The Council of Europe and Democratic Security: Reconciling the Irreconcilable?

Abstract

The concept of security has remained in the shadows of the ‘three pillars’ of the Council of Europe (CoE) until 2015 when the annual report of its Secretary General presented the term ‘democratic security’. This paper provides two alternative conceptualizations of the term and, through making a parallel with the two main approaches towards extreme speech, it looks at how the CoE could reconcile democracy and security in policies vis-a-vis extreme speech. The findings obtained via organizational analysis of the CoE’s structure and review of approaches towards extreme speech point to the two models of dealing with extreme speech in relation to democracy and security. One is ‘democratic security’ where restrictions of rights such as freedom of speech pose more substantial threats to security than the harm that might be caused by their abuse. The other is ‘militant democracy’ where such restrictions are often viewed as a safeguard of security.