Perception or Discourse? Security Threats in Copenhagen School and Neoclassical Realism

Abstract

This article compares the perceptive approach of neoclassical realist security understanding with the discursive constructivist methodology of the Copenhagen School in analyzing the emergence of security threats. It departs from the assumption that these theories divergent in their perspectives on the content of security threats as well as security actors are comparable since they reveal methodological commonalities. The main emphasis of this article is that while partly adopting the perceptive subjectivity of neoclassical realism the Copenhagen School has further developed an alternative model of discursive intersubjectivity in analyzing security threats. In this context it will first cover the discussions on the content of security threats in Security Studies literature. It will then compare the assumptions of various realist understandings of security on the content and emergence of security threats with a particular focus on the perceptive perspective of neoclassical realism. Finally it will study the threat approach of the Copenhagen School through its securitization theory with insights from the speech-act theory political theory and discourse analysis in comparison with neoclassical realism.