| Western foreign policies have begun to reflect the concept of 'underdevelopment as dangerous', as issues such as terrorism and environmental degradation begin to be interpreted as security threats to Western populations. However, these are viewed from within a traditional realist, national interest-based paradigm of security, privileging Western populations and the international state system while using development programs as security strategies to attack these problems.;This paper refers to the tenets of critical theory to draw out the contradictions in the current paradigm, and to elicit understandings of security that are better able to address today's threats. It evaluates Canadian human security as an instance of the way this new formulation of security and development has been internalized by the Canadian government, and looks at the potential for change that arises when a critical lens is used, in order to draw out strategies to work towards a more inclusive discourse. |
