Researching National Security Intelligence : Multidisciplinary Approaches

Researchers in the rapidly growing field of intelligence studies face unique and difficult challenges ranging from finding and accessing data on secret activities, to sorting through the politics of intelligence successes and failures, to making sense of complex socio-organizational or psychological phenomena. The contributing authors to Researching National Security Intelligence survey the state of the field and demonstrate how incorporating multiple disciplines helps to generate high-quality, policy-relevant research. Following this approach, the volume provides a conceptual, empirical, and methodological toolkit for scholars and students informed by many disciplines: history, political science, public administration, psychology, communications, and journalism. This collection of essays written by an international group of scholars and practitioners propels intelligence studies forward by demonstrating its growing depth, by suggesting new pathways to the creation of knowledge, and by identifying how scholarship can enhance practice and accountability.

Stephen Coulthart is an assistant professor of security studies in the National Security Studies Institute at the University of Texas at El Paso.

Michael Landon-Murray is an assistant professor in the School of Public Affairs (SPA) at the University of Colorado, Colorado Springs.

Damien Van Puyvelde is a lecturer in intelligence and international security at University of Glasgow.