Description
n this paper, we argue that Ontological Security Studies (OSS) offers a crucial yet underexplored contribution to understanding the role of human nature in International Relations (IR). While human nature and its psychological foundations were central to IR’s emergence and development, these have since been largely assumed rather than explicitly theorised. We suggest that OSS offers a productive space for revisiting this question. We particularly engage with the psychoanalytical strand of OSS, where unconscious drives, emotional life, and relational tensions are central. Drawing on Lacanian and Kleinian approaches, we show how these perspectives offer distinct but complementary ways of thinking about human nature – either as structured by an irreducible lack (Lacan) or as shaped by the dynamic interplay of internal object relations (Klein). While both traditions have influenced OSS, they are rarely examined in dialogue. By doing so, we make three contributions: (1) we reintroduce human nature as a vital but under-theorised question in IR; (2) we demonstrate how OSS, particularly its psychoanalytic strand, offers a compelling lens for conceptualising human nature as contingent, relational, and affective; and (3) we provide a critical synthesis of Freudian, Lacanian and Kleinian approaches within OSS, clarifying their relevance and limitations for IR theory. Ultimately, we argue that reconsidering human nature through OSS.
