Sebastian Bay

Intelligence theories – a literary overview

“Don’t worry, it’s a slam dunk!” (Tenet cited in Woodward 2004, p.249).

If former Director of Central Intelligence George Tenet had known that those six words he was about to utter that December morning would become a symbol for the greatest intelligence failure since Pearl Harbor, he might have chosen his words more carefully.

Many have asked what Tenet could and should have known. Just as many have asked whether or not he was influenced in his assessment by various groups of policymakers to the extent that he was forced to provide an answer he knew to be false. Fewer have asked what the limits of intelligence analysis are, and even fewer have asked what can be known and where the boundaries of knowledge are drawn in the field of intelligence.

The intelligence failures of 9/11, Iraq, London, Bali, Madrid and Istanbul have enforced the notion of intelligence as broken, defective and in urgent need of being fixed. Among scholars, this debate has given rise to a surge of activity and discussion and has led to the notion held by many that the field is conceptually weak and in need of theorizing.

How are policies that guide the intelligence services formed and guided? On what assumptions are they based? What is the intellectual and ideological divide? Theory guides us to find these answers, and the study of intelligence must be carried on under this veil to be explicit. Discussions about intelligence theory and the development of conceptual and theoretical thinking about intelligence are here to stay. These discussions are vibrant and sometimes difficult, as new thoughts and provocative ideas challenge how things are and should be done. Even if the contribution of theoretical thinking to the field of intelligence is questioned, it will by all means revolutionize and open up the academic field of intelligence analysis. Theory has become the new “in” in intelligence.

Continue reading my essay here: Intelligence theories – a literary overview

June 17th, 2009

Essence of Decision: Explaining the War on Iraq.

Natten mellan den 19 och 20 mars 2003 inledde koalitionstrupper Operation Iraqi Freedom. Detta var slutet på det som kom att gå till historien som Irakkrisen.

30 år tidigare formulerade Graham Allison en teori, i form av tre modeller, för att förklara utrikespolitiskt agerande utifrån Kubakrisen. Vi har prövat huruvida Allisons teori fortfarande kan förklara utrikespolitiskt agerande genom att pröva den på Irakkrisen. Detta har operationaliserats genom en systematisk genomgång av tillgängligt material som behandlar uppsatsämnet.

Efter att ha betraktat Irakkrisen utifrån Allisons tre olika modeller kan vi konstatera att teorin fortfarande är bärkraftig. Dock behövs viss komplettering till den 30 år gamla teorin – i form av en inrikespolitisk analys, bredare organisationsanalys samt en djupare value- och beliefsystem-analys – för att kunna åstadkomma en fylligare undersökning som förenar Allisons modeller med dagens verklighet.

Nyckelord: Allison, USA, Irakkrisen, Beslutsfattande, Teoriprövande.

Uppsatsen skriven av:

Sebastian Bay och Björn McClintock

Ladda ner hela uppsatsen här

1 comment February 1st, 2006