TSAS WP16 02 Impromptu Initiative Security Certificates and Scale

This paper offers some background and theoretical framing as part of a larger project on the Canadian Security Certificate Initiative. Here I consider questions about different ways of thinking about responses to national security and how they contrast with security concerns that do not invoke the need for secrecy.

The use of secret information in legal proceedings is a tenuous topic that requires investigation. The acceptability of closed proceedings among legal actors influences its feasibility and legitimacy as a response to terrorism. There is a significant amount of influential legal literature on the Security Certificate Initiative and some sociological consideration. This paper attempts to fill in a gap by offering new sociological framing outside of “exceptionality” literature and an interpretation of the Security Certificate Initiative that is not “legal-centric.”