The Department of Internal Security was established as a separate organizational unit within the structure of the Faculty of Political Science and International Studies in 2019. Previously, it operated within the Institute of Political Sciences under the name: the Department of Security Sciences. The formation of the Department was a response to the demand for expert knowledge in the areas of crisis management, energy security, and new forms of threats to the security of the state and the individual. A reason to separate a department dedicated to reflections on security was related to the research and teaching potential of a team of scientists dealing with the issues of non-military threats and the development of the Internal Security field of study.

The ambition of the Department is to integrate the academic community within the domain of development of the security science discipline and to create new research paths. Characteristics elements of the team’s activity are numerous conferences, seminars, and workshop events on a national and international range, devoted to, inter alia, issues of security institutions. The staff of the Department consists of high-class experts in the field of security, representing various, often innovative, research approaches characteristic for the area of ​​social sciences. Scientific activity of employees is combined with teaching as part of the offer of the University of Warsaw and popularization of knowledge in the media space. The main research areas are the security of mass events, research on terrorism and radicalization, military security, energy security, and energy policy, protection of critical infrastructure, intelligence studies, internal security systems, crisis management, emergency states of emergency, hybrid threats, and cybersecurity.

Institutional cooperation

The Department team is involved in:

• cooperation with institutions of public life, being on the program councils of foundations and associations;
• performing advisory and expert functions at the national level in the field of security (e.g. in the Government Security Centre, RCB), and at the European level (e.g. Radicalisation Awareness Network, RAN)
• substantive work within the Stakeholders’ Council for the Internal Security field of study
• promotion of Polish researchers in the field of security science within the Institute for National and International Security, European Association for Security, Baltic Intelligence and Security Studies Association, European Consortium for Political Research, The Women’s Intelligence Network, Polish Society of Political Sciences, Polish Society of National Security, Women in International Security.

Selected publications:

B.Balcerowicz , O pokoju. O wojnie. Między esejem a traktatem, Warszawa, 2013.

M. Brzeziński, Bezpieczeństwo jako wartość konstytucyjna, Warszawa, 2019.

J. Ćwiek-Karpowicz, Bezpieczeństwo energetyczne Rosji, Warszawa, 2018.

M. Dobrowolska-Opała, Rola Policji w zapewnianiu bezpieczeństwa meczów piłki nożnej w ujęciu sieciowym, Toruń, 2018.

A. Gasztold, Feminist Perspectives on Terrorism: Critical Approaches to Security Studies, Cham 2020.

G. Gudzbeler, Symulatory pojazdów w procesie szkolenia podmiotów odpowiedzialnych za bezpieczeństwo wewnętrzne, Warszawa 2018.

A. Misiuk,Zarys ustroju administracji spraw wewnętrznych w Polsce. Przemiany prawno-organizacyjne od połowy XVIII wieku do współczesności, Warszawa 2018.

M. Tomaszewska-Michalak, K. Jędrzejak (red.), Technologia w ochronie penitencjarnej, Warszawa 2017.

K. Tomaszewski, Klastry energii w Polsce – w kierunku poprawy bezpieczeństwa energetycznego. Koncepcje i uwarunkowania, „Państwo i Prawo” 2019, nr 4.

Z. Siemiątkowski, Wywiad a władza. Wywiad cywilny w systemie sprawowania władzy politycznej PRL, Warszawa 2009.

A. Sroka (et al.), Radicalism and Terrorism in the 21st Century. Implications for Security, Frankfurt am Main [u.a] 2017.