'This book is an excellent critique of the theoretical games that academics can become distracted by and the hegemonic norms that policy makers perpetuate as common sense.
It stands as a timely intervention into the debate on human security and as an innovative critique of global governance as an over-arching problem in terms of achieving broad human security. It adopts a 'neo-Foucauldian' approach which presents neo-liberalism as the calculated mismanagement of global life.
Roberts argues that the semantics of human security should focus more on creating the conditions for meaningful human security and less on refining what human security actually is and where it stands in the broad scheme of security. He argues that a lack of the minimal requirements for a healthy life and physical security can be described as biopoverty and that biopoverty is systematically linked to failures in neo-liberal governance. Roberts seeks to develop a 'counter-hegemonic nebuleuse' to challenge the neo-liberal hegemony which informs current systems of global governance. However he also rejects cosmopolitan notions of global citizenship as unrealistic.
Neo-liberal driven global governance is a cause of biopoverty, or to put it more bluntly death and those most at risk are poor children. So what can be done? Roberts argues that neo-liberal norms need not be cast aside completely in the search for human security but rather that the efficiency of markets be better utilized by a series of stakeholders who would identify who is at risk and determine how basic human needs can actually be met. This would involve relatively simple changes in the distribution and ownership of services and profit.
This book will be useful for those studying human security, global governance and international political economy.' - Dr. Pauline Eadie, University Lecturer/Co-Director Institute of Asia Pacific Studies, University of Nottingham [says that if it's too long, scrap thrid paragraph first]

'David Roberts has produced a tightly argued and impassioned manifesto for human security on a global scale. A manifesto which puts basic human needs at the centre and which argues that the barriers to meeting them are far from insuperable. Starting with the needs of those marginalised by traditional approaches, Roberts offers a new and challenging vision of power, policy-making and security for the twenty-first century.' - David Chandler, Professor of International Relations, University of Westminster

'Driven by the spectre of preventable poverty and suffering, David Roberts delivers a devastating critique of the neoliberal global order. As a way of bridging the global life-chance divide, Roberts provides a persuasive argument in support of human security as a mobilising and emancipatory concept. This is a must read for all those interested not only in social justice but the means by which social protection can be applied globally.' Professor Mark Duffield, Director, Global Insecurities Centre, University of Bristol