study (2000) drew upon responses from 60,000 people across 60 countries and revealed that security was consistently pointed to as a priority for exiting from poverty. This alone should trigger conversations at the international level about how security-related targets might be built into the post-MDG development framework.
Finally, the Millennium Declaration itself makes reference to the correlated relationship between security and development, emphasising the critical role of peace, security and disarmament for human well-being and poverty eradication (Millennium Project 2005: 183). In it, signatory states pledge to ‘spare no effort to free our peoples from the scourge of war, whether within or between States’ (Millennium Declaration 2000). However the manner in which the MDGs developed meant that the themes of peace and security were not translated into goals themselves. Yet their inclusion within the Millennium Declaration has prompted many to see a focus on security as a natural progression from the already recognized relationship between security and the MDGs. On the basis of this relationship, proposals for including security-related themes into the post-MDG framework have emerged.
Proposals to include security in the post-MDG framework
While a number of organisations and states are pushing for the relationship between security and development to be integrated into the post-2015 development framework, there is no clear consensus on how best to do this. Indeed, while many vaunt the virtues of taking security into account, it is not always clear how they intend for this to be done. From the policy literature, however, at least five proposals are apparent that each includes ‘security’ in a different way. These proposals are set out below. This list is by no means exhaustive – it is clear that there are many processes underway in which security-related themes are advocated as part of the post-MDGs process. Yet the five set out below represent the clearest attempts to influence the post-2015 agenda to date.