Journal of Human Security

Abstract: A few changes have caught up with our venerable journal since our last issue. As you have noticed, JHS is now published by Librello, an excellent new publishing house based in Switzerland. Volumes 1 though 7 are still available through the RMIT website. The two issues of volume 8 are available freely through our personal blog site http://www.hsihumansecurityjournal.com and from this current issue onward our issues will be available by open access through the Librello website http://librelloph.com/ojs/index.php/journalofhumansecurity . All archived volumes are also accessible though the Librello site, although volumes 1 through 7 are still on pay per view. We are grateful to the people at Librello for providing access to our archive in its entirety through their webside.

Abstract: It should come as no surprise that prisons can become breeding grounds for radicalisation and terrorism as prisons serve as reservoirs for society’s most dangerous individuals (Useem & Clayton, 2009). Prisons are places of vulnerability and they provide a space where radical and extremist ideologies can flourish. Despite being a popular topic among researchers and policymakers, there still remain significant gaps in our understanding and many unanswered questions. This paper provides a literature review on prisoner radicalisation. It specifically explores the role religion plays in prison and its link to radicalisation, prisoner vulnerability to radicalisation, the radicalisation process, and outlines the current debate as to where terrorist prisoners should be held. This paper concludes by identifying the major gaps in the literature and offering concluding remarks.

Abstract: This article reveals, by studying correlative relationships between US regime support and regime properties, that the US foreign policy in the Middle East has traditionally helped governments to limit the political participation of Islamists, communists, enemies of Israel and populations that could be hostile to the US oil interests. This way the US economic and strategic security interests have contributed to human insecurity in the region. With the exception of the last interest, the US has relaxed its support for repression of the above-mentioned groups. This seems to be one of the international factors that made the Arab Spring possible.

Abstract: While security of our hominid encampments and settlements must have been at or near the top of our species priorities since our evolution some several hundred thousand years ago, awareness of the magnitude of our alterations, interactions and impacts on our world is a very recent event. Even more recent is our collective and growing angst over how are species is to secure some sort of permanence on a planet that is ultimately governed by natural forces and is forever changing.

Abstract: I begin this brief review of this important volume with the confession that I have not personally pursued a teaching style that has employed a self-acclaimed textbook for many, many years, preferring to construct courses around monographs, articles and other visual materials. However, were I provided the opportunity to teach a course at the upper division undergraduate level or early gradate level in the subject of human security, this would certainly be the book I would choose (with the caveat introduced below). Alex and Sabina Lautensach have given careful and thoughtful consideration to every aspect of the text: the preface and introduction, written by the editors, lay out both the logic of the text and frame the subject matter that will locate the reader firmly in the midst of the vast challenges that consti­tute the issue of human security. They do so by em­phasizing both the multiple dimensions along which the issue of human security can be located and the inseparable nature of these as they interact with each other in complex ways. In many respects this strikes me as one of the most important contributions to the text—its steady insistence that human security as a construct is in a discursive state of constant emer­gence, such that in some important ways all its varied dimensions insistently co-vary. To make such a claim is in itself daunting—to demonstrate its validity and mutual engagements through the complex subject matters of its 20 chapters, is a tour de force. Their conclusion is sufficiently rich to stand alone as an illustrative text in other course materials.