Fall
1999
Crossing linguistic and cultural boundries
Super-power sense and sensibility
Honors
& awards
New faculty chairs
Promotions to tenure
Soundings is a publication of the School of Humanities and Social Science at MIT
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Super-power sense and sensibility
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An International Force tank at a Bosnian/Serbian checkpoint in Sarajevo, 1996. |
Fresh thinking on global security
Ten years after the end of the Cold War, at a time when no serious challenge confronts our country, what direction should U.S. foreign policy take? Should we be spreading democracy, free market economy and ethnic independence"—and if so, how"—or is less involvement more enlightened? Which direction should the U.S. military take regarding technology? And how much of the budget should be funneled towards the military of the future?
The thinking surrounding these and a host of other international security issues takes fresh, often maverick turns at the MIT Security Studies Program (SSP). "The program is not wrapped around a single ideology, but features diverse orientations," says Harvey Sapolsky, SSP director and a professor in the MIT Political Science Department, adding that the faculty find themselves united on only one issue. "We all have an aversion to NATO expansion; we see no reason for Americans to be Europe's border guards. Aside from that, we're all over the lot regarding policy."
One of the largest programs of its kind, the SSP, located at the Center for International Studies, prides itself on its interdisciplinary approach, which combines technology, policy, and social and political science in equal measure. Home to 15 faculty and 35 graduate students, most of whom are PhD candidates, the Program also hosts military fellows and a variety of visiting scholars, this past year from Russia, China, Israel, India and Kazakhstan. SSP's offerings include a weekly forum on security topics for academics, government and military communities and a special seminar series covering such subjects as the future of war, defense and the environment, and nuclear weaponry. The Program's main research areas are military innovation, national strategy, defense technology and politics, national security budget policy, and Asian security.
Consider Asia. According to some analysts, the area poses the world's greatest potential conflict, as large and powerful countries grow in size and strength and as their interests begin to clash. China, for example, is expressing expansionist inclinations on its borders touching Russia and in the Spratly Islands in the South China Sea. India, experiencing mammoth and unfettered population growth, routinely trades threats of nuclear weapons tests, as well as artillery fire, with Pakistan. North Korea is fast developing ballistic missiles and nuclear weapons, leaving its non-nuclear neighbor, Japan, feeling potentially vulnerable. In an area where frictions are episodic and self-interests shifting"—and in which no systematic global framework for dealing with such issues exists"—the thrust of U.S. policy is ripe for critical perspectives and prescriptions.
Military innovation, too, is a major focus at SSP. Among the questions being investigated are how large organizations innovate; which military technologies should be promoted to prepare for a future that can't be envisioned; how new kinds of missions"—humanitarian interventions, for example"—should be designed to cause the least amount of mayhem, and how to protect our country's vast and diverse communication systems from possible enemy attack.
Also busy is the Program's defense budget group. This year, the group is hosting a major budget/strategy review to guide defense policy planning for the next presidential administration. The group, consisting of Program faculty and outside experts, will be suggesting military options to maintain defense spending in check. In keeping with the SSP's overall thrust, the aim is to help educate officials, officers, scholars and informed citizens overseeing the security policies of the next century.
Copyright © 2000 Massachusetts
Institute of Technology