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Caring for the World: Security in the Anthropocene

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International Relations in the Anthropocene

Abstract

This chapter explores an alternative logic and ethic of security—care—that may represent the unique conditions of the Anthropocene age. It begins by providing an overview of how a specific ethical injunction—to care—has historically emerged within feminist discourses and how it has slowly been adopted by International Relations (IR) scholars. It then moves to discuss how care can be used as an ethical and political concept for addressing new types of avoidable (and unavoidable) threats arising from diverse sources entangled with human action. Finally, it explores the unique benefits and potential pitfalls for engaging with the concept of care in securing our new world. Rather than re-using traditional security concepts, which have been constructed from a belief in a violent estrangement between competing units, care allows us to see security as a radical entanglement between humans, nonhuman animals, seeds, bacteria, materials, and technology.

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Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. School of Government and International Affairs, Durham University, Durham, UK

    Cameron Harrington

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  1. Cameron Harrington
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Correspondence to Cameron Harrington .

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Editors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Politics and International Relations, University of Westminster, London, UK

    David Chandler

  2. Department of Social Sciences, University of Hamburg, Hamburg, Germany

    Franziska Müller

  3. Institute for Peace Research and Security Policy, University of Hamburg, Hamburg, Germany

    Delf Rothe

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Harrington, C. (2021). Caring for the World: Security in the Anthropocene. In: Chandler, D., Müller, F., Rothe, D. (eds) International Relations in the Anthropocene. Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-53014-3_12

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