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Richard A. Falkenrath, Ph.D. Senior Fellow, Foreign Policy Studies, The Brookings Institution Former White House Deputy, Homeland Security Advisor Before the terrorist attacks of 9/11, there was no field called "homeland security" and hence no need for a handbook such as this. Today, homeland security is a multibillion-dollar enterprise and the motivating force behind countless reforms across dozens of heretofore separate government activities. The need for this enterprise is not tied to the fate of al-Qaida or any other particular terrorist group; instead, it derives from the structural and hence, for all intents and purposes, permanent vulnerability of free and open societies to catastrophic terrorist attacks. This vulnerability existed before 9/11 and will continue to exist indefinitely. Because all governments are charged with safeguarding their civilian population from deliberate large-scale death and destruction, homeland security has become a permanent mission for responsible governments worldwide. Homeland security is a composite of many different fields that individually have some bearing on the terrorist threat to modern societies, the vulnerability of these societies to various forms of terrorist attack, and the techniques to combat these threats and vulnerabilities. Each individual field is supported by the knowledge and experience of an established community of experts and practitioners. As yet there is no community of individuals with the interdisciplinary breadth needed to manage the field of homeland security comprehensively and effectively. The contrast between homeland security and national security (another even broader interdisciplinary field) is instructive. National security describes many different kinds of measures diplomatic, economic, military, covert, overt, legal, illegal, etc. taken by a state to ensure its survival and security. National security has been practiced by governments for centuries, and over time has emerged as a distinct field supported by a community of individuals with similar educational and practical backgrounds. Individuals from this community are able to coalesce quickly into effective work groups because they share a frame of reference, an understanding of established national security processes, and a general familiarity with each other's areas of profound expertise. This collection of national security experts represents what social scientists call an "epistemic community." Homeland security has no epistemic community to speak of, but needs one. Men and women from dozens of different disciplines regional experts, terrorism analysts, law enforcement officials, intelligence officers, privacy specialists, diplomats, military officers, immigration specialists, customs inspectors, specific industry experts, regulatory lawyers, doctors and epidemiologists, research scientists, chemists, nuclear physicists, information technologists, emergency managers, firefighters, communications specialists, and politicians, to name a few are currently involved in homeland security, but it is not enough merely to aggregate specialists. The tendency to organize around disciplines, to adopt "stovepiped" approaches to problems, and to optimize solutions for part but not all of the problem is too strong among loose collections of unadulterated specialists. Only a team of individuals with genuine crosscutting knowledge and experience will be able to understand the complexity of any particular homeland security challenge, devise an efficient and viable strategy for dealing with the problem, and implement this strategy effectively. There is an acute national and indeed international need for professionals who can think and operate across the breadth of homeland security while at the same time contributing expertise in one or more of the disciplines that comprise the field as a whole. There are only a few such individuals today, so more must be trained. Governments worldwide have already created a demand for such individuals, but the educational system in the United States has only just begun to provide the knowledge base and training capabilities needed to meet the government's demand for the genuine homeland security professional. Educational systems outside the United States are even farther behind. This volume is long, and for a reason: its length is indicative of the substantive breadth of homeland security itself. Each individual chapter deals with a different and important aspect of the field as a whole. Together, the chapters provide a first-rate overview of a new and exceedingly complex field, a perspective that is broad, deep, and cognizant of the interrelationships among the disparate disciplines that make up homeland security. In that respect, this handbook is the first of its kind and an invaluable resource. This handbook represents an important step toward creating the professional community that governments require to implement a comprehensive homeland security agenda effectively and efficiently. As such, the book makes a rare contribution not just to a professional literature but also to a noble public purpose: securing a nation from catastrophic terrorist attack while preserving the freedom and openness that make the homeland vulnerable in the first place. |
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