This dissertation examines how we construct security threats. Theoretically, it contributes to the literature on securitization and threat construction, which has hitherto overlooked how influential bureaucracies that – in contrast to the police and the military – have little to gain from widened threat perceptions, may still contribute to threat construction. The dissertation studies the European Commission and the issue of irregular immigration. By using frame analysis, it firstly explores what constructions of irregular immigration that the Commission generates and to what extent these contribute to threat construction. Using the Bourdieusian concepts of field, capital and habitus, it secondly analyzes how certain constructions of irregular immigration are authorized at the expense of others, due to the inner bureaucratic logic of the Commission. The empirical result reveals that the Commission mostly defines irregular immigrants as victims, yet simultaneously favors policy solutions that mainly seek to avert immigration. The Commission thus contributes to threat construction primarily through its policy solutions. Studying the inner logic of the Commission field highlights how informal routines and tacit power relations between Commission departments authorize certain frames over others. Importantly, the analysis shows how the naming of irregular immigrants as victims tends not to cost the officials anything in terms of symbolic capital, whereas the suggesting of less restrictive solutions tends to do so. Definitions and policy solutions thus follow different bureaucratic logics, which enables a mismatch between them. Moreover, the threat construction appears not because Commission officials believe that restrictive measures are the only way to solve problems linked to irregular immigration. On the contrary, officials believe that a multitude of solutions are needed. Instead, the threat construction is an unintended consequence of the logic of the field. / <p>Författaren är verksam både vid Statsvetenskapliga institutionen på Stockholms universitet och vid Statsvetenskapliga avdelningen på Försvarshögskolan.</p>

Why are some issues seen as threats? This dissertation attempts to explain the dynamics of threat construction by national decision-makers. The theoretical ambition is twofold: first, the dissertation aims at improving the research on threat construction by suggesting a broad approach that analyzes this process in a structured manner. Second, the dissertation also contributes to the more mainstream International Relations security research agenda, which often under-problematizes this issue. The point of departure is that the link between a condition (e.g. structure) and threat framing (e.g. agency) is not to be taken for granted, and that threat construction is subjective and varies among actors.  This assertion is supported by the findings of the dissertation’s component parts. Essay I finds that US security doctrines such as the Truman and Bush doctrines are not routine responses to external threats but rather the natural continuation of a political and societal discourse in which certain norms and identities interact. Essay II finds that a condition that could lay the foundation for a threat construction does not necessarily evoke such a reaction, such as the HIV/AIDS epidemic in Russia. Essay III demonstrates the opposite situation; that a securitization can take place although the contextual conditions do not necessarily point toward such a move, such as US President Clinton’s declaration that AIDS is a threat to the national security of the United States. Essay IV proposes a framework that incorporates explanatory factors from the international, the domestic, and the individual levels of analysis. Such a framework allows for a more refined analysis which better captures the contingent relationships between factors. Taken together, the findings of this dissertation indicate that the correlations between conditions and threat constructions are intricate, and that the explanation of a securitization lies in the interaction of certain social and cognitive processes.

This study is called When the ice of the Arctic melts is the world defrosting? and written by Rebecca Fröling. The purpose of the study is to investigate how the concept ‘security’ is used in the Swedish arctic strategy and why the concept is described in that way. The debate of the concept ‘security’ has been going on for years, but the debate is still present today. What we put in to the concept is operative for how we regard and discuss security and security politics. To analyze the strategy I used two theories, one with a traditional approach and one with a critical approach to security: Realism and Copenhagen School. The method that has been applied to the study is qualitative content analysis, to be able to analyze the text on the depth. To complement the analysis I interviewed three scientists in the field of security and Arctic politics. The analysis pointed out that the strategy still has a traditional point of view in the way of observing the object of security. But the traditional idea is starting to disintegrate and the critical perspective has been taking its place. The scientists have a more critical perspective, even thou it does not show in the strategy.

Desde siempre, las personas han migrado, en busca de nuevos territorios, de mejores condiciones de vida o de tierras de asilo. No obstante, las personas migrantes, refugiadas y solicitantes de asilo forman uno de los grupos poblacionales más vulnerable a nivel mundial, siendo víctimas de múltiples violaciones a sus derechos humanos y viviendo constantemente en una situación de precarización, discriminación y exclusión social. Desde los últimos años, asistimos al cruce de dos series de paradigmas en la formación de políticas migratorias y de mecanismos de protección de los derechos humanos de la población migrante: la libertad y la seguridad, así como la ciudadanía y la protección internacional de los derechos humanos. Tomando como base teórica los estándares jurídicos internacionales y regionales en materia de derechos humanos de las personas migrantes, refugiadas y solicitantes de asilo, así como los escritos de autores como Rawls, Derrida, Benhabib, Arendt, De Lucas y Carens, la presente tesis analiza las consecuencias de ese cruce de paradigmas sobre la formación de las políticas migratorias de Argentina y Canadá. Observando tres momentos claves de la “ruta del migrante”, o sea la entrada, la permanencia y la integración en el país de acogida, ésta investigación presenta las consecuencias concretas de ese cambio de paradigmas sobre el goce de los derechos humanos de las personas que han migrado en los dos países estudiados. Esta tesis intenta demostrar que desde el principio de los años 2000, la política migratoria argentina se acerca más bien de un paradigma de libertad y universalidad de los derechos humanos, mientras Canadá encarna un enfoque de seguridad nacional, resultando en un cierre progresivo de las fronteras, una criminalización de la migración irregular y un deterioro del goce de los derechos humanos por parte de la población migrante y refugiada.

Securitization is the process by which subjects move from the mundane to “worth securing”. What a group of people consider to be “worth securing” reflects how they understand that subject’s value in relation to their lives. A dominant trend in securitization studies has been the use of speech-act theory to allocate the “source” of security to some specific dominant influence; speech-act securitization is not necessarily coercive, but it privileges the act of declaring security, and only offers that privilege to a handful of actors. This paper instead proposes that declaration is not the dominant aspect of securitization. Rather than stemming from communication, security is a feature of a social system that exists within communication. Securitization is an autopoeitic (in the language of social theorist Niklas Luhmann, whose work this paper draws upon heavily) process that allows society to adapt and respond to threats and change in specific ways.

投資計畫和融資決策間存在強烈的連動關係，因此近年來推動新金融商品以為籌資來源在全球資本市場上蔚為風潮，資產證券化便是相當受到重視的新金融工具。 資產證券化（Asset Securitization）最早由美國投資銀行家 Ranieri, Lewis R.於1977年接受《華爾街日報》記者採訪時提出。有別於傳統的融資工具，資產證券化可靈活的設計出不同的架構來滿足不同融資者的需求，在各國也有不同的制度設計以適應不同國家的經濟、法律和社會環境。 由於資產證券化在歐美已行之有年，我國政府為與國際金融接軌，促進金融國際化、自由化及多元化，也展開對資產證券化商品的推動。繼1996年率先頒佈「信託法」、2000年「信託業法」作為資產證券化的鋪路法源後，2002年7月公佈實施「金融資產證券化條例」、2003年7月公佈實施「不動產證券化條例」，而「金融資產證券化條例施行細則」及「不動產證券化條例施行細則」等相關子法也分別於2003年8月、2003年12月陸續公佈實施，國內銀行與證券商等相關業者均相當看好這塊新金融市場之潛力。雖然國內已有金融資產證券化商品及不動產資產信託、不動產投資信託商品，但金融資產證券化商品目前仍以企業貸款、債券貸款及住宅抵押貸款為主要證券化標的，仍有開發新資產基礎的空間。 因應在金融海嘯後，國內政府陸續推出四年5,000億振興經濟擴大公共建設投資計畫及愛台十二項建設等計劃，如同國際潮流，政府諸多公共建設投資計劃中多個項目即規劃採用BOT、BOO、ROT或OT等模式發包予民間投資人。在內部及外在環境條件均有利於民間機構參與公共建設的狀況下，對於參與BOT或BOO的民間機構而言，最關切的問題便是資金的來源與規劃。 本研究以發展環境資源相關BOT案的個案公司為研究基礎，分別以BOT專案計劃本身財務規劃的角度出發之單一資產證券化；及以BOT資產組合透過信託基金方式籌資以募集資金池，支應個案公司長期發展BOT業務的資金來源等兩個方向，探討個案公司以BOT資產為基礎的籌資建議，以為個案公司多元化籌資之參考。 / Investment plan and financing decision have strong feedback relationship. Hence, promote creative financial instruments as the source of funds raising becomes widespread in global capital market in recent years. Asset securitization is regarded as a new and potential financial instrument. The idea of asset securitization was brought up earliest by the American investment banker, Mr. Ranieri Lewis R. while interviewed by “The Wall Street Journal " reporter in 1977. Different from the traditional financing instruments, the request from various financing requirements can be satisfied by issuing asset securitization with the feasibility arrangements of transaction structure. And distinct systems have been structured to get with the local economic, legal and society environment in different countries. Assets securitization has already implemented for a long time in America and Europe. In order to integrate with the global finance market and promote financial internationalization, liberalization and pluralism, the government launched the push of the assets securitization goods in Taiwan. “Trust Business Law”has been issued in 2000 after sourcing first “Trust Law” in 1996, as law of paving the way to assets of securitization. Continually, the government implemented “Financial Asset Securitization Act” in July of 2002 and promulgated “Clauses of the Real Estate Securitization Act” in July of 2003. Following these rules, such relevant sub laws, “Enforcement Rules of the Financial Asset Securitization Act” and “Enforcement Rules of the Real Estate Securitization Act” were announced in August of 2003 and December of 2003 respectively. Consequently, domestic banks and underwriters had already had an optimistic view of the potentiality of this new financial market. Even though there are already financial asset securitization goods, real estate trust and real estate investment trust goods trading in Taiwan capital market. However, the major financial asset securitization goods are major for Collateralized Loan Obligation (“CLO”), Collateralized Bond Obligation (“CBO”) and Residential Mortgage Backed Securities (“RMBS”). It has to cultivate more new asset types as the asset base for securitization goods. After the financial tsunami, the government speeds up domestic public expenditure, such like “NT$ 500 billion for the Special Act for Expanding Investment in Public Works to Revitalize the Economy” and “The i-Taiwan 12 Projects”, etc.. To keep pace with the international market trend, the government plans to adopt the major projects with the participation of private sectors through BOT, BOO, ROT or OT model. Considering the favorable economy environment for public-private partnership, the most critical issue for BOT or BOO developers is only the sourcing and planning of the fund raising. The study focus on an individual environmental resources company which developing BOT related business. The study proposes two options for the future fund raising of the case company. The single BOT assets securitization or raising trust fund as the capital pool for BOT asset combination should be taken as the capital source alternates for the case company to fulfill its capital requirement.

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