Stanford University

Networks and Nukes: A Multiplex Model of Nuclear Proliferation

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Abstract: While impressive strides have been made in detecting physical evidence of nuclear weapons production, there is no consensus on how international relationships combine to motivate or deter policymakers from seeking nuclear weapons. Rather than address a single variable, this study investigates how networks of interstate conflict, alliances, trade, and nuclear cooperation merge to increase or decrease the proliferation likelihood of individual states. Using multiplex networks to study the structure of international relations factors theorized to deter or incentivize nuclear proliferation and open-source data on military alliances, macroeconomic ties, armed conflicts, and nuclear cooperation agreements, we construct a multilayer network model in which states are nodes linked by proliferation-relevant variables. This work shows the first quantitative heterogenous analysis of external proliferation determinants using a network science formalism and opens a new avenue of study of the external proliferation motivators for each state within an international network. Preliminary findings suggest that specific external relations—particularly the existence of armed conflict and the signing of Nuclear Cooperation Agreements—largely explain the decision of states to proliferate or not.

About the Speaker: Bethany L. Goldblum is a member of the research faculty in the Department of Nuclear Engineering at the University of California, Berkeley. She is the Scientific Director of the Nuclear Science and Security Consortium, a multi-institution initiative established by DOE’s NNSA to support the nation’s nonproliferation mission through cutting-edge research in nuclear security science in collaboration with the national laboratories. Goldblum founded and directs the Nuclear Policy Working Group, an interdisciplinary team of undergraduate and graduate students focused on developing policy solutions to strengthen global nuclear security. She has been involved with the Public Policy and Nuclear Threats Boot Camp nearly since its inception, and acted as director of the program since 2013. Goldblum received a Ph.D. in Nuclear Engineering from the University of California, Berkeley in 2007.

 

 

Encina Hall, 2nd floor

Bethany L. Goldblum Department of Nuclear Engineering, UC Berkeley
Seminars

Can changes in climate cause conflict?

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Abstract: A growing body of empirical evidence indicates that changes in climate are associated with increases in human violence.  I review new and recent evidence on this topic, using data ranging from baseball games in the US to civil war in Africa.  Across disparate settings, warmer-than-average temperatures are shown to cause increases in violence, with effect sizes that are both consistent and large.  Economic theories of conflict appear to explain some of the linkage between climate and conflict, but are not consistent with the data in all settings. Constructive engagement with the political science and security communities will be very helpful in understanding and interpreting these findings.

About the Speaker: Marshall Burke is assistant professor in the Department of Earth System Science, and Center Fellow at the Center on Food Security and the Environment at Stanford University. His research focuses on social and economic impacts of environmental change, and on the economics of rural development in Africa. His work has appeared in both economics and scientific journals, including recent publications in Nature, Science, the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, and the Review of Economics and Statistics. He holds a PhD in Agricultural and Resource Economics from UC Berkeley, and a BA in International Relations from Stanford.

Marshall Burke Assistant Professor, Dept. of Earth System Science Stanford University
Seminars

Inside the CIA: A Conversation with Michael Morell

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This event is at maximum capacity. We thank you for your interest and regret that we cannot accept more registrations.

- This event is part of the Robert G. Wesson Lectures Series -

About the Event: Michael Morell, Former Deputy Director and twice Acting Director of the Central Intelligence Agency, will be interviewed by Amy Zegart, CISAC Co-director and Davies Family Senior Fellow at the Hoover Institution. Audience members will have an opportunity to ask questions after the interview. 

About the Speaker: Michael Morell, the former Acting Director and Deputy Director of the Central Intelligence Agency, is the Wesson Lecturer at the Freeman-Spogli Institute for International Studies and the Center for International Security and Cooperation for 2017. He is one of our nation’s leading national security professionals, with extensive experience in intelligence and foreign policy.  He has been at the center of our nation’s fight against terrorism, its work to prevent the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction, and its efforts to respond to trends that are altering the international landscape—including the Arab Spring, the rise of China, and the cyber threat.  Politico has called Michael the “Bob Gates of his generation.”

During his 33-year career at CIA, Michael served as Deputy Director for over three years, a job in which he managed the Agency’s day-to-day operations, represented the Agency at the White House and Congress, and maintained the Agency’s relationships with intelligence services and foreign leaders around the world.  Michael also served twice as Acting Director, leading CIA when Leon Panetta was named Secretary of Defense and again after David Petraeus left government.

Michael’s senior assignments at CIA also included serving for two years as the Director of Intelligence, the Agency’s top analyst, and for two years as Executive Director, the CIA’s top administrator—managing human resources, the budget, security, and information technology for an agency the size of a Fortune 200 firm.

Michael has been a witness to history on multiple occasions.  He is the only person who was both with President Bush on September 11th, when al-Qaida burst into the American consciousness, and with President Obama on May 1st, when Bin Laden was brought to justice.  Michael played a major role in the Bin Laden operation.

Michael is known inside CIA for his leadership.  He inspired individuals and work units to perform beyond expectations.  He mentored most of the Agency’s current senior leadership team, including a significant number of women and minorities.  When he departed CIA, thousands of officers wrote Michael notes of thanks.

Michael is the recipient of many awards.  He received the Presidential Rank Award for exceptional performance – the nation’s highest honor for civilian service.  He also received the Distinguished Intelligence Medal, CIA’s highest award, for his role in the Bin Laden operation.  Michael is also the recipient of the Distinguished Career Intelligence Medal, the National Intelligence Distinguished Service Medal, and the Department of Defense Service Medal.    

Today, Michael is involved in a wide range of activities.  He is a member of the Board of Directors of the Goodyear Tire and Rubber Company; Senior Counselor to Washington’s fastest growing consulting firm, Beacon Global Strategies; and a consultant to a number of private sector entities.  He is the Chairman of the Board of one of those entities – Culpeper National Security Solutions, a subsidiary of DynCorp International.

Much of what Michael does today is tied to national security.  Until recently, he was a senior national security contributor for CBS News.  He is a frequent guest on the Charlie Rose Show discussing national security issues.  He is a Senior Fellow at Harvard University’s Kennedy School of Government; a Senior Fellow at West Point’s Center on Combatting Terrorism; a resident fellow this fall at the Institute of Politics at the University of Chicago, a member of the Aspen Institute’s Homeland Security Group, which advises the Secretary of Homeland Security on national security issues; a member of the Board of Director’s of the Atlantic Council, a member of the Advisory Board to the University of Chicago’s Project on Security and Terrorism, and a member of the Atlantic Council’s advisory group to its study on the future of the Middle East.  He served as a Member of President Obama’s Review Group on Intelligence and Communications Technology.

Michael is the author of the New York Times bestseller on CIA’s nearly 20-year fight against al Qa`ida.  The title of the book is “The Great War of Our Time:  An Insider’s Account of the CIA’s Fight Against Terrorism – From al Qaida to ISIS.”  It was published in May 2015.

Michael is a native of Cuyahoga Falls, Ohio, and he maintains close ties to northeast Ohio.  His father and mother—who taught him hard work, the pursuit of excellence, and humility—were an autoworker and a homemaker.  Michael is a first-generation college student, earning a B.A. summa cum laude in economics from the University of Akron.  He also earned an M.A. in economics from Georgetown University.  

Michael is involved with charities associated with supporting the families of fallen soldiers and intelligence officers.

 

Inside the CIA: A Conversation with Michael Morell
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Encina Hall, 2nd floor

Michael Morell Former director Central Intelligence Agency
Seminars
Directors' Seminar Series

Vector-borne disease in a changing world: Insights from ecology across scales

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Abstract: Globally, infectious diseases are emerging at an increasing rate. Vector-borne diseases in particular present one of the biggest threats to public health globally. Many of these diseases are zoonotic, meaning they cycle in animal populations but can spillover to infect humans. As a result, risk to humans of acquiring a zoonotic or vector-borne disease largely depends on the distribution and abundance of the reservoir hosts—the species of animals that pathogens naturally infect—as well as of the vector species. The ecology of many reservoir hosts and vectors is rapidly changing due to global change, which will fundamentally alter human disease risk in as yet unforeseen ways. In this talk, I will present and discuss three lines of research aimed at identifying drivers of disease emergence and risk at multiple spatial scales including 1) the ecological and environmental drivers of Lyme disease in California, 2) the roles of human behavior and land use in driving human Lyme disease in the northeastern US, and 3) effects of deforestation, land use policy and socio-ecological feedbacks in driving malaria in the Brazilian Amazon.

About the Speaker: Andrew MacDonald is a disease ecologist and a National Science Foundation Postdoctoral Fellow in Biology at Stanford University. He received his PhD from the Department of Ecology, Evolution and Marine Biology at the University of California, Santa Barbara in September 2016. His dissertation focused on the effect of land use and environmental change on tick-borne disease risk in California and the northeastern US. His current work focuses on coupled natural-human system feedbacks and land use change as drivers of mosquito-borne disease, with a focus on malaria in the Amazon basin.

Encina Hall, 2nd floor

CISAC
Seminars

Provably beneficial AI

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Abstract: Should we be concerned about long-term risks from superintelligent AI?

If so, what can we do about it?  While some in the mainstream AI community dismiss these concerns, I will argue instead that a fundamental reorientation of the field is required. Instead of building systems that optimize arbitrary objectives, we need to learn how to build systems that will, in fact, be beneficial for us.  I will show that it is useful to imbue systems with explicit uncertainty concerning the true objectives of the humans they are designed to help.

About the Speaker: Stuart Russell received his B.A. with first-class honors in physics from Oxford University in 1982 and his Ph.D. in computer science from Stanford in 1986. He then joined the faculty of the University of California at Berkeley, where he is Professor (and formerly Chair) of Electrical Engineering and Computer Sciences and holder of the Smith-Zadeh Chair in Engineering. He is also an Adjunct Professor of Neurological Surgery at UC San Francisco and Vice-Chair of the World Economic Forum's Council on AI and Robotics. He is a recipient of the Presidential Young Investigator Award of the National Science Foundation, the IJCAI Computers and Thought Award, the World Technology Award (Policy category), the Mitchell Prize of the American Statistical Association and the International Society for Bayesian Analysis, and Outstanding Educator Awards from both ACM and AAAI. In 1998, he gave the Forsythe Memorial Lectures at Stanford University and from 2012 to 2014 he held the Chaire Blaise Pascal in Paris. He is a Fellow of the American Association for Artificial Intelligence, the Association for Computing Machinery, and the American Association for the Advancement of Science. His research covers a wide range of topics in artificial intelligence including machine learning, probabilistic reasoning, knowledge representation, planning, real-time decision making, multitarget tracking, computer vision, computational physiology, global seismic monitoring, and philosophical foundations. His books include The Use of Knowledge in Analogy and Induction, Do the Right Thing: Studies in Limited Rationality (with Eric Wefald), and Artificial Intelligence: A Modern Approach (with Peter Norvig).

Encina Hall, 2nd floor "Central"

Stuart Russell Professor of Computer Science University of California, Berkeley
Seminars

U.S. Strategic Command Perspectives on Deterrence and Assurance

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- Registration for this event is mandatory -

About the Speaker: Gen. John E. Hyten is Commander of U.S. Strategic Command (USSTRATCOM), one of nine Unified Commands under the Department of Defense. USSTRATCOM is responsible for the global command and control of U.S. strategic forces to meet decisive national security objectives, providing a broad range of strategic capabilities and options for the President and Secretary of Defense.

General Hyten attended Harvard University on an Air Force Reserve Officer's Training Corps scholarship, graduated in 1981 with a bachelor’s degree in engineering and applied sciences and was commissioned a second lieutenant. General Hyten’s career includes assignments in a variety of space acquisition and operations positions. He served in senior engineering positions on both Air Force and Army anti-satellite weapon system programs.  He commanded Air Force Space Command from Aug 2014-Oct 2016.

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Encina Hall, 2nd floor

GEN John Hyten Commander, USSTRATCOM
Seminars
Directors' Seminar Series

Aspirational Power: Brazil and the International Order

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Abstract: What do emerging powers want from the international order? Are their intentions generally benign or potentially harmful to global order? What capabilities do emerging powers use to influence the international order and how? This book, Aspirational Power, examines these questions through the lens of Brazil’s historical and contemporary experience as an emerging power. Brazil has long aspired to grandeza (greatness) and to emerge to take its place among the major powers that influence and shape the international order. By history and by design, Brazil emphasizes soft power in its pursuit of a more democratic international order based on sovereign equality among nations. This book examines the domestic sources of Brazil’s international influence and how it attempts to use its particular set of capabilities to influence global order. It demonstrates how the weakness of Brazil’s domestic institutions and periodic internal crises repeatedly undermine its pursuit of major power status. The book concludes by examining how Brazil might take better advantage of existing opportunities in the international order to enhance its influence and how deepening ties to democratic emerging powers such as India and South Africa might better advance its global interests.

About the Speaker: Harold Trinkunas joins the Center as the successor to Lynn Eden in the concomitant role of Senior Research Scholar and Associate Director for Research. Harold comes to CISAC from the Brookings Institution, where he was the Charles W. Robinson Chair and Senior Fellow as well as Director of the Latin America Initiative. Previously, he served as Chair of the National Security Affairs Department at the Naval Postgraduate School, where he was also an Associate Professor. One of the nation's leading Latin America specialists, Harold's work has examined civil-military relations, ungoverned spaces, terrorist financing, emerging power dynamics, and global governance. His newest book, Aspirational Power: Brazil's Long Road to Global Influence, co-authored with David Mares of UCSD, was published this summer by Brookings Institution Press.

Harold brings to the Associate Director for Research role extensive experience in academic administration, program development, mentoring, teaching, and policy analysis. His leadership will continue to advance the Center's mission of training the next generation of international security specialists; developing original policy-relevant scholarship; and extending our outreach to global policymakers to improve the peace and security of our world.

Born and raised in Venezuela, Harold earned his doctorate in political science from Stanford University in 1999 and has been a predoctoral fellow and later a visiting professor at CISAC. 

Encina Hall, 2nd floor

Harold Trinkunas

CISAC
Stanford University
Encina Hall, E205
Stanford, CA 94305-6165

(650) 725-8035
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Senior Research Scholar
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Harold Trinkunas is the Deputy Director and a Senior Research Scholar at the Center for International Security and Cooperation at the Freeman Spogli Institute for International Studies at Stanford University. Prior to arriving at Stanford, Dr. Trinkunas served as the Charles W. Robinson Chair and senior fellow and director of the Latin America Initiative in the Foreign Policy program at the Brookings Institution. His research focuses on issues related to foreign policy, governance, and security, particularly in Latin America. Trinkunas has written on emerging powers and the international order, ungoverned spaces, terrorism financing, borders, and information operations. 

Trinkunas has co-authored Militants, Criminals and Warlords: The Challenge of Local Governance in an Age of Disorder (Brookings Institution Press, 2017), Aspirational Power: Brazil’s Long Road to Global Influence (Brookings Institution Press, 2016) and authored Crafting Civilian Control of the Military in Venezuela (University of North Carolina Press, 2005). He co-edited and contributed to Oxford Handbook of Peaceful Change in International Relations (Oxford University Press, 2021), Three Tweets to Midnight: The Effect of the Global Information Ecosystem on the Risk of Nuclear Conflict  (Hoover Institution Press, 2020), American Crossings: Border Politics in the Western Hemisphere (Johns Hopkins University Press, 2015), Ungoverned Spaces: Alternatives to State Authority in an Era of Softened Sovereignty (Stanford University Press, 2010), Global Politics of Defense Reform (Palgrave MacMillan, 2008), and Terrorism Financing and State Responses (Stanford University Press, 2007).

Dr. Trinkunas also previously served as an associate professor and chair of the Department of National Security Affairs at the Naval Postgraduate School in Monterey, California. He received his doctorate in political science from Stanford University in 1999. He was born in Maracaibo, Venezuela. 

 

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Seminars

Building resilient infrastructure? The most critical component is the people

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Abstract: From programing firmware for IoT devices to misoperations in the field and control room, humans have the potential to offer creative, collaborative, and highly efficient solutions to some of society’s greatest challenges. However, human errors can lead to software vulnerabilities, blackouts, and loss of public trust. As we strive to make infrastructures more robust and lives safer, paradoxically, we often put humans at increased risk of distraction and error. Growing system and market speeds, interconnectivities between critical infrastructures, fear of compliance violations, and public scrutiny create challenges for operators, increase risks and costs, and prevent the system from deriving the greatest benefit from its people. Organizations are complex sociotechnical systems with complex political hierarchies; techniques such as root cause analysis demonstrate how intertwined our people and organizations are with technical system outcomes. Michael Legatt will highlight his work as a human factors engineer, from an emergency operations center during the 2003 blackout, to ten years at ERCOT (the grid operator for most of Texas), to founder of a company focused on improving human-computer and human-organizational interfaces for critical infrastructure management.
 
About the Speaker: Michael Legatt is the CEO and Founder of ResilientGrid. He has been a programmer for over 20 years in the energy, financial, medical, neuroscience research, and educational sectors. He has a Ph.D. in Clinical Health Psychology/Neuropsychology, a Ph.D. in Energy Systems Engineering, and is a Certified Performance Technologist.
 
As an amateur radio operator, he received a commendation for helping to provide emergency communications during the 2003 blackout in the northeastern United States, which sparked his interest in the psychology of critical infrastructure management.
 
Prior to founding ResilientGrid, Michael spent a decade as Electric Reliability Council of Texas’ Principal Human Factors Engineer. There, his development of the Macomber Map® was featured in several news outlets, and was credited as being instrumental in helping ERCOT operators maintain grid reliability through severe weather and record-setting wind generation. He also works on the behavioral aspects of consumer electric use, electric vehicle to grid integration, behavioral aspects of conservation and consumer awareness in grid management, and the cybersecurity, behavioral, and reliability issues that arise with integrating new technologies across layers of the grid.

Encina Hall, 2nd floor

Michael Legatt CEO and Founder ResilientGrid
Seminars

Resolve in International Politics

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Abstract: Why do some actors in international politics display remarkable persistence in wartime, while others “cut and run” at the first sign of trouble? IR scholars tend to explain this variation by positing that some leaders and publics are more resolved — or less sensitive to the costs of war — than others, and thus more willing to continue to fight. Yet although resolve is one of the most commonly used independent variables in IR, we have relatively little conceptual sense of what it is, or where it comes from. I offer a behavioral theory of resolve, suggesting that variation in time preferences, risk preferences, honor orientation, and trait self-control can help explain why some actors display more resolve than others. In this portion of the project, I test the theory experimentally in the context of public opinion about military interventions. The results not only help explain why certain types of costs of war loom larger for certain types of actors, but also shed light onto some of the contributions of the "behavioral revolution" in the international relations more broadly.
 
About the Speaker: Joshua D. Kertzer is an Assistant Professor of Government at Harvard University, and a Visiting Associate Research Scholar at the Niehaus Center for Globalization and Global Governance at Princeton University. His research explores the intersection of international security, foreign policy, political psychology, and experimental methods.  He is the author of Resolve in International Politics (Princeton University Press, 2016) along articles appearing in a variety of outlets, including the American Journal of Political Science, Journal of Politics, International Organization, International Studies Quarterly, and World Politics. He is the recipient of the American Political Science Association’s Helen Dwight Reid and Kenneth N. Waltz awards, as well as recognitions from the Peace Science Society, International Society of Political Psychology, and Council of Graduate Schools.

 

Encina Hall, 2nd floor

Joshua D. Kertzer Assistant Professor of Government Harvard University
Seminars

On the Identification and Analysis of Previously Unknown Linkages in Critical Infrastructure Systems

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Abstract: Critical infrastructure systems including manufacturing facilities, ports, transportation systems, communications networks, and energy and water distribution systems often consist of many interacting components linked in complex ways. This can lead to unforeseen interactions among components that may not be expected or intended by the designers and operators of the system. These interactions constitute linkages within a system of which designers are generally unaware, and that therefore constitute a security vulnerability. In this talk, I will present and discuss a formal approach for identifying and analyzing the existence and severity of security vulnerabilities resulting from these previously unknown linkages (so-called implicit interactions) in critical infrastructure systems. The presence of these implicit interactions in a system can indicate unforeseen flaws that, if not mitigated, could be exploited by an attacker. This can have severe consequences in terms of the safety, security, and reliability of the system. Therefore, this notion of implicit interactions must be carefully managed in order to have systems that operate as intended, and that are resistant to cyber-attacks and failures. 

 
About the Speaker: Jason Jaskolka is a U.S. Department of Homeland Security Cybersecurity Postdoctoral Scholar at Stanford University within the Center for International Security and Cooperation (CISAC). He received his Ph.D. in Software Engineering in 2015 from McMaster University in Hamilton, Ontario, Canada. His research aims to address increasingly critical issues in designing and implementing safe, secure, and reliable systems. His current work involves the design and development of critical infrastructure cybersecurity assessment methodologies and associated modeling and simulation environments. His research interests include cybersecurity assurance, covert channel analysis, distributed multi-agent systems, and algebraic approaches to software engineering.

Encina Hall, 2nd floor

U.S. Department of Homeland Security Cybersecurity Postdoctoral Scholar CISAC
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