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On 22–23 November 2016, the Department of Politics and International Studies (PAIS) at the University of Warwick hosted a lively conference on research 'impact', a key component of the Research Excellence Framework (REF)—the periodic peer review in UK Higher Education to evaluate the quality of academic work, in turn determining how nearly £2 billion of annual research funding is allocated among competing institutions. In contrast to many other conferences and workshops about impact, a feature of REF that has generated much fevered commentary across the university sector about the public value of academic research, our event was tightly focused on impact as it relates to the discipline of Politics and International Studies. Featuring presentations from a range of academic and non-academic constituencies—including journalists, government officials, and representatives from the Higher Education Funding Council for England (HEFCE),1 the creator and (at the time of writing) controller of the REF—conversation was particularly timely, owing to the publication, a few months earlier, of the eagerly awaited Stern Review on the future of university research assessment. This special issue contains selected papers from the conference, with the goal of shedding light on how the discipline as a whole, but also its varied composite parts, is responding to the impact agenda in the lead up to REF2021, now looming close on the horizon. We are grateful to the contributors for their participation and for opening up many new facets to the ongoing dialogue about impact.

Classified is a fascinating account of the British state's long obsession with secrecy and the ways it sought to prevent information about its secret activities from entering the public domain. Drawing on recently declassified documents, unpublished correspondence and exclusive interviews with key officials and journalists, Christopher Moran pays particular attention to the ways that the press and memoirs have been managed by politicians and spies. He argues that, by the 1960s, governments had become so concerned with their inability to keep secrets that they increasingly sought to offset damaging leaks with their own micro-managed publications. The book reveals new insights into seminal episodes in British post-war history, including the Suez crisis, the D-Notice Affair and the treachery of the Cambridge spies, identifying a new era of offensive information management, and putting the contemporary battle between secret-keepers, electronic media and digital whistle-blowers into long-term perspective

In recent years the subject of intelligence has well and truly come out of the shadows. The terrorist attacks of 9/11 and 7/7, the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, debates about domestic surveillance, secret detention and rendition have all brought unprecedented notoriety and exposure to the work of the intelligence services. In a media world, both the limitations and abuses of intelligence have never been more visible. Faced with the threat of militant jihadism, public expectations of intelligence have greatly increased, as have calls for more transparency about combatting this new menace. These essays draw together Britain's leading intelligence historians to present a fresh and original study of British secrecy since 1945. A combination of synoptic works and empirical case studies, drawing on recently declassified archival materials, the essays touch upon several historiographical concerns: the advantages and disadvantages of greater openness; the accuracy of media reporting on secret services; the representation of intelligence in popular culture; and the use and misuse of intelligence in the so-called 'War on Terror'. A focal point of this volume is the role of intelligence in imperial contexts, especially during the period of decolonisation. The contributors include Richard Aldrich, Christopher Andrew, Philip Davies, Anthony Glees, Rob Johnson, Philip Murphy and Calder Walton.

United States President Joe Biden has been in government since 1973. Despite the changing nature of international relations since then, his approach to intelligence has remained consistent and stable, including his enthusiasm for national intelligence and uneasiness about militarizing it. This article assesses United States President Joe Biden's approach to intelligence. It evaluates his evolving relationship with the Central Intelligence Agency and the rest of the intelligence community from the early 1970s, when he was elected to Congress, to the early 2020s, when he became the forty-sixth president of the United States. It concludes that, against the ever-changing context of international affairs, from the late Cold War to the global 'war on terror', Biden's approach to intelligence has remained consistent and stable, showing, on the one hand, enthusiasm for the production of national intelligence, and, on the other, a marked uneasiness about paramilitary covert action and the militarization of intelligence. The discussion that follows speaks to a larger debate, dating to the 1940s and still ongoing, in the executive and legislative branches of government, concerning the purposes and proper use of intelligence. This will interest policy-makers, officials and lawmakers responsible for intelligence and oversight, researchers and practitioners in security and intelligence, and scholars of American foreign relations.

Secrecy has never stopped people from writing about intelligence. From memoirs and academic texts to conspiracy-laden exposÃ♭s and spy novels, writing on intelligence abounds. Now, this new account uncovers intelligence historiography's hugely important role in shaping popular understandings and the social memory of intelligence. In this first introduction to these official and unofficial histories, a range of leading contributors narrate and interpret the development of intelligence studies as a discipline. Each chapter showcases new archival material, looking at a particular book or series of books and considering issues of production, censorship, representation and reception. Key Features. 15 chapters from contributors including: Richard Aldrich, intelligence historian Matthew Jones, novelist Nicholas Dujmovic, CIA Staff Historian Keith Jeffery, author of the first official history of MI6 Jo Wippl, Former CIA operations officer Chapman Pincher, journalist Explores topics such as CIA historiography, MI5/MI6 historiography, the literature of eavesdropping and the importance of film in constructing proto or counter-histories of intelligence Offers original insights into intelligence through an engagement with its past formulation and emerging patterns

The significance of Edward Snowden's revelations has been viewed primarily through the prism of threats to citizen privacy. Instead, we argue that the most dramatic change has been a decline of government secrecy, especially around national security. While the ethical aspects of state secrets and 'whistle-blowing' have received recent attention, few have attempted to explain the dynamics of this growing climate of exposure. Our argument is largely technological and we ground our analysis in the changing nature of intelligence work, which is increasingly merging with 'big data'. But we also identify a related cultural change: many intelligence contractors are at best agnostic about the national security state. Meanwhile, the Internet itself provides the perfect medium for the anonymous degradation of secrets. Because the main driver is technology, we suggest this trend is likely to accelerate, presenting national security chiefs with one of their biggest future challenges.

The Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) has long required its staff to sign a secrecy agreement pledging, subject to legal penalties, not to disclose classified information. The agreement includes a prepublication review, sanctioned by the U.S. Supreme Court, stipulating that employees must obtain permission before publishing anything that relates to their work or the CIA. This condition extends beyond the individual's service career into perpetuity. Administering this arrangement is an in-house body known as the Publications Review Board (PRB). The overriding purpose of the PRB is to prevent authors from inadvertently endangering national security through the public disclosure of classified information. To shed light on the genesis and evolution of the PRB, a transcribed interview with Dr. John Hollister Hedley is presented. Hedley is a 30-year veteran of U.S. intelligence and was chairman of the board of the PRB from 1996 to 1998. Adapted from the source document.

This article examines the ways in which the US intelligence community is leveraging the power of artificial intelligence (AI) for national security purposes. Drawing on declassified intelligence records, it contends that this community has been fascinated by AI for decades. This is important to acknowledge because this historical context has shaped contemporary projects and thinking within the community. It has given the United States a first-mover advantage, establishing precedents that other global actors need to comply with, negotiate or resist. The article advances three arguments. One, the community has long recognized that it needs to collaborate with the tech sector on AI. However, these relationships bring certain challenges since the sector is a curious compound of ideologies and interests. Two, while the community was initially attracted to the data processing advantages of AI to help human analysts to overcome "data smog," today it has broadened its focus to consider how AI can improve all stages of the intelligence cycle. Three, while many voices feverishly herald the transformative potential of AI in the global security environment, we argue instead that US agencies will not be able to exploit the full potential of AI, and thus talk of an intelligence revolution is premature. This is because of national and international rules on data collection and retention but also because of cultural tensions within the global AI ecosystem. The discussion will appeal to scholars and practitioners interested in the impact of emerging technologies on national security processes and decision-making and, more broadly, global security.