Generally speaking, the traditional approach of security mainly regards states as a sole referent object of security and refutes any attempt to broaden the concept of security. This understanding is known as a realist approach. This approach, however, has been recently challenged by the Copenhagen School, the Welsh School, and the human security approach. The Copenhagen School assumes that there is now a duality of security: state security and societal security. However, both the Welsh School and the human security school look at individuals as a sole referent object of security. This article critically reviews the traditional approaches of security, the Copenhagen School, the Welsh School, and the human security approach. This article finally argues that the Copenhagen School could successfully broaden the concept of security, and therefore, it is more convincing when compared to other schools.

Institutional conflicts within the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan (PUK) have existed ever since the party’s founding in 1975 as a result of a merger of three different factions. The conflicts were successfully managed in a way that did not hurt the party’s overall functioning until the Gorran movement, led by Nawshirwan Mustafa, split off in 2009. However, it was the withdrawal of party leader Jalal Talabani from political and public life due to a stroke suffered in 2012 that most damaged the party’s ability to function, and widened factional cracks within the organization. The absence of Talabani led to the emergence of intense competition between various groups within the PUK for influence and positions. Consequently, PUK policies on a number of important issues in Iraqi Kurdistan have been indecisive and weak since approximately 2013. This research will discuss the PUK’s inconsistent policies and their negative implications for the Kurdistan Region. Furthermore, it will argue that the PUK’s internal conflicts emboldened its rival, the Kurdistan Democratic Party, between the years 2014 and 2018.

This article focuses on Kurdish security question in Iraq from 2003 to the present. Its central argument is that the security of the Kurdish region of Iraq has only constitutionally de-securitised since 2003. However, the Kurdish security demands in Iraq have been politicized by the different Iraqi governments since 2005, and therefore, security relations between the Iraqi state and the Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG) have been fraught with distrust, tensions, and chaos since that time. The concepts derived from the Copenhagen School (CS) provide the framework for discussing security relations and the inherent security struggles between the Iraqi state and the KRG.

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