Security culture Britain’s security culture

Why studying security culture of the MSs? MSs motivated by instrumental as well as social rationality when they move towards a common policy in security and defence The notion of ‘security culture’ as entailing these aspects of MSs motivations Can we talk about strategic cultural convergence; strategic differences in Europe: -Large and small MSs -Europeanists and Atlanticists -Allies and neutrals -Professional power projection tradition and conscript-based territorial defence tradition -Weapons-systems providers and weapons-systems consumers -Nuclear and non-nuclear states -Preference for hard power instruments and preference for civilian power instruments

The notion of security culture Strategic culture and security culture Security culture: -security identity (role structures, interests, interpretations of the security environment) -Security capability: military power and institutional capabilities Factors that determine security culture: historical experiences, historical narratives, neighbours, national borders, occupation and defeat, etc. Theoretical traditions in security culture explanations /Johnson, 1995/ -The first generation, early 1980s: use of macro environmental variables- history, geography, political culture -The second generation, mid-1980s: strategic culture as a tool of political hegemony in the realm of strategic decision-making -The third generation, 1990s: ideational independent variables to explain particular strategic decisions

Britain’s security culture Historical experiences World war II and post WW II experiences; domestic factors, external factors and global developments Cold war experiences: domestic developments, armed forces, standing in the world Post cold war experiences: Russia, America, global trends

Britain’s security culture Identity and capabilities An allied state The ‘special relationship’/ imbalanced relationship Large state, a former colonial power A nuclear state though does not have an independent nuclear deterrent Professional expeditionary army Weapons systems providers