THE CONCEPT OF SOCIETAL SECURITY: THEORY, DISCUSSION, AND CASPIAN PERSPECTIVES

Abstract

The issue of ensuring security remains one of the most important for the social sciences at the present stage. In recent decades, the concept of societal security, which tracks its origin to Copenhagen School, has been increasingly prominent. The purpose of this article is to systematize the main provisions of the societal approach to security and to identify the possibility of its operational application to the study of the Caspian region. The main provisions of the societal approach include the following factors: the reference object of the research is the so-called societal community ; the basis for the existence of such a community is a collective, most often cultural, sometimes confessional identity; this problem is always considered in relation to a certain social space, which is transformed under the influence of political, economic, and environmental factors. Traditionally, the societal approach has been applied to the analysis of security problems in the European space: the Baltic States, Spain, there is an experience of its application to African society in some Asian countries. Another interesting area for analysis may be the Caspian region, which after the collapse of the USSR has become a strategically important Euro-Asian geopolitical and economic hub. However, the regional specifics require researcher to implement a creative application of this approach, taking into account both theoretical criticisms and the specifics of the space itself.