Progressive and Regressive Securitisation: Covid, Russian Aggression and the Ethics of Security

Abstract

This paper contributes to the debate about the normative assessment of securitisation in light of Covid-19 and the Russian invasion of Ukraine. It develops the distinction of progressive and regressive securitisation. In doing so, it emphasises the processual, contextual and ambiguous nature of securitisation. I suggest that progressive securitisation is closely linked to the solidarisation, whereas regressive securitisation implies the pluralisation of international society. The two cases of Covid-19 and Russia illustrate that international order has increasingly been characterised by regressive securitisation and a pluralisation of international society, despite possible alternatives, such as a transnational response to the spread of Covid-19. They have thus contributed to the further demise of the post–Cold War liberal order, which despite its problems, has involved a re-orientation of security away from state territory and national identity as the core referent objects. I end with a plea to take the ethics of security more seriously again, and in particular to scrutinise the ways in which our own behaviour reinforces regressive securitisation.