Currently, forms of warfare have evolved and are often fought within states themselves, between public interest and business interests, transparency and information manipulation, as well as between citizenship and surveillance infrastructure. This new type of conflict, invisible and structural, demands a redefinition of concepts such as security, conflict, and public policy.
"Mass displacements do not arise from chance, but from the simultaneous collapse of security, justice, and opportunity. And each body is a story that the system has yet to learn to protect," emphasizes a security expert. Fear, now transformed into a more subtle tool, plays an important role in this new scenario, where governance must resist authoritarian temptations and rethink its strategies.
The new forms of warfare, encompassing economic, biological, and digital aspects, impact not only territorial limits but also populations by expelling, silencing, and precarizing. A structural, ethical, and systemic approach is necessary to confront these challenges and rethink security in a broad sense.
With a record number of people living outside their countries of origin, it is essential to anticipate invisible threats and build institutions capable of detecting them. Issues such as digital sovereignty, economic justice, and global public health become fundamental in the fight against conflicts that do not require uniforms or battlefields.
Governing in the era of invisible conflicts means resisting the automatism of power use, rethinking institutions, and building capacities to face emerging challenges. Concepts such as "national security," "sovereignty," and "peace" need to be redefined to adapt to this new global landscape, where a trade treaty, a cyberattack, or a pharmaceutical patent can have effects comparable to a military intervention.
Resistance in this context manifests in the ability to anticipate and detect subtle threats before they become irreversible. Governing becomes an act of constant interpretation of the environment, risk, and time, and requires moving away from simplification and binary narratives to confront the complexity of current challenges.
