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Conflict

Writing About War

Writing About War - Award-winning writers in conversations about the ethics of war

This year marks both the 150th anniversary of the end of the Civil War and the 14th year that U.S. troops have been engaged in conflict since 9/11. How have American writers portrayed the face of battle, the ethical dilemmas of combat, and the memory of war? As a prelude to next season’s Live Context “War: Return and Recovery” theme, join us for an evening of readings and conversation with award-winning writersNatasha Tretheway and Phil Klay. 

Welcome remarks will be delivered by Jonathan Fanton, President of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences. 

Ms. Tretheway, the 19th Poet Laureate of the United States and Professor of English and Creative Writing at Emory University, will read from her 2007 Pulitzer Prize winning book, Native Guard, featuring poems written in the voice of a black soldier fighting for the Union army. 

Mr. Klay, a U.S. Marine Corps veteran of the war in Iraq, will read from Redeployment, his 2014 National Book Award winning collection of short stories, based on his service in Anbar Province during the 2007-2008 surge. 

Following the readings, both writers will engage in a candid conversation on writing about war with Stanford Political Scientist Scott Sagan.

This event is part of the Stanford Live 15-16 Season, Summer Series. It is co-sponsored by the Center for International Security and Cooperation and the American Academy of Arts and Sciences. 

Writing About War

 

Bing Concert Hall

327 Lasuen Street

Stanford University

Phil Klay 2014 National Book Award winner Author U.S. Marine Corps veteran
Natasha Trethewey 19th Poet Laureate of the United States Author Emory University

Scott D. Sagan

CISAC
Stanford University
Encina Hall, E202
Stanford, CA 94305-6165

(650) 725-2715 (650) 723-0089
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The Caroline S.G. Munro Professor of Political Science
The Bass University Fellow in Undergraduate Education  
Senior Fellow, Freeman Spogli Institute for International Studies
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Scott D. Sagan is the Caroline S.G. Munro Professor of Political Science, the Bass University Fellow in Undergraduate Education, and a Senior Fellow at the Center for International Security and Cooperation, where he previously served as the social science co-director. He is the Inaugural Harry Frank Guggenheim Fellow for Nuclear Ethics and Security at the Carnegie Council for Ethics in International Affairs (2026-2027). Sagan also serves as co-chair of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences’ Committee on International Security Studies. Before joining the Stanford faculty, he was a lecturer in the Department of Government at Harvard University and served as special assistant to the director of the Organization of the Joint Chiefs of Staff in the Pentagon.

Sagan is the author of Moving Targets: Nuclear Strategy and National Security (Princeton University Press, 1989); The Limits of Safety: Organizations, Accidents, and Nuclear Weapons (Princeton University Press, 1993); and, with co-author Kenneth N. Waltz, The Spread of Nuclear Weapons: An Enduring Debate (W.W. Norton, 2012). He is the co-editor of Insider Threats (Cornell University Press, 2017) with Matthew Bunn; and co-editor of The Fragile Balance of Terror (Cornell University Press, 2022) with Vipin Narang. Sagan was also the guest editor of a two-volume special issue of Daedalus: Ethics, Technology, and War (Fall 2016) and The Changing Rules of War (Winter 2017).

Recent publications include “Creeds and Contestation: How US Nuclear and Legal Doctrine Influence Each Other,” with Janina Dill, in a special issue of Security Studies (December 2025); “Kettles of Hawks: Public Opinion on the Nuclear Taboo and Noncombatant Immunity in the United States, United Kingdom, France, and Israel”, with Janina Dill and Benjamin A. Valentino in Security Studies (February 2022); “The Rule of Law and the Role of Strategy in U.S. Nuclear Doctrine” with Allen S. Weiner in International Security (Spring 2021); “Does the Noncombatant Immunity Norm Have Stopping Power?” with Benjamin A. Valentino in International Security (Fall 2020); and “Just War and Unjust Soldiers: American Public Opinion on the Moral Equality of Combatants” and “On Reciprocity, Revenge, and Replication: A Rejoinder to Walzer, McMahan, and Keohane” with Benjamin A. Valentino in Ethics & International Affairs (Winter 2019).

In 2022, Sagan was awarded Thérèse Delpech Memorial Award from the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace at their International Nuclear Policy Conference. In 2017, he received the International Studies Association’s Susan Strange Award which recognizes the scholar whose “singular intellect, assertiveness, and insight most challenge conventional wisdom and intellectual and organizational complacency" in the international studies community. Sagan was also the recipient of the National Academy of Sciences William and Katherine Estes Award in 2015, for his work addressing the risks of nuclear weapons and the causes of nuclear proliferation. The award, which is granted triennially, recognizes “research in any field of cognitive or behavioral science that advances understanding of issues relating to the risk of nuclear war.” In 2013, Sagan received the International Studies Association's International Security Studies Section Distinguished Scholar Award. He has also won four teaching awards: Stanford’s 1998-99 Dean’s Award for Distinguished Teaching; Stanford's 1996 Hoagland Prize for Undergraduate Teaching; the International Studies Association’s 2008 Innovative Teaching Award; and the Monterey Institute for International Studies’ Nonproliferation Education Award in 2009.     

Former co-director, Center for International Security and Cooperation
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Panel Discussions

‘Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell’ Secrecy, Security, and Oversight of Targeted Killing Operations

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Abstract: Governments around the world have been targeting and killing individuals to prevent them from committing terror attacks or other atrocities. They use this method secretly, sometimes without even taking responsibility for such operations, and without making public most of the relevant information: who is being targeted and what are the criteria for targeting individuals, what evidence is used to make targeting decisions, and what procedures are adopted to identify mistakes or misuse of this method. Recently released documents, such as the U.S. Department of Justice Drone Memo (analyzing lethal operations against U.S. citizen Anwar Al-Aulaqi), the more general White Paper on targeted killings of US citizens, or the Report of the Israeli Special Investigatory Commission on the targeted killing of Salah Shehadeh, shed some light on otherwise highly secretive decision-making processes, thereby introducing to the public debate important information previously unavailable. At the same time, in revealing only a small amount of relevant information, they emphasize the thick veil of secrecy that still surrounds the discussions in this field. Moreover, the information that is available demonstrates the vague nature of the relevant rules; the security-oriented implementation of these rules; and the inadequacy of current oversight mechanisms of targeted killing operations. These challenges to a process designed to take human lives emphasize the need to develop effective and independent accountability mechanisms, with powers to investigate high-level policymakers as well as operational-level decision-makers. This policy-paper proposes concrete solutions to the main weaknesses of the current legal framework: it narrowly (and clearly) defines legal terms such as ‘imminent threat,’ ‘feasibility,’ and ‘last resort’; it develops an activity-based test for determinations on direct participation in hostilities; it designs an independent ex post review mechanism; and it calls for governmental transparency and meaningful oversight. Most importantly, it promotes a targeted killing policy that protects civilians from both terror and counter-terror attacks.

About the Speaker: Shiri Krebs is a JSD Candidate at Stanford Law School, specializing in international criminal and humanitarian law. She was recently awarded the Christiana Shi Stanford Interdisciplinary Graduate Fellowship in International Studies and is a Law and International Security Predoctoral Fellow at Stanford Center on International Security and Cooperation (CISAC).

Her doctoral dissertation focuses on war crimes investigations and fact-finding during armed conflicts. This interdisciplinary research project combines theories and methods from law, psychology, sociology and political science, including online survey experiments.

From 2005 to 2010 Shiri served as legal advisor on international law matters in the Chief-Justice's chambers, the Israeli Supreme Court. During that time she has taught public international law at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, a teaching assistantship which granted her the Dean's award for excellent junior faculty members, as well as 'best teacher' award. After leaving the Supreme Court, Shiri joined the Israeli Democracy Institute as a researcher, working on 'Terrorism and Democracy' projects, and publishing frequent op-eds in various newspapers and blogs.

In September 2010 Shiri started her graduate studies at Stanford Law School. Her Masters thesis - an empirical analysis of preventive detention cases - was presented in several international conferences and has won the Steven M. Block Civil Liberties Award. 

In 2012, while working on her dissertation, Shiri was appointed as a Teaching Scholar at Santa Clara University School of Law, teaching international criminal law and international humanitarian law. She is currently serving as a Teaching Assistant for the Stanford Interschool Honors Program in International Security Studies. 

Encina Hall (2nd floor)

Shiri Krebs

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Shiri Krebs is a Professor of Law at Deakin University and Director of the Centre for Law as Protection. She is also the Chair of the Lieber Society on the Law of Armed Conflict, an affiliate scholar at Stanford University Center for International Security and Cooperation (CISAC), and co-lead of the Australian Government Cyber Security Cooperative Research Centre (CSCRC) Law and Policy Theme. In 2024, she was appointed as a Visiting Legal Fellow at the Australian Government Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade (DFAT). Her research on drone warfare and predictive technologies in counterterrorism and armed conflict is currently funded by a 3-year Australian Research Council (ARC) DECRA fellowship and an Alexander von Humboldt Experienced Researcher Fellowship at the University of Hamburg.

Prof Krebs’ research projects on international fact-finding, biases in counterterrorism decision-making, and human-machine interaction in drone warfare, have influenced decision-making processes through invitations to brief high-level decision-makers, including at the United Nations (CTED, Office of the Secretary-General), the United States Department of Defense, and the Australian Defence Force.

Her recent research awards include the David Caron Prize (American Society of International Law, 2021), the ‘Researcher of the Year’ Award (Australian Women in Law Awards, 2022), the Australian Legal Research Awards (finalist, Article/Chapter (ECR), 2022), and the Vice-Chancellor’s Researcher Award for Career Excellence (Deakin, 2022).

Before joining Deakin University, Prof Krebs has taught in several law schools, including at Stanford University, University of Santa Clara, and the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, where she won the Dean’s award recognizing exceptional junior faculty members.

She earned her Doctorate and Master Degrees from Stanford Law School, as well as LL.B. and M.A., both magna cum laude, from the Hebrew University of Jerusalem.

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Seminars

From "Olympic Games" to the Sony Hack: The Future of Offensive Cyber in Statecraft

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Abstract: When President Obama approved the "Olympic Games'' cyber attacks on Iran, he told aides that he was worried about what would happen when nations around the world began to use destructive cyber attacks as a new weapon of disruption and coercion. Now, we've begun to find out. David Sanger, the national security correspondent of The New York Times and author of Confront and Conceal, the book that revealed the cyber program against Iran, will explore how offensive cyber operations have developed in the Obama administration -- and why they have been so little debated.

About the Speaker: David E. Sanger is National Security Correspondent and senior writer for The New York Times. He is the author of two bestsellers on foreign affairs: The Inheritance: The World Obama Confronts and the Challenges to American Power (2009) and Confront and Conceal: Obama’s Secret Wars and Surprising Use of American Power (2012). He served as the Times’ Tokyo Bureau Chief, Washington Economic Correspondent, White House correspondent during the Clinton and Bush Administrations and Chief Washington Correspondent.

Mr. Sanger has twice been a member of New York Times teams that won the Pulitzer Prize, first for the investigation into the causes of the Challenger disaster in 1986, and later for investigations into the struggles within the Clinton administration over technology exports to China. He teaches national security policy at Harvard's Kennedy School of Government.

This event is offered as a joint sponsorship with the Hoover Institution.

 

Encina Hall (2nd floor)

David Sanger National Security Correspondent and senior writer for The New York Times Speaker New York Times
Seminars
Directors' Seminar Series

Educational and Entrepreneurial Initiatives to Support Youth in Places of Violence

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Participant youth, Wallace and Wellington, overlooking the city from their community.

CONFERENCE OVERVIEW

The heavy presence of youth and young adults in the world of criminality is an issue that has been gaining increasingly more attention in the agendas of policymakers and politicians in developing and developed nations. With scarce options for a quality education, prospects for gainful employment and the possibility for future economic sustainability, on a daily basis, young individuals from poor communities throughout Latin American and U.S. cities are exposed to a violent environment with easily accessed - and often attractive - gateways into the world of criminality. From casual affiliation to gangs in schools and neighborhoods in Southern California, to full-time armed participation in international drug cartels in Juarez and drug factions in Rio de Janeiro favelas, youth are the biggest target – and victims – of violence.

In attempts to shed light to this very complex and fundamental issue that is claiming thousand of lives every year and deteriorating the social fabric across cities, the Program on Poverty and Governance (PovGov) at Stanford Center on Democracy, Development, and the Rule of Law (CDDRL) in conjunction with the Center for Latin American Studies, The Bill Lane Center for the America West, The Mexico Initiative at FSI, and The Center on International Security and Cooperation, will hold a two-day conference to discuss the dimensions of youth and criminal violence in Latin American and U.S. cities and share pathways to hope.

Ranging from grassroots initiatives to widespread government policies, the conference will develop on various established development actions and programs aimed at providing educational, work, and entrepreneurial opportunities for youth in territories impacted by poverty, criminality and violence in the U.S. and Latin America. We will gather activists and practitioners from grassroots civil society organizations, community leaders, educators, professionals from international development platforms, policy-makers, politicians, scholars - as well as some of the very individuals participating in these programs - to discuss the many challenges faced by the youth population in these different locations and to share innovative and inspirational initiatives to generate opportunities and foster change.                                                        

At PovGov, we believe in the importance of creating an environment where actors with different backgrounds across sectors, disciplines, realities and environments can come together to share their first-hand experiences, challenges and aspirations. We hope this wide-reaching and multiplayer conference can enrich the discussion around the formulation of policies and development strategies to benefit the youth in places of violence and better inform the work moving forward.    

 

Conference Materials

Conference Agenda

Descriptions of Panels and Talks

Speaker Bios

 

Agenda

Tuesday, April 28th 2015

8:40 – 9:00: Welcoming Remarks

·      Beatriz Magaloni, Director, PovGov, Stanford University.

·      Larry Diamond, Director, CDDRL, Stanford University.

·      Rodolfo Dirzo, Director, Center for Latin America Studies, Stanford University.

 

 9:00 – 10:30

Panel 1. Youth Violence: Risk Factors and Consequences

·      Beatriz Magaloni, Director, PovGov, Stanford University.

·      Brenda Jarillo, Post-Doctoral Fellow, PovGov, Stanford University.

·      Monica Valdez González, Director of Research and Studies, IMJUVE, Mexico.

Discussant: Francis Fukuyama, Director, Program on Governance, Stanford University.

 

10:40 – 11:40

Keynote Speaker

The Agenda for Youth Violence Prevention in Brazil: Where We Are Now and Where We Are Heading

Angela Guimarães, Brazil’s Sub-Secretary of Youth and President of the National Council on Youth (CONJUVE)

 

11:50 – 12:50: Lunch

 

1:00 – 2:30

Panel 2. Initiatives for At-risk Youth in Rio Favelas

·      Eliana de Sousa e Silva, Director, Redes de Desenvolvimento da Maré, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil.

·      Jailson de Sousa e Silva, Director, Observatório de Favelas, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil.

·      Ivana Bentes, National Secretary of Citizenship and Cultural Diversity, Brazil.

Discussant: Larry Diamond, Director, CDDRL, Stanford University.

 

(10-minute break)

 

2:40 – 4:10

Panel 3. Reducing Youth Gang Activity and Violence in the U.S.

·      Amy Crawford, Deputy Director, Center for Crime Prevention and Control, John Jay College of Criminal Justice in New York.

·      Lateefah Simon, Director, California’s Future Initiative at Rosenberg Foundation, San Francisco, California.

·      Christa Gannon, Founder and Director, Fresh Lifelines for Youth, San Mateo and Santa Clara, California.

Discussant: Bruce Cain, Director, Bill Lane Institute for the American West, Stanford University.

 

4:15 – 5:00: Closing Event of the Day

Stanford International Crime and Violence Lab announcement; cooperation agreement ceremony; photography exposition from Observatório de Favelas (“People’s Images” project).

·      Beatriz Magaloni, Stanford University.

·      Alberto Diaz-Cayeros, Stanford University.

(Adjourn)

 

Wednesday, April 29th 2015

9:00- 10:30

Panel 4. Evaluating Effective Interventions for Youth

·      Jorja Leap, Adjunct Professor, Department of Social Welfare; Director, Health and Social Justice Partnership, UCLA.

·      Gustavo Robles, Pre-Doctoral Fellow, PovGov, Stanford University.

·      Felix Lucero, The Prison University Project, California, U.S.

Facilitator: Martin Carnoy, Professor, Graduate School of Education, Stanford University. 

 

10:40 – 1:00

Panel 5. The “Network for Youth Agency” Experience

 

Sector 5.1. Instruments to Make a Difference

·      Veruska Delfino, Production Coordinator, Agência de Redes Para Juventude.

·      Ana Paula Lisboa, Methodology Coordinator, Agência de Redes Para Juventude.

·      Elaine Rosa, Former Participant and Entrepreneur, Agência de Redes Para Juventude.

Discussant: Stephen Commins, Lecturer in Urban Planning and Associate Director for Global Public Affairs at the Luskin School of Public Affairs, UCLA.

                                                                                                                      

Section 5.2. World Exchange of Methodologies

·      Marcus Faustini, Director and Founder, Agência de Redes Para Juventude, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil.

·      Paul Heritage, Professor, Queen Mary University of London, UK.

·      Liz Moreton, Battersea Arts Centre, London, UK.

·      Suzie Henderson, Contact Theatre, Manchester, UK.

Discussant: Stephen Commins, Lecturer in Urban Planning and Associate Director for Global Public Affairs at the Luskin School of Public Affairs, UCLA.

 

1:00 – 2:00: Lunch

 

2:10 – 3:10

Keynote Speaker

Applied Social Research: Youth and Gangs in Mexico City

Hector Castillo Berthier, Founder and Director, Circo Volador, Mexico

 

3:55 - 4:35

Panel 6. Victims and Perpetrators of Violence: Redirecting Youth in Mexican Prisons

·      Carlos Cruz, Founder and Director, Cauce Ciudadano, Mexico.

·      Ana Laura Magaloni, Professor of Law, Center for Research and Teaching in Economics (CIDE), Mexico.

·      Humberto Padgett, Journalist, Mexico.

·      Antonio Cervantes, Producer, Mexico.

Discussant: Alberto Diaz-Cayeros, Senior Fellow, FSI, Stanford University.

 

4:40– 6:00

Panel 7: Youth Experiences: Sharing Lives, Practices and Knowledge

·     Emanuelle Gomes Pereira Mallete, Agência de Redes Para Juventude and Pontão de Cultura, Sepetiba, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil.

.     Mariluce Mariá de Souza, Social Enterpreneur and Activist, Complexo do Alemão, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil.

·     Francisco Valdean Alves dos Santos, Observatório de Favelas, Complexo da Maré, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil.

·     Valnei Succo, Observatório de Favelas, Rocha Miranda, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil.

·     Christian Paronable, Fresh Lifelines for Youth, California.

·     Alma Yureni Esqueda Garcia, Cauce Ciudadano, Morelos, Mexico.

Facilitator: Izabela Moi, John S. Knight Journalism Fellow, Stanford University.

 

6:00 – Closing Remarks and Final reception

·       Beatriz Magaloni, Director, PovGov, Stanford University.

 

WE THANK YOU FOR YOUR PARTICIPATION.

 

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Conferences
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Nuclear Dynamics in South Asia

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About the Speaker: Lieutenant General (retired) Khalid Kidwai is advisor to Pakistan’s National Command Authority and pioneer Director General of Pakistan’s Strategic Plans Division, which he headed for an unprecedented 15 years. He is one of the most decorated generals in Pakistan and was awarded the highest civil award Nishan-i-Imtiaz, as well as Hilal-i-Imtiaz and Hilal-i-Imtiaz (Military). Winner of the Sword of Honor at Pakistan’s Military Academy, he later saw frontline combat action in erstwhile East Pakistan and was a prisoner of war in Pakistan’s 1971 war with India. General Kidwai conceived, articulated, and executed Pakistan’s nuclear policy and deterrence doctrines into a tangible and robust nuclear force structure. General Kidwai is also the architect of Pakistan’s civilian Nuclear Energy Program and National Space Program.

Encina Hall (2nd floor)

Khalid Kidwai advisor to Pakistan’s National Command Authority Speaker
Seminars
Directors' Seminar Series

Wales to Warsaw: NATO and the Current State of Transatlantic Security

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At the NATO Summit in Wales in September 2014, NATO leaders were clear about the security challenges on the Alliance’s borders. In the East, Russia’s actions threaten our vision of a Europe that is whole, free and at peace.  On the Alliance’s southeastern border, ISIL’s campaign of terror poses a threat to the stability of the Middle East and beyond.  To the south, across the Mediterranean, Libya is becoming increasingly unstable. As the Alliance continues to confront theses current and emerging threats, one thing is clear as we prepare for the 2016 Summit in Warsaw: NATO will adapt, just as it has throughout its 65-year history.

Douglas Lute, Ambassador of the United States to NATO

 

In August 2013, Douglas E. Lute was sworn-in as the Ambassador of the United States to the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO).  From 2007 to 2013, Lute served at the White House under Presidents Bush and Obama, first as the Assistant to the President and Deputy National Security Advisor for Iraq and Afghanistan, and more recently as the Deputy Assistant to the President focusing on Afghanistan, Pakistan and India.  In 2010, AMB Lute retired from the U.S. Army as a Lieutenant General after 35 years on active duty.  Prior to the White House, he served as the Director of Operations on the Joint Staff, overseeing U.S. military operations worldwide. He served multiple tours in NATO commands including duty in Germany during the Cold War and commanding U.S. forces in Kosovo.  He holds degrees from the United States Military Academy and Harvard University.

A light lunch will be provided.  Please plan to arrive by 11:30am to allow time to check in at the registration desk, pick up your lunch and be seated by 12:00 noon.

Co-sponsored by The Europe Center, the Freeman Spogli Institute for International Studies, the Center for International Security and Cooperation and the Center for Russian, East European and Eurasian Studies.

 

Douglas Lute United States Ambassador to NATO Speaker
Lectures

The Super Smart Way to Dismantle ISIS

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Every week, the Islamic State (ISIS) makes further headlines with its ruthless behavior. Beheadings, mass executions, burnings and extreme acts of brutality are the methods of a terrorist campaign intended to cow opponents and rally potential fighters. At the same time, the group is fighting a guerilla war against Iraqi forces while engaging in more conventional infantry battles against Kurdish Peshmerga and Free Syrian Army cadres. The many tactics of ISIS raises the question: Which type of war are we fighting against?

CISAC's Joe Felter and his Empirical Studies of Conflict colleagues Eli Berman and Jacob Shapiro ask those questions in this National Interest article.

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Sagan honored with prestigious NAS award

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Stanford political science professor Scott Sagan, a senior fellow at the Center for International Security and Cooperation and the Freeman Spogli Institute for International Studies, has been honored with a prestigious award from the National Academy of Sciences for his pioneering work addressing the risks of nuclear weapons and the causes of nuclear proliferation.

“Sagan's work has become an integral part of the nuclear debate in the United States and overseas,” the NAS said in a statement. “He has shown, for example, that a government's decision to pursue nuclear weapons can be prompted not only by national security concerns but also because of domestic political interests, parochial bureaucratic infighting, or concerns about international prestige.”

The William and Katherine Estes Award recognizes research in any field of cognitive or behavioral science that advances the understanding of issues relating to the risk of nuclear war. Sagan and other NAS award winners will be honored in a ceremony on April 26 during the academy’s 152nd annual meeting.

The academy noted that Sagan has developed theories about why different types of political regimes behave differently once they acquire “the bomb.”

“Sagan and his colleagues have also investigated U.S. public attitudes about nuclear weapons and found that few Americans actually believe that there is a taboo against their use in conflicts,” the NAS said. “The possession of nuclear weapons also raises the risk of nuclear weapons accidents, and Sagan has shown that even though there has never been an accidental nuclear war, there have been many more close-calls and near-accidents than was previously known.”

Sagan and co-authors Daryl G. Press and Benjamin A. Valentino, examined the taboos, traditions and non-use of nuclear weapons in this article in the American Political Science Review. He continues to work on an original survey experiment that examines the public attitudes about the “unthinkable” use of the nuclear bomb.

Siegfried Hecker – one of the world’s leading experts on plutonium science and a senior fellow at FSI – said that he has learned greatly from Sagan over the years as colleagues and former co-directors of CISAC. The two represent the center’s foundational spirit of combing the social and hard sciences to build a safer world.  

“The beauty of Scott’s work is that he has combined rigorous political science thinking with a practical knowledge of the limits of humans and organizations to deal with the complexities and dangers of nuclear weapons,” Hecker said. “Scott’s work has convinced me that there is real science in the political science of nuclear weapons. It is appropriate that this honor comes from the National Academy of Sciences.”

Sagan said he is honored to follow in the footsteps of previous recipients of the William and Katherine Estes Award, calling them “some of my intellectual heroes.”

Among those who have won the award are Thomas C. Schelling, Alexander L. George, Robert Jervis, Robert Powell and Graham Allison.

Allison, director of the Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs at Harvard University, called Sagan's honor a "well-deserved recognition of a scholar who has illuminated the intersection of organizational behavior and nuclear danger."

The National Academy of Sciences is a private, nonprofit institution that was established under a congressional charter signed by President Abraham Lincoln in 1863. It recognizes achievement in science and provides science, engineering, and health policy advice to the federal government and other organizations.

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Former Secretary of Defense William J. Perry, left, and Political Science Professor Science Professor Scott Sagan talk during a break in Perry's Stanford class, "Living at the Nuclear Brink." | ©Light at 11B
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Understanding conflict is the road to peace

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Understanding the nature of violent conflict in the world's most dangerous flashpoints may help find ways to peace and stability, according to a Stanford expert.

Once a soldier, now a scholar, Joe Felter knows better than most the intrinsic meaning of war and conflict – he served on the front lines in the U.S. Special Forces in places such as Iraq, Afghanistan and the Philippines.

Today, the senior research scholar at Stanford's Center for International Security and Cooperationand research fellow at the Hoover Institution is on a different kind of mission: building knowledge on the subject of politically motivated conflict.

For example, how are the most casualties suffered and under what conditions? Are there patterns to why rebels are surrendering? And how do armed battles affect development and education in local communities?

Answers to these and other questions are found in the Empirical Studies of Conflict project database, which is led by Felter and Jacob Shapiro, his former Stanford political science classmate, now a professor at Princeton University. The effort focuses on insurgency, civil war and other sources of politically motivated violence worldwide. Launched last year, it currently covers the Philippines, Afghanistan, Colombia, Iraq, Northern Ireland, Mexico, the Israeli-occupied territories, Pakistan and Vietnam. The site includes geospatial and tabular data as well as thousands of documents, archives and interviews.

Since 2009, Felter has collaborated with colleagues at Princeton, the University of California, San Diego, and other institutions in developing the database. Today, they are advising policymakers and military leaders on how best to curb conflict, reduce civilian casualties and promote prosperity. Felter and his colleagues have outlined some of their work in this Foreign Affairs article published in January 2015.

Felter's research on Filipino insurgencies, for instance, has produced significant results. The senior officials there have invited him to brief their military on battlefield trends and counterinsurgency strategy, as Felter and his colleagues have interviewed thousands of combatants as part of the project.

What do they learn about the insurgent mindset? One Islamic militant chief talked tactics with him, then revealed that his greatest tool was his men's belief that Allah was waiting for them on the other side. Others included a Roman Catholic nun who was running guns and money to help the poor and a young college freshman recruited with the promise of $40 a month to support her family.

Pathways to peace

In the case of the Philippines, Felter had access to more than 100,000 individual reports of conflict episodes dating back to 1975 and more than 13,000 interview transcripts from rebels who were captured or had surrendered over the last 30 years. That information was coded in detail and compiled as part of the Empirical Studies of Conflict Project database. The Philippines is home to some of the most protracted Muslim separatist and communist insurgencies in the world, and that is precisely why the government is interested in learning how to thwart it.

L.A. Ciceroscholar Joe Felter and student research assistant Crystal Lee

Crystal Lee, a Stanford senior and history major, has been Joe Felter’s research assistant since her freshman year.

"For me, it's kind of validating all the thousands and thousands of hours that went into all our coding," said Felter, adding that the information will help the Philippines government find ways to ease the costs and human suffering in the conflicts it faces.

It has been a transformational journey for Felter, who retired in 2012 from the U.S. Army as a colonel following a career as a Special Forces and foreign area officer with missions and deployments across Asia, Panama, Iraq and Afghanistan. In 2010-11, he commanded the International Security and Assistance Force Counter Insurgency Advisory and Assistance Team in Afghanistan.

"I spent a long time in the military deployed to environments where you could appreciate that what you were doing was having an impact," Felter said.

In higher education now, his vantage point is different from what it was on the front lines. Today, both perspective and policy are two of his main goals.

"Since I transitioned to academia, I haven't lost my commitment to trying to help practitioners in the field to better understand conflict – by using data," Felter said.

Stanford senior Crystal Lee, a history major, has been working with Felter as a research assistant since her freshman year, helping him code and compile the datasets.

"It's been really interesting for me to think about the implications that this type of data analysis has on governments and broader policy work," said Lee, who also has analyzed and reconstructed hundreds of interviews with former rebels for Felter's upcoming book.

She said that a romantic notion exists in Silicon Valley that if one uses a huge database, one can wave a magic wand and believe that so-called "big data" will solve everything. "But it's a really messy field and we've had to use best practices to make sense of the increasingly complicated picture of counterinsurgency and terrorism," she said.

Study at the local level

Felter pointed out that to truly comprehend the nature of counterinsurgency in places like the Philippines, Iraq or Afghanistan, one must realize that its roots are in local communities.

"You need to study it at the local level to really understand it," Felter said. "And the Philippines is like a petri dish for studying both insurgency and counterinsurgency because you have multiple, long-running insurgencies, each with distinct characteristics, and with an array of government and military responses to address these threats over time."

The coders are now doubling back over the dataset from 1975 to 2012 to make sure it's accurate and cleaned of any potentially sensitive details before it goes public. The data are the basis for two of Felter's ongoing book projects and dozens of working papers and journal articles.

Roots of research

A Stanford alum, Felter was in the Philippines in 2004 conducting field research as part of his doctoral dissertation when he was first able to gain access to what would become a trove of detailed incident-level data on insurgency and counterinsurgency.

John Troncoscholar Joe Felter with members of the First Scout Ranger Regiment, Philippine Army

Stanford scholar Joe Felter with members of the First Scout Ranger Regiment, Philippine Army. His research in the Philippines helps inform the Empirical Studies of Conflict database.

After bringing back the data and meeting with his faculty advisers – Stanford political science Professors David Laitin and James Fearon – he realized the extensive incident-level data could be coded in a manner that would make it a tremendous resource for scholars studying civil wars, insurgencies and other forms of politically motivated violence.

"This comprehensive conflict dataset is going to be the holy grail of micro-level conflict data," Felter said. "It has the potential to drive a significant number of publications, reports and analyses, and enable conflict researchers to develop insights and test theories that they would not have been able to do before."

The network is expanding. A dozen young scholars who were supported by funding for the Empirical Studies of Conflict (ESOC) project as postdoctoral fellows have now been placed in tenure-track positions at universities.

"What's unique about ESOC is that we're trying hard to make it easier for others to study conflict by pulling together everything we can on the conflicts we've studied," said Jake Shapiro, an associate professor of politics and international affairs at Princeton University and the project's co-director.

On Iraq, for example, the website provides data on conflict outcomes, politics and demographics, in addition to maps, links to other useful information sources and other types of research on Iraq, he said.

Shapiro says researchers working for the Canadian Armed Forces, the World Bank and the U.S. military have already turned to the database for help. Insurgencies cost human lives and dollars, enough so that the United States and the international community are now focused on rebuilding social and political orders in those troubled countries.

As Felter put it, "We are devoted to learning from all those experiences and to making it easier for others to do so as well, so that we can all live more peacefully and safely in the future."

Research highlights

The Empirical Studies of Conflict project includes the following scholarly advances:

• Research on insurgent compensation paid during the U.S. Iraq conflict shows that pay was not based on risk factors.
• Findings show rebel violence will decrease when projects are secure and valued by community members and when implementation is conditional on the behavior of non-combatants.
• A journal article describes the preference for "certainty" in the relationship between violence and economic risk in wartime Afghanistan.

Media Contact

Beth Duff-Brown, Center for International Security and Cooperation: (650) 725-6488,bethduff@stanford.edu

Clifton B. Parker, Stanford News Service: (650) 725-0224, cbparker@stanford.edu

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CISAC Senior Research Scholar Joe Felter with members of the First Scout Ranger Regiment, Philippine Army. His research in the Philippines helps inform the Empirical Studies of Conflict Project database. | John Tronco
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Hecker: Don't forget North Korea nukes amid movie flap

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The threats, turmoil, and media circus surrounding the Hollywood satire "The Interview," in which bungling American journalists assassinate North Korean leader Kim Jong Un, have put the country in the international spotlight again. Often forgotten amid all this comedy, though, is the very unfunny fact that North Korea’s nuclear weapons program has been relentlessly expanding for a decade, and poses a real and deadly threat to the rest of Northeast Asia.

Senior Fellow Siegfried Hecker writes in this Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists piece that North Korea today may possess a nuclear arsenal of roughly 12 nuclear weapons, half likely fueled by plutonium and half by highly enriched uranium.

And in this related Q&A, David Straub, a Korea expert at FSI's Walter Shorenstein Asia-Pacific Research Center, answers questions about the Sony hacking after North Korea condemned "The Interivew."
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