Interdisciplinary,cross-sector collaboration in the US Intelligence Community: lessons learned from past and present efforts

ABSTRACT

How does one design and sustain interdisciplinary, cross-sector collaboration to improve intelligence results for twenty-first century security threats? This paper will analyse five past and present initiatives designed to create interdisciplinary, cross-sectoral collaboration within different agencies of the US Intelligence Community (IC). We will discuss key features of each effort, their successes and challenges, identify common themes and, propose which collaborative model might be most advantageous for a particular type of project based on project constraints. In so doing, we provide direction for IC leaders seeking to improve academia–industry–intelligence partnerships for future planning on intelligence-funded collaborations.     

Analytic Outreach for Intelligence: Insights from a Workshop on Emerging Biotechnology Threats

This article describes a new effort to engage in analytic outreach between academic scholars and intelligence analysts on the issue of emerging biotechnology threats to US national security. The context of this outreach was a September 2012 meeting in London to explore possibilities for enhanced analytic outreach in relation to emerging biotechnology threats, supported by the UK Genomics Policy and Research Forum. This meeting consisted of a mix of current and former intelligence practitioners and policy officials, and social science and scientific experts, from both the UK and the US. As will be described below, this unique pairing of experts and subjects revealed new insights into how to improve intelligence assessments on biotechnology and bioweapons threats. It also revealed continuing challenges in reforming assessments within existing intelligence work routines.     

Effects of prostitution: An urban population responds

This article examines community perceptions about the legalization of prostitution in a large southern community. The authors utilized a random digit dialing technique to develop a representative sample consisting of 850 respondents. In addition, the authors interviewed prostitutes to determine their perceptions about how they helped individuals and society. Themes were developed from the personal accounts of the prostitutes and presented to the public to assess their feelings regarding whether or not prostitution is beneficial in certain instances. One of the major findings of the study was that 32% of the community members interviewed believed that prostitution should be legalized. This finding led the authors to discuss policy implications in the last section of the article.     

Tunnel vision: The regulation of endocrine disruptors

This study examines the failure of a small but significant element of U.S. chemical regulatory policy: the Endocrine Disruptor Screening Program (EDSP). A range of conditions are implicated in the failure of this program, but one condition, the scientific testing and regulation paradigm (STRP), seems particularly important and ties the failure of EDSP to the failure of other U.S. chemical regulatory programs. This paradigm is a group of assumptions that have driven pesticide (and other chemical) regulatory policy since World War II. This study investigates the relationship between STRP and the failure of EDSP, the potential efficacy of alternatives to this program, and one alternative that broke from this paradigm. Ultimately, this study suggests that we must revise the role of science in regulation in order to find effective alternatives to modern chemical regulatory policy.     

The Roles of Women in Contemporary Political and Revolutionary Conflict: A Thematic Model

Global population-level patterns in female participation in contemporary political and revolutionary conflict remain largely unknown as systematic empirical research in the area is lacking. Accordingly, this study systematically documented the participation of a comprehensive sample of women involved in conflict around the world. A statistically derived model of female participation is proposed that consists of four thematic roles representing specific patterns of activity: active, representing fighting and leadership activities; caring, representing traditional feminine tasks; support, representing logistically based tasks, and; ideological, representing activities that propagate the ideology of the group. The contribution of the model to theory, research, and practice is considered.     

Chen Yun: his life

Chen Yun, one year younger than Deng Xiaoping, was born 100 years ago. For several decades beginning in 1931 when he joined the Central Committee at 26, he was ranked higher in the Party than Deng. Although known as an ‘economist’, Chen played a much broader role, in organization work, high-level Party discipline, urban administration, and basic Party policy. He was the key person to link China and Russia following the Zunyi Conference. He was head of the Organization Department from 1937 to 1943. He pioneered the liberation of urban areas as the leader in Harbin and later in Shenyang. He led the fight to get inflation under control during 1949–1952 and led the organization of the first five year plan. He was one of the most vocal against the leap forward and one of the most instrumental in guiding readjustment afterwards. On many occasions he withdrew from leadership and nourished his health. After 1978, he was the only person who spoke to Deng as an equal. Chen Yun was cautious, believing that progress would come from steady small steps rather than wild leaps. He believed in markets, but felt they should be bounded by plans and in 1978–1981 he helped guide the retrenchment policy that put the economy on a solid base before it began rapid growth.     

Bureaucratic Neutrality among Competing Bureaucratic Values in an Ethnic Federalism: The Case of Ethiopia

This article uses Kaufman's theory of competing bureaucratic values as a foundation for studying bureaucratic values in a developing society. It discusses civil service reform within a socio-bureaucratic-political exchange, as well as characteristics associated with bureaucratic values and ethnic federalism. The inherent conflicts between a civil service grounded in the values of bureaucratic neutrality, representativeness, or executive leadership and practices within a government structured on the basis of ethnicity are explored. Factors related to Ethiopia's postconflict status, which further complicate the governance environment, are identified, and building blocks for postconflict governance are suggested.     

Unpacking the Relationships between Impulsivity,Neighborhood Disadvantage,and Adolescent Violence: An Application of a Neighborhood-Based Group Decomposition

Scholars have become increasingly interested in how social environments condition the relationships between individual risk-factors and adolescent behavior. An appreciable portion of this literature is concerned with the relationship between impulsivity and delinquency across neighborhood settings. The present article builds upon this growing body of research by considering the more nuanced pathways through which neighborhood disadvantage shapes the development of impulsivity and provides a situational context for impulsive tendencies to manifest in violent and aggressive behaviors. Using a sample of 12,935 adolescent from the National Longitudinal Study of Adolescent to Adult Health (Add Health) (mean age?=?15.3, 51% female; 20% Black, 17% Hispanic), we demonstrate the extent to which variation in the association between impulsivity and delinquency across neighborhoods can be attributed to (1) differences in mean-levels of impulsivity and violence and (2) differences in coefficients across neighborhoods. The results of a series of multivariate regression models indicate that impulsivity is positively associated with self-reported violence, and that this relationship is strongest among youth living in disadvantaged neighborhoods. The moderating effect of neighborhood disadvantage can be attributed primarily to the stronger effect of impulsivity on violence in these areas, while differences in average levels of violence and impulsivity account for a smaller, yet nontrivial portion of the observed relationship. These results indicate that the differential effect of impulsivity on violence can be attributed to both developmental processes that lead to the greater concentration of violent and impulsive adolescents in economically deprived neighborhoods as well as the greater likelihood of impulsive adolescents engaging in violence when they reside in economically disadvantaged communities.     

Legitimacy in Conflict: Concepts,Practices, Challenges

ABSTRACT

The study of legitimacy in situations of conflict and peacebuilding has increased in recent years. However, current work on the topic adopts many assumptions, definitions, and understandings from classical legitimacy theory, which centers on the relationship between the nation-state and its citizens. In this introduction, we provide a detailed critical overview of current theories of legitimacy and legitimation and demonstrate why they have only limited applicability in conflict and post-conflict contexts, focusing on the three main areas that the articles included in this special issue examine: audiences for legitimacy, sources of legitimacy, and legitimation. In particular, we show how conflict and post-conflict contexts are marked by the fragmentation and personalization of power; the proliferation and fragmentation of legitimacy audiences; and ambiguity surrounding legitimation strategies.     

Power comes with responsibility��or does it?

In a Public Good (PG) experiment, after playing it the standard way, one of the players (the allocator) is given power over the endowments of her co-players. Will the allocator show responsibility i.e., contribute most or all of her own as well as her co-players?? endowments? Can we thus improve the suboptimal level of voluntary provisions of public goods? The result is that, on average, all players are better off than in the standard PG game. In repetitions of the procedure, however, selfish behavior (contributing mainly the others?? endowments) becomes more and more frequent.