A wide range of actors have publicly identified cyber stability as a key policy goal but the meaning of stability in the context of cyber policy remains vague and contested: vague because most policymakers and experts do not define cyber stability when they use the concept; contested because they propose measures that rely – often implicitly – on divergent understandings of cyber stability.
This is a thorough investigation of instability within cyberspace and of cyberspace itself. Its purpose is to reconceptualise stability and instability for cyberspace, highlight their various dimensions and thereby identify relevant policy measures.
It critically examines both ‘classic’ notions associated with stability – for example, whether cyber operations can lead to unwanted escalation – as well as topics that have so far not been addressed in the existing cyber literature, such as the application of a decolonial lens to investigate Euro-American conceptualisations of stability in cyberspace.
Robert Chesney holds the James Baker Chair and also serves as the Associate Dean for Academic Affairs at the University of Texas School of Law. In addition, he is the Director of the Robert S. Strauss Center for International Security and Law, a University-wide research unit bridging across disciplines to improve understanding of international security issues. He is a member of the American Law Institute, and a senior editor for the Journal of National Security Law & Policy, and a former non-resident Senior Fellow of the Brookings Institution. He is a co-founder and contributor to www.lawfareblog.com, the leading source for analysis, commentary, and news relating to law and national security.
James Shires is a senior research fellow in cyber policy at Chatham House. He is a co-founder and trustee of the European Cyber Conflict Research Initiative (ECCRI), and is a non-resident associate fellow with The Hague Program for International Cybersecurity. He speaks regularly and has published extensively on cybersecurity and global politics, including The Politics Of Cybersecurity In The Middle East (Hurst/Oxford University Press, 2021). A full list of publications is available at https://www.jamesshires.com/research.
Max Smeets is Senior Researcher at the Center for Security Studies (CSS) at ETH Zürich. He is also an Affiliate at Stanford University Center for International Security and Cooperation and Research Associate at the Centre for Technology and Global Affairs, University of Oxford. He has also published widely on cyber statecraft, strategy and risk. Next to his scholarly publications, Max is a frequent contributor to policy outlets, including Washington Post, Lawfare, War on the Rocks, Slate, Cipher Brief, and CFR.
