FSI scholars produce research aimed at creating a safer world and examing the consequences of security policies on institutions and society. They look at longstanding issues including nuclear nonproliferation and the conflicts between countries like North and South Korea. But their research also examines new and emerging areas that transcend traditional borders – the drug war in Mexico and expanding terrorism networks. FSI researchers look at the changing methods of warfare with a focus on biosecurity and nuclear risk. They tackle cybersecurity with an eye toward privacy concerns and explore the implications of new actors like hackers.
Along with the changing face of conflict, terrorism and crime, FSI researchers study food security. They tackle the global problems of hunger, poverty and environmental degradation by generating knowledge and policy-relevant solutions.
European Neighborhood Policy
In its communication on Wider Europe in 2003, the Commission launched a new program to structure its relations with its neighbors, the European Neighborhood Policy (ENP). With the 2004 EU enlargement in mind the EU wanted to start forging closer bonds with its new neighbors in the East. The objectives of the ENP would be to provide political stability and economic prosperity to its neighbors. The ENP would thus prevent that the new EU borders would become stark political and economic dividing lines. In exchange for reforms the EU would offer its neighbors further economic integration. The integration would fall short of EU membership, however. Prospects for membership would not be provided in the medium term, even though the approach is reminiscent of the path taken in the enlargement process. In the two years that have transpired since its launch, the EU has set out strategies and action plans for different countries as part of the ENP.
The workshop intends to study a variety of aspects of the ENP: legal, institutional, economic and political issues. It will analyze the specific characteristics of the policy and its expected political and economic impact on the neighbors, the EU's border regions and the rest of the EU. In studying these various issues a wide range of points of view will be considered: views from within the EU and from within the EU institutions, as well as perspectives from Eastern Europe, North-Africa, the Middle East and North-America.
Daniel and Nancy Okimoto Conference Room
Alfred Tovias
Speaker
Hebrew University of Jerusalem and CEPII Paris
Lior Herman
Speaker
Hebrew University of Jerusalem
Paul Kubicek
Speaker
Oakland University
Timothy E. Josling
Speaker
Stanford University
Hassan Abouyoub
Former Moroccan Minister of Trade and Agriculture
Speaker
Christophe Crombez
Encina Hall
Stanford University
Stanford, CA 94305
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christophe.crombez@stanford.edu
Senior Research Scholar at The Europe Center
Christophe Crombez is a political economist who specializes in European Union (EU) politics and business-government relations in Europe. His research focuses on EU institutions and their impact on policies, EU institutional reform, lobbying, party politics, and parliamentary government.
Crombez is Senior Research Scholar at The Europe Center at the Freeman Spogli Institute for International Studies at Stanford University (since 1999). He teaches Introduction to European Studies and The Future of the EU in Stanford’s International Relations Program, and is responsible for the Minor in European Studies and the Undergraduate Internship Program in Europe.
Furthermore, Crombez is Professor of Political Economy at the Faculty of Economics and Business at KU Leuven in Belgium (since 1994). His teaching responsibilities in Leuven include Political Business Strategy and Applied Game Theory. He is Vice-Chair for Research at the Department for Managerial Economics, Strategy and Innovation.
Crombez has also held visiting positions at the following universities and research institutes: the Istituto Italiano di Scienze Umane, in Florence, Italy, in Spring 2008; the Department of Political Science at the University of Florence, Italy, in Spring 2004; the Department of Political Science at the University of Michigan, in Winter 2003; the Kellogg Graduate School of Management at Northwestern University, Illinois, in Spring 1998; the Department of Political Science at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign in Summer 1998; the European University Institute in Florence, Italy, in Spring 1997; the University of Antwerp, Belgium, in Spring 1996; and Leti University in St. Petersburg, Russia, in Fall 1995.
Crombez obtained a B.A. in Applied Economics, Finance, from KU Leuven in 1989, and a Ph.D. in Business, Political Economics, from Stanford University in 1994.
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Workshops
Experts on Defense: Constructing Scientific Authority in Security Debates
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Despite the increasing centrality of computer software in modern weapons systems, computing remains relatively underrepresented in public debates about weapons policy. For example, in 1991, a software glitch in the Patriot missile defense system killed 28 people, yet physicists remain the most prominent technical critics of this system. This talk suggests that the different patterns of political intervention exhibited by physicists and computer experts cannot be explained by technical relevance. It suggests alternate explanations by examining the processes by which technical judgments are generated and rendered authoritative in the political arena, using insights from science and technology studies. These processes are then illustrated by comparing how computer experts and physicists intervened in political controversy about the feasibility of 'Star Wars', President Ronald Reagan's proposal to develop a missile defense that would render the massive Soviet nuclear arsenal 'impotent and obsolete.' I compare how critical groups of physicists and computer professionals attempted to persuade the public that a perfect missile shield could not be built. This analysis suggests that sharp differences in the two groups' technical frames of analysis, rhetoric, and professional organizations all contributed to the physicists' ability to demonstrate a much higher level of consensus and authority in the political arena.
Reuben W. Hills Conference Room
Rebecca Slayton
Science Fellow
CISAC
Seminars
Inside ASEAN: Cambodia, Laos, Myanmar, Vietnam, and the Non-Interference Controversy
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The Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) has long been based on the principle of national sovereignty, including a norm against interference by one member state in another's domestic affairs. But some members would like to set aside the prohibition in cases such as Myanmar, whose military junta continues to repress Aung San Suu Kyi and her National League for Democracy to the detriment of ASEAN's image in the West. Opposed to this view are the group's newest, poorer, more continental, and politically more closed members: Cambodia, Laos, Vietnam, and of course Myanmar itself. They want ASEAN to uphold national sovereignty and reaffirm non-interference. The prospect of Myanmar assuming the chair of ASEAN in 2006-2007 makes this controversery even more acute. Is ASEAN splitting up? Will a compromise be reached? And with what implications for the nature and future of ASEAN and its conservative faction?
Carlyle A. Thayer is the 2004-2005 C. V. Starr Distinguished Visiting Professor at the Johns Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies in Washington DC. He has written and lectured widely on Southeast Asian affairs. He has held positions at the Asia-Pacific Center for Security Studies (in Hawaii) and the Australian Defence College. His degrees are from the Australian National University (PhD), Yale University (MA), and Brown University (BA).
This is the 10th seminar of the 2004-2005 academic year hosted by the Southeast Asia Forum.
Okimoto Conference Room
Carlyle A. Thayer
Professor of Politics
Australian Defence Force Academy
Seminars
Two CISAC arms control experts join call for nations to strengthen Non-Proliferation Treaty
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News
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CISAC's William J. Perry and George Bunn joined 21 other nonproliferation experts in a public statement that calls upon all governments to strengthen the Non-Proliferation Treaty during the pact's review conference this May. Along with former Secretary of State Madeleine Albright, former Secretary of Defense Robert McNamara, and others from around the world, Perry and Bunn urged nations to "recommit themselves to the legal and political obligations established by the treaty" and to "agree on a specific and balanced program of action to strengthen treaty implementation and compliance."
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The Shifting Face of Chemical Terrorism
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While U.S. policy is focused on defending against a mass-effect bioterrorism attack, we may be missing a lower-tech threat of much higher probability. The path from the "street chemistry" of improvised explosive devices (IEDs) to improvised chemical devices (ICDs) is very short. Whereas the path from IEDs to effectively weaponized, transgenic biological agents is a substantial leap for states and, even more so, for non-state actors. Examining the rising interest in highly portable, easily assembled improvised devices incorporating commercial and research chemicals by non-state actors, principally radical Islamists, this work considers the threat of improvised chemical terrorism within a comprehensive WMD risk framework.
Reuben W. Hills Conference Room, East 207, Encina Hall
Margaret E. Kosal
Seminars
Conference on Health, Demographics and Economic Development
The Conference on the Health, Demographics and Economic Development will take place on May 20-21, 2005 at the Center on Development, Democracy and the Rule of Law, Stanford Institute for International Studies. This conference is organized by Peter Lorentzen and Romain Wacziarg.
The conference is organized around three themes:
1. The Demographic Transition and the Industrial Revolution
2. Health, Fertility, and Human Capital
3. The Effects of Health on Income and Growth: Micro and Macro Evidence.
Participants include: Manuel Amador (Stanford University), Javier Birchenall (UC Santa Barbara), Hoyt Bleakley (UC San Diego), David Bloom (Harvard University), Michele Boldrin (University of Minnesota), David Canning (Harvard University), Shankha Chakraborty (University of Oregon), Matthias Doepke (UCLA), Miriam Golden (UCLA), Larry Jones (University of Minnesota), Sebnem Kalemli-Ozcan (University of Houston), Pete Klenow (Stanford University), Peter Lorentzen (Stanford University), Aprajit Mahajan (Stanford University), John McMillan (Stanford University), Rodrigo Soares (University of Maryland), Uwe Sunde (IZA Bonn), Michele Tertilt (Stanford University), Romain Wacziarg (Stanford University), and David Weil (Brown University).
TBA
Romain Wacziarg
UCLA Anderson School of Management
110 Westwood Plaza
Los Angeles CA 90095-1481
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wacziarg@gsb.stanford.edu
Associate Professor of Economics, UCLA Anderson School of Management
Romain Wacziarg is an associate professor of economics at UCLA's Anderson School of Management. Previously, he was associate professor of economics at Stanford University's Graduate School of Business. An expert on international political economy, he has focused mainly on international trade and its relationship with economic development. Most recently, he has published research on the relationship between openness to trade and economic growth, as well as on the effect of an open world-trade regime on incentives for geographic regions to secede. His other areas of recent focus include a study linking ethnic, religious and linguistic diversity with economic variables; a study evaluating the economic costs and benefits of political borders; and two studies evaluating the relationship between international trade and the rise and fall of industries.
Wacziarg is a faculty research fellow at the National Bureau of Economic Research, a faculty fellow at the Stanford Center for International Development, and he was a national fellow at the Hoover Institution in 2002-2003. He grew up in India and France and has worked as a consultant to the World Bank. He received his undergraduate degree from the Institut d'Etudes Politiques de Paris, an MA from the University of Paris-Dauphine and a PhD in Economics from Harvard University.
Europe Center Research Affiliate
Peter Lorentzen
Speaker
Conferences
Research worth fighting for
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"Of the Pentagon's $419.3 billion budget request for next year, only about $10.5 billion--2 percent--will go toward basic research, applied research and advanced technology development," write %people1% and John M. Deutch, former secretary and assistant secretary of defense, respectively, in a New York Times op-ed. This 20 percent reduction will weaken national security in the long run, they warn, adding, "Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld should reconsider this request, and if he does not, Congress should restore the cut."
Of the Pentagon's $419.3 billion budget request for next year, only about $10.5 billion - 2 percent - will go toward basic research, applied research and advanced technology development. This represents a 20 percent reduction from last year, a drastic cutback that threatens the long-term security of the nation. Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld should reconsider this request, and if he does not, Congress should restore the cut.
These research and development activities, known as the "technology base" program, are a vital part of the United States defense program. For good reason: the tech base is America's investment in the future. Over the years, tech base activities have yielded advances in scientific and engineering knowledge that have given United States forces the technological superiority that is responsible in large measure for their current dominance in conventional military power.
Research into basic understanding of methods for reducing radar signatures in the 1970's, for example, gave rise to "stealth" technology. Advances in electronic sensor technology enable the vast collection of information from satellites, and past work on computer systems permits distribution of this information in near real-time to military commanders. The combination of near-real-time intelligence and precision munitions are the heart of the so-called "revolution in military affairs" that avoids large and costly systems and approaches.
These advances require years of sustained effort by university, industry and government researchers. If the Pentagon does not make the required investments today, America will not have dominant military technology tomorrow.
The technology base program has also had a major effect on American industry. Indeed, it is the primary reason that the United States leads the world today in information technology. American companies not only draw heavily on the Pentagon's work, but they have also come to depend on it. The research and development programs of many of America's major information technology companies are almost exclusively devoted to product development.
It was the investment of the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency in a network known as ARPA-net in the 1960's and 70's, for example, that gave rise to the Internet. The JPEG file format for digital images is based on software and standards developed by the Pentagon. The global positioning satellite system, first developed for precision-guided munitions, is now used in many cellphones and has the potential to revolutionize our air traffic control system. America's ability to translate the Pentagon's technology base into commercial achievement is the envy of the world.
Of course, the administration and Congress need to make tough budget choices. But to shift money away from the technology base to pay for Iraq, other current military operations or research on large, expensive initiatives, is to give priority to the near term at the expense of the future. This is doubtful judgment, especially at a time when the nature of the threat confronting America is changing. New threats, like catastrophic terrorism and the spread of weapons of mass destruction, urgently call for new technology.
There should be no doubt that basic research will continue to make a contribution. Robotics, artificial intelligence, biotechnology, brain and cognitive sciences, nanotechnology, large-scale modeling and simulation: all these fields can have a huge impact. If properly supported, basic technology work is likely to lead to unprecedented results.
Mr. Rumsfeld has long championed the need to transform the military and exploit new technology. He has supported the technology base in the past and has urged the adoption of a more long-term view of security needs. He should, then, be willing to review and reverse the Pentagon's request for reducing its technology base. He should understand that short-term budget requirements for the armed services always tend to push out the technology base program - unless the Pentagon leadership supports it.
Perhaps the reason for this year's reduction is the mistaken belief that a one-year gap in financing does not matter, because innovation takes so long. But tech base advances occur because of stable financing. Fluctuating budgets cause wasted effort.
It is possible that Congress will restore the cuts in technology base programs and correspondingly reduce some other part of the defense budget. But Mr. Rumsfeld should not depend on Congress. It would be vastly better if the Pentagon understood the importance of the tech base effort, and acted on that understanding.
The Department of Defense's technology base programs have been an important factor in giving America the dominant military force in the world. They have also helped many American information technology companies become successful. The Pentagon should maintain its dedication to these programs, and that will require leadership from the secretary of defense - as well as support from Congress.
John Deutch, a professor of chemistry at M.I.T., was deputy secretary of defense from 1994 to 1995. William J. Perry was secretary of defense from 1994 to 1997.
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Effective Policies to Control BSE (Mad Cow Disease)
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Cellular prion protein (PrPC) is present in the healthy adult brain. It is a presumably essential membrane protein but its cellular function is unclear. Like Ice-9 - the fictitious water allotrope in Kurt Vonnegut's Cat's Cradle, which "taught the atoms a novel way in which to stack, lock and crystallize until the oceans turned to ice" - cellular prion protein can, in a rare event, adopt a pathogenic and 'contagious' shape, PrPSc, which causes mad cow disease or Bovine Spongiform Encephalopathy (BSE). New variant Creutzfeldt Jakob Disease (vCJD) is the human malady attributed to eating beef tainted with BSE. In comparison to the UK epidemic (at the peak of which 37,280 cases of BSE were reported in the single year 1992), the emergence of four North American mad cows since May 2003 is minor yet still alarming. This work examines the USDA's response to indigenous BSE as manifested in "The Final Rule" (9 CFR 93-96, Jan 4, 2005) and questions whether current regulations are stringent enough to keep PrPSc out of cattle feed and human food.
Sheila Healy is a CISAC Science Fellow. She is currently analyzing USDA policy addressing Bovine Spongiform Encephalopathy (BSE) or mad cow disease. She recently finished a postdoctoral appointment in Stanley Prusiner's laboratory in the Department of Neurology at the University of California, San Francisco. There she studied the molecular and structural requirements for the conversion of cellular prion protein to its pathogenic form, the agent that causes BSE. She holds a doctoral degree in biochemistry and molecular and cellular biology from the University of Arizona.
Reuben W. Hills Conference Room, East 207, Encina Hall
Sheila Healy
Seminars
Calculated Risks? Computing and the Problem of Missile Defense, 1957--Today
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Visions of missile defense have long centered on missile interceptors or lasers, occasionally included the radar "eyes" of a system, and usually ignored the computer "brains" that must inevitably control a system. This talk will examine the causes and consequences of the relative invisibility of computing in missile defense research and policy, examining three historical episodes: the Army's push to deploy a missile defense from 1957-63, the "Safeguard" and "Sentinel" deployment proposals of the late 1960's, and the "Star Wars" controversy of the 1980's. I argue that the problems of missile defense have been defined and tackled in ways that do not merely reflect technical realities. Rather, assessments of missile defense also reflect the social status of some scientists - and the non-status of others - as experts on missile defense. In particular, this talk will show how the contested status of computing as a profession and as a science has shaped assessments of missile defense, and conclude by considering some implications for today.
Reuben W. Hills Conference Room
Rebecca Slayton
Seminars