Tom Vander Beken SRC 10 Societal Security 23

Tom Vander Beken – SRC’ 10 - Societal Security – 23 September 2010 Trick or threat? Implicit understandings within security research and their consequences Prof. dr. Tom Vander Beken SRC’ 10 Research, development and innovation for a more secure Europe Societal Security session Ostend, 23 September 2010 www. ircp. org Universiteitstraat 4, B-9000 Ghent, Belgium Tom. Vander. Beken@UGent. be T +32 (0)9 264 69 39, F +32 (0)9 264 84 93 1

Tom Vander Beken – SRC’ 10 - Societal Security – 23 September 2010 Background & focus Reflections on the conclusions from the Workshop on 'Societal security' in security research and development of 1 July 2010 in Brussels. Background & focus: security and criminal policy reseach www. ircp. org Universiteitstraat 4, B-9000 Ghent, Belgium Tom. Vander. Beken@UGent. be T +32 (0)9 264 69 39, F +32 (0)9 264 84 93 2

Tom Vander Beken – SRC’ 10 - Societal Security – 23 September 2010 Research on implicit understandings … of what the threats to Europe really are. Many projects and tasks consider these threats as given. Few research makes them explicit and provides transparency about the way they are defined; … of the concepts used and their utility and relevance. Threats, risks, harms and vulnerabilities are different concepts; … of the availability of knowledge about threats and risks. How to assess them in an uncertain (and thus uncalculable and unpredictable) world? … of the consequences of a resilience based approach and anticipation of high impact events? … of the consequences of these epistemological problems on the transparency and accountability of the European security policy. What is the evidence base for preparatory, preventive and repressive action? www. ircp. org Universiteitstraat 4, B-9000 Ghent, Belgium Tom. Vander. Beken@UGent. be T +32 (0)9 264 69 39, F +32 (0)9 264 84 93 3