The Cosmopolitan Military ― Armed Conflict and the Protection of Human Security in the 21st Century

What role should national militaries play in an increasingly globalised and interdependent world? The Cosmopolitan Military examines the often difficult transition they have made toward missions aimed at protecting civilians and promoting human security. It poses the question of whether we might be seeing the emergence of armed forces that exist to serve the wider human community, rather than the nation state, and examines the role played by overseas ethical commitments in shaping recent Western defence and security policy. Although national militaries have the traditional responsibility of defending the state and its citizens, operations to protect vulnerable non-citizens have now become an important additional role in the post-Cold War world.

This path-breaking study provides an incisive analysis of peacekeeping, the Responsibility to Protect (R2P), military operations during the War on Terror, and the rise of human security thinking. Drawing upon cosmopolitan ethical approaches, it formulates a new mode of military practice, one that might help militaries to escape the constraints of warfighting and better embrace responsibilities to a wider community of humankind.

Jonathan Gilmore is a Senior Lecturer in Politics and International Relations at Kingston University. His research centres on the connections between international ethics, foreign policy rhetoric and the practice of security, with particular reference to peace operations and humanitarian intervention. His previous work has been published in Security Dialogue, European Journal of International Relations, British Journal of Politics and International Relations, and International Affairs.