Jurisdictional Challenges in the 21st Century Security Environment

Abstract

What security and intelligence strategies do subnational governments require to protect themselves and the social, cultural, economic, and safety interests of their citizens? Although subnational governments wield important levers in areas now inhabited by an expanding array of domestic and foreign threat actors, few have any coherent security and intelligence culture, architecture, or strategy. This paper seeks to address the conspicuous absence of discourse on contemporary subnational security challenges, suggesting that subnational security strategies are an inescapable requirement of the 21st century security environment. Given that the inception of any form of polycentric security strategy with an enabling architecture and culture is a complex undertaking, the utility of the design-basis threat concept is explored to provide a tangible starting point for evaluation of key drivers for analysis in the contemporary subnational security environment. A simplified framework for a provincial-level design-basis threat analysis is proposed as a gateway to deeper analysis.