SCIENCE AND TECHNOLOGY
March 2012
"On the Use of Offensive Cyber Capabilities: A Policy Analysis on Offensive US Cyber Policy"
Paper
By Robert Belk and Matthew Noyes
This paper offers analysis and policy recommendations for use and response to various forms of cyber action for Offensive Military Cyber Policy. It establishes a pragmatic policy-relevant, effects-based ontology for categorizing cyber capabilities, and develops a comprehensive framework for cyber policy analysis. Furthermore, it demonstrates the utility of the cyber policy analysis framework by analyzing six key categories of external cyber actions identified by our ontology, which range the entire spectrum of cyber activity. Lastly, this work develops actionable policy recommendations from our analysis for cyber policy makers while identifying critical meta-questions.
May 2012
"Internet Fragmentation: Highlighting the Major Technical, Governance and Diplomatic Challenges for U.S. Policy Makers"
Paper
By Jonah Force Hill, Former Belfer IGA Fellow 2011–2012
The Internet is at a crossroads. Today it is generally open, interoperable and unified. Tomorrow, however, we may see an entirely different Internet, one not characterized by openness and global reach, but by restrictions, blockages and cleavages. In order to help ensure that the Internet continues to serve as a source of global integration, democratization, and economic growth, American policymakers must be aware of the most significant technical, political and legal challenges to a unified Internet.
Summer 2012
Intensive Workshops Examine Energy Technologies, Future of Oil and Gas Reserves
Newsletter Article, Belfer Center Newsletter
By Traci Farrell, Communications Assistant
A group of American and European academics working on understanding the future prospects of energy technologies and the role of governments shaping these prospects gathered at Harvard Kennedy School in April. Hosted by Laura Diaz Anadon, director of the Energy Technology Innovation Policy.... the group discussed the need to incorporate uncertainty around technical change, the challenges of utilizing expert elicitations to inform policy decisions using models, and future collaborative work combining different expert elicitations and different energy-economic models.
Summer 2012
Fellows Enrich Belfer Center and Harvard Kennedy School with Vital Research, Dialogue
Newsletter Article, Belfer Center Newsletter
By Sharon Wilke, Associate Director of Communications
Several times each week, the Belfer Center library is filled with students, faculty, and fellows eager to listen, challenge, and exchange information and ideas triggered by the day’s presentation. Many of these talks are by one of the Center’s more than 70 research and senior fellows. This article features a few of the talented women and men who are current and former faculty, fellows, staff and associates of the Belfer Center whose work is making significant contributions in public and private sectors around the world.
Summer 2012
Newsmakers
Newsletter Article, Belfer Center Newsletter
By Traci Farrell, Communications Assistant
"Belfer Center Newsmakers" highlights members of the Belfer Center community who have been featured recently in the news.
April 30, 2012
Lewis Branscomb Gift Launches New Center for Science and Democracy
News
Lewis M. Branscomb, director emeritus of the Belfer Center’s Science, Technology, and Public Policy Program and member of the Center’s board of directors, has presented a $1 million gift to the Union of Concerned Scientists (UCS) to help launch a Center for Science and Democracy. Branscomb, the Aetna Professor of Public Policy and Corporate Management (emeritus) at Harvard Kennedy School and adjunct professor at the University of California San Diego, is a prominent physicist and intellectual leader on science and policymaking.
April 30, 2012
"African Game Change"
Op-Ed, Newsweek
By Niall Ferguson, Member of the Board, Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs
"In the years that lie before us, a great struggle will play out south of the Sahara: a struggle between man and Malthus. According to the Rev. Thomas Malthus’s famous principle—sometimes called the Malthusian trap—population grows geometrically, but the supply of food increases arithmetically. Viewed in those terms, many African countries today seem doomed to misery and vice," writes Belfer Center International Council member Niall Ferguson, "So is Africa heading over a demographic waterfall? Maybe not....Two things are changing the continent’s prospects. The first is the surging demand for the natural resources that are so abundant in Africa....The other game changer is mobile telephony....cellphones are giving poor Africans access to basic financial services for the first time."
April 25, 2012
"When We Wage Cyberwar, the Whole Web Suffers"
Op-Ed, Bloomberg
By Susan P. Crawford, Faculty Affiliate, Information and Communications Technology and Public Policy Project
"Purveyors of cyberfear are going in the opposite direction. They are not interested in engaging with other countries to come up with codes of online conduct or to translate the Geneva Conventions for cyberspace — so as to avoid collateral damage and protect hospitals, electrical grids, and so on. They want to be able to change ones to zeros on servers around the globe, whatever that means for speech and commerce at home and worldwide."
AP Photo
May 2012
"The Price of Wind Power in China During its Expansion: Technology Adoption, Learning-by-doing, Economies of Scale, and Manufacturing Localization"
Journal Article, Energy Economics, issue 3, volume 34
By Yueming Qiu and Laura Diaz Anadon, Associate Director, Science, Technology, and Public Policy Program; Director, Energy Technology Innovation Policy research group; Adjunct Lecturer in Public Policy
Using the bidding prices of participants in China's national wind project concession programs from 2003 to 2007, this paper built up a learning curve model to estimate the joint learning from learning-by-doing and learning-by-searching, with a novel knowledge stock metric based on technology adoption in China through both domestic technology development and international technology transfer. The paper describes, for the first time, the evolution of the price of wind power in China, and provides estimates of how technology adoption, experience building wind farm projects, wind turbine manufacturing localization, and wind farm economies of scale have influenced the price of wind power.
Winter 2012
"Toward a Common Wireless Market"
Op-Ed, Issues in Science and Technology
By Tolu Odumosu, Postdoctoral Research Fellow, Science, Technology, and Public Policy Program and Venkatesh "Venky" Narayanamurti, Benjamin Peirce Professor of Technology and Public Policy; Professor of Physics, Harvard; Director, Science, Technology, and Public Policy Program; Co-Principal Investigator, Energy Technology Innovation Policy research group
"With different policies and a focus on interoperability, the FCC can move the wireless industry toward a single interoperable market in which consumers have real choice and flexibility. This truly competitive market is achievable in the near future, and it can be reached with minimal financial and logistical impact on mobile wireless operators...."
