal of Peace Research41, no. 3 (2004): 275-301. Note that Professor Fearon’s dataset only covers civil wars, not the minor armed conflicts thatUCDP includes, and that it only extends to 1999, not 2005.60. “Excess” here refers to death rates that exceed the “normal” death rate prior to the outbreak of conflict. See InternationalRescue Committee, “The Lancet Publishes IRC Mortality Study from DR Congo; 3.9 Million Have Died: 38,000 Die perMonth,” 6 January 2006, http://www.theirc.org/news/page.jsp?itemID=27819067 (accessed 28 November 2006).61. This is based on data from the Independent Evaluation Group, Engaging With Fragile States: World Bank Support to Low-Income Countries Under Stress (Washington, DC: IBRD/WB, 2006).30H U M A N S E C U R I T Y B R I E F 2 0 0 6
WHAT IS HUMAN SECURITY?Human security is a relatively new concept, but one that is now widely used to describe the complexof interrelated threats associated with civil war, genocide, and the displacement of populations. Thedistinction between human security and national security is a basic but important one.While national security focuses on the defence ofthe state from external attack, human security is aboutprotecting individuals and communities from any form ofpolitical violence.Human security and national security should be—andoften are—mutually reinforcing. But secure states do notautomatically mean secure peoples. Protecting citizens fromforeign attack may be a necessary condition for the securityof individuals, but it is not a sufficient one. Indeed, duringthe last 100 years far more people have been killed by theirown governments than by foreign armies.All proponents of human security agree that itsprimary goal is the protection of individuals. But consensusbreaks down over what threats individuals should beprotected from. Proponents of the “narrow” concept ofhuman security, which underpins the Human Security Report,focus on violent threats to individuals, while recognizing thatthese threats are strongly associated with poverty, lack ofstate capacity and various forms of socio-economic andpolitical inequity.Proponents of the “broad” concept of human securityarticulated in the UN Development Programme’s 1994,Human Development Report, and the Commission on HumanSecurity’s 2003 report, Human Security Now, argue that thethreat agenda should be broadened to include hunger,disease, and natural disasters because these kill far morepeople than war, genocide, and terrorism combined.Although still subject to lively debate within theresearch community, the two approaches to human securityare complementary rather than contradictory.
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Page 4: Andrew Testa / Panos Pictures. AFGH
Page 11 and 12: 6050403020Intrastate conflictsInter
Page 13 and 14: tance increases the killing capacit
Page 15 and 16: Martin Adler / Panos Pictures. LIBE
Page 17 and 18: Figure 2.3 Number of Reported, Coda
Page 19 and 20: 12108642019561961Figure 2.5 Number
Page 21 and 22: The PITF genocide/politicide datase
Page 23 and 24: 14121086420Figure 3.1 Average Numbe
Page 25 and 26: Peace agreements that follow wars o
Page 27 and 28: It is too early to make any definit
Page 29 and 30: the key dilemmas and constraints th
Page 31 and 32: 14. Note that fatality estimates ar
Page 33: 45. See Human Security Centre, Huma

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