Security

The word “secure” is derived from securus, meaning freedom from anxiety.

In debate about national security strategies, some argue that security depends principally on developing protective and coercive capabilities in order to protect the security referent in a hostile environment (and potentially to project that power into its environment, and dominate it to the point of strategic supremacy). Others argue that security depends principally on building the conditions in which equitable relationships can develop, partly by reducing antagonism between actors, ensuring that fundamental needs can be met, and also that differences of interest can be negotiated effectively.

A number of African states such as South Sudan and Somalia have been unable to govern their security in meaningful ways. Often failing to be able to claim the monopoly of force in their territory and thus being the Sovereign challenged.

Notably, the Act did not define national security, which was conceivably advantageous, as its ambiguity made it a powerful phrase to invoke against diverse threats to interests of the state, such as domestic concerns.

Measures taken to ensure US national security include:

• Using diplomacy to rally allies and isolate threats.
• Marshaling economic power to elicit cooperation.
• Maintaining effective armed forces.
• Implementing civil defense and emergency preparedness policies (including anti-terrorism legislation).
• Ensuring the resilience and redundancy of critical infrastructure.
• Using intelligence services to detect and defeat or avoid threats and espionage, and to protect classified information.
• Tasking counterintelligence services or secret police to protect the nation from internal threats.