The securitisation of pandemic influenza: Framing, security and public policy

Abstract

This article examines how pandemic influenza has been framed as a security issue, threatening the functioning of both state and society, and the policy responses to this framing. Pandemic influenza has long been recognised as a threat to human health. Despite this, for much of the twentieth century it was not recognised as a security threat. In the decade surrounding the new millennium, however, the disease was successfully securitised with profound implications for public policy. This article addresses the construction of pandemic influenza as a threat. Drawing on the work of the Copenhagen School, it examines how it was successfully securitised at the turn of the millennium and with what consequences for public policy.

How issue frames shape beliefs about the importance of climate change policy across ideological and partisan groups

“…Regarding security frames, Kamradt-Scott and McInnes [24] find that the framing of influenza as a security threat by health practitioners and elected officials increased political attention to an outbreak, motivating policy change. In an experimental setting, Lahav and Courtemanche [25] find that framing immigration as a security threat generates an increase in public support for the limitation of civil liberties.…”

Framing and global health governance: Key findings

“…Reubi (2012) also alludes to the use of EBM in tobacco control, referring to public health arguments as a powerful frame in initial opposition to smoking. Kamradt-Scott and McInnes (2012), however, identify a second frame operational in pandemic influenza, namely security, which is based on a different narrative Á that of pandemic influenza as an existential threat to the state and society. Security also features as a frame in Rushton's (2012) paper on HIV/AIDS and travel restrictions, where policies of denying entry were justified on the grounds that 'allowing PLWHIV [people living with HIV] to enter the country exposes the domestic population to a public health risk'.…”

Disasters, climate change, and securitisation: the United Nations Security Council and the United Kingdom's security policy

“…The concept has been applied to a wide range of issues since its conception in the mid‐1990s by Wæver (1995) and its elaboration most notably by Buzan, Waever, and de Wilde () in the late 1990s. Its evolution reflects a broadening of the issues considered in the security domain (Roe, 2004, in McDonald, ; Kamradt‐Scott and McInnes, ; Hartman, ). At the heart of the securitisation thesis is the idea that an issue can transcend conventional politics and be labelled as an ‘existential threat’ to state and society, and framed in ways that, if accepted, can be used to legitimise ‘emergency action’ (Buzan, Waever, and de Wilde, ).…”