Post Cold War Peace Research&Copenhagen School Studies

The expansion of peace world wide during Post Cold War Era has embarked a new stage of Peace Research.Peace Research,or as Peace and Conflict Studies,is a discipline that identities and analyzes the violent or non-violent behavior and the structural mechanism which leads to social conflicts.Peace Research aims to reduce or inhibit violence and achieve peace by peaceful means.A series of violent conflicts originating from domestic sphere,the non-traditional conflicts(ethnic or religious disputes)in the marginalized regions and New Wars,widening security notion and democratization issues as well as global governance have began to redefine the border and approach of Peace Research.Since the end of Cold War,Strategic Studies and Security Studies shifted their focus to non-military sectors instead of traditional military area.While Peace Research experienced a crisis of expansion,the reality of European Integration offered a somewhat realistic motives for Security Studies of Copenhagen School.Copenhagen School,built in 1985 in Denmark,innovatively raised a series of new security concepts,such as Securitization,societal security and regional security complex etc.which help to promote and maintain international peace.Based on the extensive group research proects in non-offensive defense and non-military security,Copenhagen School successfully led the widening security agenda in International Relations,facilitated the research focus from peace-oriented agenda towards security-oriented agenda.Since then,European Peace Research has entered a new era that emphasized on Security Studies.The thesis is divided into Introduction,Chapter ?,Chapter ?,Chapter ?,Chapter ? and Conclusion part.The Introduction part,based on recent expansion paradox of Peace Research,briefly introduced current development status and theoretical lineages of Post Cold War Peace Research;introduced international and domestic research of Copenhagen School;raised several key questions linking to Copenhagen School Security Theories;and finally,discussed the theoretical and realistic significance of Copenhagen School Security Studies.Chapter ?,discussed the historical background and theoretical origins of Copenhagen School.Chapter ?,discussed the establishment,expansion and deepening of Copenhagen School Security Studies.Chapter ?,discussed further about the Securitization theory which war first created by Copenhagen School.Chapter ?,conducted a comparative analysis of the variant strands of Post Cold War Security Studies,such as Critical Security Studies,Copenhagen School and Traditional Security Studies.In the conclusion part,the paper recalled the theoretical contribution of Copenhagen School,summarized the theorizing methods,approaches and nature of Securitization theory,analyzed the main approaches of the politics of Securitization,and finally,uninevitably the response of Copenhagen School towards many criticisms and queries.Copenhagen School,as a pioneer who created the new framework of Post Cold War Widening Security Studies,had successfully initiated a hot debate in basic security theories and innovatively led a security-shift of Post Cold War Peace Research agenda.Securitization theory is a prominent academic innovation.However,Copenhagen School and the Securitization theory still had some of its own limitations and normative dilemmas.The dissertation,therefore,aims to conduct a comprehensive study of the logic and consequences of Securitization theory as well as its theoretical methods,in order to obtain more and new productive thinking and application of Security Studies both academically and realistically.