The Everyday Security of Living With Conflict

When ‘cyber’ is used as a prefix, attention is typically drawn to the technological
and spectacular aspects of war and conflict – and, by extension, security. We
offer a different approach to engaging with and understanding security in such
contexts, by foregrounding the everyday – mundane – experiences of security
within communities living with and fleeing from war. We do so through three
vignettes from our field research in Colombia, Lebanon and Sweden, respectively,
and by highlighting the significance of ethnography for security research with
communities living in regions afflicted by war. We conclude by setting out a call to
action for security researchers and practitioners to consider such lived
experiences in the design of security technology that aims to cater to the needs of
communities in ‘global conflict and disaster regions’.