Jacob Shapiro (speaker) is a CISAC postdoctoral fellow. His primary research interest is the organization of terrorism and insurgency. His other research interests include international relations, organization theory, and security policy. Shapiro's ongoing projects study the balance between secrecy and openness in counterterrorism, the impact of international human rights law on democracies' foreign policy, the causes of militant recruitment in Islamic countries, and the relationship between public goods provision and insurgent violence in Iraq and Afghanistan. His research has been published in International Security, International Studies Quarterly, Foreign Policy, and a number of edited volumes. Shapiro is a Harmony Fellow at the Combating Terrorism Center at the United States Military Academy. As a Naval Reserve officer he was assigned to the Office of Naval Intelligence and the Naval Warfare Development Command. He served on active duty at Special Boat Team 20 and onboard the USS Arthur W. Radford (DD-968). He holds a PhD in political science and an MA in economics from Stanford University and a BA in political science from the University of Michigan.

Jeremy Weinstein (discussant) is an assistant professor of political science at Stanford University and an affiliated faculty member at CDDRL and CISAC. Previously, he was a research fellow at the Center for Global Development, where he directed the bi-partisan Commission on Weak States and US National Security. While working on his PhD, with funding from the Jacob Javits Fellowship, a Sheldon Fellowship, and the World Bank, he conducted hundreds of interviews with rebel combatants and civilians in both Africa and Latin America for his forthcoming book, Inside Rebellion: The Politics of Insurgent Violence. He has also worked on the National Security Council staff; served as a visiting scholar at the World Bank; was a fellow at the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars; and received a research fellowship in foreign policy studies at the Brookings Institution. He received his BA with high honors from Swarthmore College, and his MA and PhD in political economy and government from Harvard University.

Martha Crenshaw (speaker) is a senior fellow at CISAC and FSI and a professor of political science by courtesy. She was the Colin and Nancy Campbell Professor of Global Issues and Democratic Thought and professor of government at Wesleyan University in Middletown, Conn., from 1974 to 2007. Her current research focuses on innovation in terrorist campaigns, the distinction between "old" and "new" terrorism, how terrorism ends, and why the United States is the target of terrorism. She serves on the Executive Board of Women in International Security and chairs the American Political Science Association (APSA) Task Force on Political Violence and Terrorism. She has served on the Council of the APSA and is a former President and Councilor of the International Society of Political Psychology (ISPP). In 2004 ISPP awarded her its Nevitt Sanford Award for Distinguished Scientific Contribution and in 2005 the Jeanne Knutson award for service to the society. She serves on the editorial boards of the journals International Security, Orbis, Political Psychology, Security Studies, and Terrorism and Political Violence. She coordinated the working group on political explanations of terrorism for the 2005 Club de Madrid International Summit on Democracy, Terrorism and Security. She is a lead investigator with the National Center for the Study of Terrorism and the Response to Terrorism (NC-START) at the University of Maryland, funded by the Department of Homeland Security. She was a Guggenheim Fellow in 2005-2006. She serves on the Committee on Law and Justice and the Committee on Determining Basic Research Needs to Interrupt the Improvised Explosive Device Delivery Chain of the National Research Council of the National Academies of Science. She was a senior fellow at the National Memorial Institute for the Prevention of Terrorism in Oklahoma City for 2006-2007.

David Laitin (discussant) is the James T. Watkins IV and Elise V. Watkins Professor of Political Science and a CISAC faculty member. He has conducted field research in Somalia, Nigeria, Spain, and Estonia. His latest book is Identity in Formation: The Russian-Speaking Populations in the Near Abroad. He is currently working on a project in collaboration with James Fearon on civil wars in the past half-century. From that project, "Ethnicity, Insurgency, and Civil War" has appeared in the American Political Science Review. Laitin received his BA from Swarthmore College and his PhD from the University of California, Berkeley.

James R. Gosler joined Sandia National Laboratories in 1979. Early contributions included establishing a performance modeling/simulation program in the Data Processing Operating Systems Design area and developing attack methodologies for both cryptographic and nuclear weapon systems in the Adversarial Analysis Group. In 1989, Mr. Gosler was invited by the National Security Agency to serve as Sandia's first Visiting Scientist to Fort Meade, MD. Upon his return to Sandia, he was named Manager of the Software Adversarial Analysis Department. In 1993, he established and directed the Vulnerability Assessments Program (VAP) and was named as an Assistant Director of the Systems Assessment and Research Center.

In April 1996, Mr. Gosler entered the Senior Intelligence Service (SES-5) at CIA as the first Director of the Clandestine Information Technology Office (CITO). In May 2001, Mr. Gosler returned to Sandia as a Senior Scientist supporting National Information Operations, Information Assurance, Critical Infrastructure, and Terrorism initiatives. He continues to provide service to Intelligence Community leaders as a strategist and subject matter expert through participation on numerous boards and panels. In September 2003, he was appointed as Sandia National Laboratories' sixth Fellow. His area of focus is Information Operations Studies. Mr. Gosler earned a BS degree in Physics and Mathematics and a MS degree in Mathematics.

Brent Durbin (speaker) is a PhD candidate at the University of California, Berkeley, and a predoctoral fellow at CISAC. He is also a 2007-2008 dissertation fellow at the Institute for Global Conflict and Cooperation. In his dissertation, Durbin explains the political and policy dynamics of U.S. intelligence adaptation. His broader research interests fall at the intersection of organization theory, decision-making, and national security policy. Durbin has served as a visiting fellow at the University of Cambridge (UK) and The George Washington University, and as a senior staff member for U.S. Senator Patty Murray. He holds degrees from Oberlin College, Harvard University, and the University of California, Berkeley.

Paul Stockton (discussant) is a senior research scholar at CISAC. He was formerly the associate provost at the Naval Postgraduate School in Monterey, California, and was the former director of its Center for Homeland Defense and Security. His teaching and research focuses on how U.S. security institutions respond to changes in the threat (including the rise of terrorism), and the interaction of Congress and the Executive branch in restructuring national security budgets, policies and institutional arrangements. Stockton joined the faculty of the Naval Postgraduate School (NPS) in August 1990. From 1995 until 2000, he served as director of NPS's Center for Civil-Military Relations. From 2000-2001, he founded and served as the acting dean of NPS's School of International Graduate Studies. He was appointed associate provost in 2001.