EMERGENCY RESPONSE
AP Photo
June 2009
"Before Disaster Strikes: Rate and Raise Public Preparedness Now"
Policy Brief
By Debra K. Decker, Associate, International Security Program/Project on Managing the Atom
More, more severe, and new types of disasters can be expected to occur as a result of new types of threats (e.g., biological, cyber, nuclear/radiological) and more as well as more severe threats due to increased global interconnectedness and climate change. Yet, most Americans are not adequately prepared to respond to or recover from a catastrophic disaster, and many expect the government to take care of them. Even those who have experienced many common disasters such as earthquakes and hurricanes may not make appropriate preparations or exercise proper judgment in responding to new disasters that may require different responses. Although community disaster preparation is considered the purview of state and local governments, when a disaster strikes, the federal government is often called in to respond or to help with recovery. For example, New Orleans estimates that the federal government role in rebuilding that city will be $15 billion. Although all rebuilding costs cannot be averted, better citizen preparation and community standards have been shown to reduce the costs of catastrophes.
May 2009
"Foreword"
Book Chapter
"The question of whether we can "act in time" on energy and climate change poses one of the most profound challenges facing the world today. No human activity, other than the wide-scale use of nuclear weapons, has greater potential to reshape and harm our planet and our species than the rapidly expanding generation of greenhouse gases. What is so frustrating about the issue is that even though the dangers are widely accepted in the scientific community, and even though failing to act in time could set off a chain of events that would be all but irreversible, action to date has been weak at best."
AP Photo
April 27, 2009
"SARS Corporate Playbook"
Op-Ed, On Leadership at washingtonpost.com
By Ben Heineman, Senior Fellow, Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs
"Multinational corporations have seen this movie before. It was a horror flick called "SARS" (Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome)."
AP Photo
April 2009
"Improving India's Counterterrorism Policy after Mumbai"
Journal Article, CTC Sentinel, issue 4, volume 2
By Paul Staniland, Former Research Fellow, International Security Program/Intrastate Conflict Program, 2008–2009
"All of these pathologies were evident in the failure to prevent or appropriately respond to the Mumbai attacks. There was in fact significant intelligence suggesting a seaborne terrorist attack was likely, and even that prominent sites such as the Taj Hotel would be targeted. This information, however, was ignored by several key bureaucratic actors—including the Coast Guard and the Maharashtra state director-general of police—because it was deemed unactionable. Others, such as the Maharashtra Anti-Terrorism Squad, at least attempted some kind of preparation. The differences in readiness highlight the extent of fragmentation among the security apparatus. Even when Mumbai police tried to take preventive action, they lacked the manpower to sustain increased security at the hotels. Once the attack occurred, the security forces did not have sufficient night-vision equipment, heavy weaponry, or information about the attack sites, leading to a long response time and the emergence of a disastrous siege...."
istock Photo
March 23, 2009
"How to Keep the Bomb From Terrorists"
Op-Ed, Newsweek
By Graham Allison, Director, Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs; Douglas Dillon Professor of Government; Faculty Chair, Dubai Initiative, Harvard Kennedy School
The only thing that can keep nuclear bombs out of the hands of terrorists is a brand-new science of nuclear forensics.
AP Photo
Spring 2009
"Reinventing Reform"
Magazine or Newspaper Article, Democracy: A Journal of Ideas
By Elaine Kamarck, Lecturer in Public Policy
"Reforming government is a difficult and thankless task. Political leaders find that reform is almost always unpopular in the short term because it disrupts existing power arrangements. And if they manage to produce reforms that bear lasting and positive results in the long run, they are often out of power by the time the reforms bear fruit. I should know—I’ve been there."
RichardMasoner
July 14, 2008
A Tax Credit for Volunteerism
Magazine or Newspaper Article, The Louisiana Weekly
Hurricane Katrina devastated our region in 2005. With the help of volunteers, we have been rebuilding. If oil prices rise high enough to make travel unaffordable for volunteers, our resurrection will falter.
Summer 2008
"Divining Nuclear Intentions: A Review Essay"
Journal Article, International Security, issue 1, volume 33
By William C. Potter and Gaukhar Mukhatzhanova
Although projections of nuclear proliferation abound, they rarely are founded on empirical research or guided by theory. Even fewer studies are informed by a comparative perspective. The two books under review—The Psychology of Nuclear Proliferation: Identity, Emotions, and Foreign Policy, by Jacques Hymans, and Nuclear Logics: Alternative Paths in East Asia and the Middle East, by Etel Solingen, are welcome exceptions to this general state of affairs, and represent the cutting edge of nonproliferation research. Both works challenge conventional conceptions of the sources of nuclear weapons decisions and offer new insights into why past predictions of rapid proliferation failed to materialize and why current prognoses about rampant proliferation are similarly flawed. While sharing a number of common features, including a focus on subsystemic determinants of national behavior, the books differ in their methodology, level of analysis, receptivity to multicausal explanations, and assumptions about decisionmaker rationality and the revolutionary nature of the decision. Where one author emphasizes the importance of the individual leader’s national identity conception in determining a state’s nuclear path, the other explains nuclear decisions primarily with regard to the political-economic orientation of the ruling coalition. Notwithstanding a tendency to overinterpret evidence, the books represent the best of contemporary social science research and provide compelling interpretations of nuclear proliferation dynamics of great relevance to scholars and policymakers alike.
June 26, 2008
With Private Dollars at Stake, Delays Hurt
Magazine or Newspaper Article, The Times-Picayune
In a public hearing last week, the New Orleans City Council tangled with the Office of Recovery and Development and Administration over a state tax credit program to promote cultural activities. Some council members felt their districts were being ignored. The mood turned contentious. As a result of this debate, approval of funding for the city's 17-zone recovery plan was put off -- at Dr. Ed Blakely's request -- for at least another week.
szbluewater
June 16, 2008
"Spirit of Chinese People"
Op-Ed, The Korea Times
By Shacheng Wang, Former Research Fellow, International Security Program, 2007-2008
Shacheng Wang, a predoctoral fellow at Harvard Kennedy School's International Security Program at the Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs, writes about the response of the Chinese people to the earthquakes that hit Sichuan Province in the spring of 2008. Faced with such a castastrophe, the Chinese people have united in assisting the victims and have shown their true spirit, Wang says.
