“Collective security clearly implies collective measures for dealing with threats to peace” - Palmer and Perkins. Security is the chief goal of all nations and is the primary concern of International Relations. Collective security is a system of international security in which the participating nations agree to take joint action against a nation that attacks any one of them.
About the Concept
This concept was pioneered by Michael Joseph Savage, Martin Wright, Immanuel Kant & Woodrow Wilson. In this system, the security of one is the concern of all and the like-minded nations cumulatively respond to the threats and breaches of peace. According to Palmer and Perkins, for collective security to be efficient, the cumulative strength of the nations to cope with the aggressor has to be very strong and it must be put into action as soon as the aggression commences.
Collective security was earlier considered to be an abstract concept and was rather considered dangerous because of the existing diversity among nations in several different aspects that had the potency to ignite conflicts among them. The concept of collective security was actually actualized between the unfolding of Soviet “New Thinking” in the late 1980s and the eviction of Iraqi forces from Kuwait in 1991.
The concept of collective security focuses on maintaining the law and order of the society, good governance, and abjuring violence by preventing any conflict to turn into a hot war. For attaining this political and societal stability, policy-making instruments, like negotiation, diplomacy, mediation, are ascribed on the similar beliefs of the nations.
The U.N. Charter recognizes collective self-defense and Article 5 of NATO (North Atlantic Treaty Organization) emphasizes the mutual defense obligation as per the Washington Treaty. NATO has nuclear, conventional, and missile defense capabilities and if any nation is not ready to compromise and mutually accept the terms of integrative negotiation, then NATO may take action to deter and defend against any threat of aggression.
The primary organ of the United Nations for the maintenance of international peace is the Security Council which is responsible to recognize the existence of certain international unrest and as a consequence, formulate measures for regaining international peace and order.
Japan and Germany have traced accomplishments on the grounds of collective security and that has guided American foreign policy from World War II through the Cold War. It cannot be discarded or ignored that the U.S. is the superpower, and the world feels more secure when American power is amalgamated with the powers of other countries, coalitions, and institutions on behalf of common goals.
When Does It Become a Source of Power?
Collective security proves to be very beneficial when it comes to safeguarding the peaceful and prosperous interests of any sovereign nation, whether strong or weak. The concept of collective security has repeatedly reminisced since the successful relaxing of the conflicts that arose in between the communists and the capitalists during the Cold War, thus prohibiting it from turning into a Hot War.
Another major example is of the 9/11 attacks that reaffirmed the advantages of collective security as a system for maintaining good governance and order. To conclude, I would like to say that no system comes independent of shortcomings but it is an indispensable truth that “The whole is greater than the sum of its parts.”
Written by - Chandreyee Ray
Edited by- Dana Asnan
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