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EXTENDING THE CONVERSATION

One of the most pleasant aspects of blogging for me is receiving high quality feedback from readers or other bloggers. Oddly, it’s impossible to predict which post is going to produce a high volume of comments or links so it is even nicer when a post that I feel is important strikes some readers in the same way. Even moreso as the feedback came from across the political spectrum

I’d like to highlight the responses to the recent “Applied History” post:

From Art Hutchinson at Mapping Strategy:

Art is a premier strategic thinking consultant with Cartegic Group who specializes in scenario planning. He doesn’t post all that frequently, so I was very pleased to find that he had delved deeply into the topic of “Cognitive Maps of Future History“:

“What’s needed to turn the seeming surprise of today’s urgent corporate decision into an historically rooted, deeply contextualized choice?

As the saying goes: “there’s nothing new under the sun”.

From Nonpartisan, the guiding spirit of the up and coming, left of center, group blog ProgressiveHistorians in the “Friday Open Thread ” Nonpartisan welcomed Stewart Brand’s historical call to arms:

“At ProgressiveHistorians, we’ve been advocating this sort of direct policy action on the part of historians since our founding, but it’s nice to see the liberal icon who founded the Whole Earth Network taking up our cause. If there’s one thing that unites everyone at this site, I think, it’s their agreement with some portion of Brand’s thesis. It’s encouraging how many of us see the meaning in this logical extension of our profession.”

In the comments section of ” Applied History” I am indebted to Shane Deichman, Managing Director of The Institute for Technologies in Global Resilience and Federal Historian Dr. Maarja Krusten, formerly of The National Archives, for their thoughtful observations, such as:

Deichman:

“Policymaking, on the other hand, is not about asserting truths — it is about influencing action. Therefore it is an inherently social and, dare I say, “complex” phenomenon that defies linear, reductionist logic. So it is perfectly understandable (even acceptable) for the policymaker to “cherry pick” conclusions that support their objectives (e.g., yellow cake from Nigeria; hostile naval action in the Gulf of Tonkin; the fictitious “Tenth Army” in WW II). This is why I believe so few historians are apt to get involved with policymaking.”

Krusten:

“Many thanks for posting this interesting essay on a subject that deserves more attention than it usually receives among academic historians.

Since your posting centers on applied history and policy, you might find interesting this article by Victoria Harden, “What Do Federal Historians Do?”

( Note to aspiring history PhD’s – make friends with a professional archivist or academic librarian *before* you begin your dissertation. The cites they can pull off the top of their heads on the most obscure topics imaginable are stunning. They are to historians what historians are to the general public)

Thanks again for the excellent feedback!

MIL THEORY GOES MAINSTREAM

It’s rather nice to see the esoteric theory topics I kick around here in conjunction with sites like The Small Wars Council, DNI, Tom Barnett and John Robb’s blogs and the circle of related bloggers, are penetrating the mainstream press. Some recent examples:

William Lind in UPI

Max Boot citing the Small Wars Journal

“War without limits” by Christopher Shea in the Boston Globe (hat tip to Dr.Ralph Luker)

Thomas Barnett’s frequent appearances in columns by David Ignatius going back several years

This is a good thing. While there is a healthy tendency in our online alternative defense thinking community to disagree, at times caustically, there is a shared consensus that the current structure, strategy and appropriations process for America’s armed forces are ill-suited to the challenges facing the United States.

Change is required and change will only come when the ideas that we have been batting around on blogs, discussion boards and ( in a few instances ) books, penetrates the mass media and gets into the minds of the political class and the voting public. Maximizing attention on the ideas, rather than being distracted by infighting or loose cannon comments, is the route we need to go.

APPLIED HISTORY

Last week, HNN ran a somewhat critical piece by John Elrick on Colonel H.R. McMaster and Frederick Kagan entitled “The Two Historians Who Are Playing a Key Role in “The Surge“. The primary hook for HNN’s readers was the aspect of two historians (albeit one a serving military officer) playing an influential role in developing administration policy:

“Like Kagan, H.R. McMaster holds a PhD in military history, earning his from the University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill. Col. McMaster was commander of the 3rd Armored Cavalry Regiment in northwestern Iraq from 2005-2006 and is currently an advisor to the head of US forces, General David Petraeus. McMaster belongs to a group of “warrior intellectuals” who, according to Thomas Ricks of the Washington Post, “make up one of the most selective clubs in the world: military officers with doctorates from top-flight universities and combat experience in Iraq.”

Both Kagan and McMaster have taught history at West Point. The former was a Professor at the US Military Academy from 1995 to 2005, while the latter taught there from 1994 to 1996.”

Traditionally, relatively few historians have been deeply engaged in shaping current policy or political affairs. Bernard Lewis, the eminent Mideast scholar, is frequently cited as having been a deep influence on the Bush administration policy makers who favored the invasion of Iraq. Sean Wilentz was a vigorous defender of President Clinton during impeachment hearings and leading historians like Richard Pipes have sometimes quietly served tours of duty on the staff of the National Security Council. Few have ever gone so far as did the recently deceased Arthur Schlesinger, jr. and become members of a President’s White House inner circle. Most historians though, keep their distance from current policy.

The acclaimed scientist, environmentalist and futurist Stewart Brand, whose ideas presaged the internet-based information revolution has called on historians to practice “Applied History“

“All historians understand that they must never, ever talk about the future. Their discipline requires that they deal in facts, and the future doesn’t have any yet. A solid theory of history might be able to embrace the future, but all such theories have been discredited. Thus historians do not offer, and are seldom invited, to take part in shaping public policy. They leave that to economists.

Done wrong, Applied History could paralyze public decision making and corrupt the practice of history — that’s the danger. But done right, Applied History could make decision making and policy far more sophisticated and adaptive, and it could invest the study of history with the level of consequence it deserves.”

Brand has a solid point. Historians have a useful skill-set to offer policy makers. As a discipline, history requires the cultivation of a very large cognitive map that serves both as a knowledge base as well as a starting point for recognizing patterns and analogies. Historians spend much time assessing the validity and reliability of data and discerning cause and effect. Like scientists ( perhaps the only time when historians are like scientists), historians attempt to isolate causation from mere correlation. When policy makers have to deal with uncertainty, historians can reduce that uncertainty at the margins by providing the context in which to make logical extrapolations or to apply the specfic skills of psychologists, economists, game theorists or other specialized analysts.

Historians, of course, are just as liable to bias as anyone else, so no pretensions to omniscience should be aired. However, all things being equal, historians at least can provide a better-informed bias than if their contribution were absent from the policy process.

BLOGOSPHERIC MATRIMONY

First Curzon and now tdaxp takes the plunge !

Hearty Congratulations to both of the happy couples !

EN FUEGO

The shadowy bloggers of Kent’s Imperative have been busy of late.

“The money quotes, in our opinion, for understanding the future of the disconnect between talent and management: “Heh,” I joked. “I bet the first time my boss finds out where I am is when he sees my photo on the front page of his own website.” and But the best punch line was that … he didn’t find out when it was on the front-page of his website – he found out when I posted that fact to my blog! “

Hey Tom ! Isn’t that what happened to you at NWC ???

UPDATE:

Yes, it did!

“How did Watman know I was conducting my secret negotiations?
My dean followed it obsessively on my blog after numerous professors told him they were fans of it and he became concerned I was growing beyond his control.
When I was confronted by charges of this conspiracy, I replied, “Yes, we were all in it together, me and my tens of thousands of readers.” Clearly, I would have made a terrible spy.”

Hat tip to the master of webmasters, Sean.