The Politics of Cybersecurity: Balancing Different Roles of the State

Author(s): Myriam Dunn Cavelty, Florian J. Egloff
Journal Title: St Antony’s International Review
Volume: 15
Issue: 1
Pages: 37-57
Publisher(s): University of Oxford
Publication Year: 2019

This article investigates the role of the state in cybersecurity along three dimensions: theoretical, empirical, and normative. Theoretically, we find that the literature is narrowly highlighting the role of the state as a security actor. Empirically, we analyze policy development, and show the diversity of the roles the state imagines for itself. We find six different roles of the state in cybersecurity: 1) security guarantor; 2) legislator and regulator; 3) supporter and representative of the whole of society; 4) security partner; 5) knowledge generator and distributor, and 6) threat actor. Normatively, we outline three main areas of tension between the state, the economy, and society in which cybersecurity policies are situated. This results in two types of questions occupying the center stage of cybersecurity policy: a question regarding the boundaries of responsibility and a question regarding the concrete assumption of responsibilities.

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