Open Access. Powered by Scholars. Published by Universities.®

Social and Behavioral Sciences Commons

Open Access. Powered by Scholars. Published by Universities.®

San Jose State University

Political Science

Secrecy

Publication Year

Articles 1 - 14 of 14

Full-Text Articles in Social and Behavioral Sciences

Review, Dark Mirror: Edward Snowden And The American Surveillance State, By Barton Gellman, Patrice Mcdermott Aug 2023

Review, Dark Mirror: Edward Snowden And The American Surveillance State, By Barton Gellman, Patrice Mcdermott

Secrecy and Society

No abstract provided.


(Not) Accessing The Castle: Grappling With Secrecy In Research On Security Practices, Lilly P. Muller, Natalie Welfens Aug 2023

(Not) Accessing The Castle: Grappling With Secrecy In Research On Security Practices, Lilly P. Muller, Natalie Welfens

Secrecy and Society

This article discusses how to deal with secrecy and limited access in ethnographically inspired research of security fields. Drawing inspiration from recent debates about secrecy in Critical Security Research and from Franz Kafka’s The Castle, we propose to treat access limitations and the secrecy we encounter as methodological tools that provide insights into social relations and power structures of security fields. We develop the argument in two steps. First, we argue for a more fine-grained taxonomy of secrecy, that allows to distinguish between mystery, concealment and the relational dimension of secrecy. Second, we apply the taxonomy to our respective …


Technologies And Time Tempers: How Things Mediate A State’S (Cyber Vulnerability) Disclosure Practices, Clare Stevens Aug 2023

Technologies And Time Tempers: How Things Mediate A State’S (Cyber Vulnerability) Disclosure Practices, Clare Stevens

Secrecy and Society

State secrecy and disclosure practices are often treated as processes of intentional and strategic human agency, and as forms of political time management (Bok 1982; Horn 2011). Through a critical analysis of the United States government’s disclosure practices in the context of their discourse around the cybersecurity “Vulnerabilities Equities Process” (VEP), this paper will present a two-fold argument against these conventional treatments of secrecy and disclosure. While government secrecy and disclosure can certainly be understood as a form of (agential) timing, orientation and control (Hom 2018), this paper will also show how government secrecy practices are emergent at the point …


Introduction To The Special Issue On Secrecy And Technologies, Clare Stevens, Sam Forsythe Aug 2023

Introduction To The Special Issue On Secrecy And Technologies, Clare Stevens, Sam Forsythe

Secrecy and Society

Many scholars have treated the inscrutability of technologies, secrecy, and other unknowns as moral and ethical challenges that can be resolved through transparency and openness. This paper, and the special issue it introduces, instead wants to explore how we can understand the productive, strategic but also emancipatory potential of secrecy and ignorance in the development of security and technologies. This paper argues that rather than just being mediums or passive substrates, technologies are making a difference to how secrecy, disclosure, and transparency work. This special issue will show how technologies and time mediate secrecy and disclosure, and vice versa. This …


Secrecy In U.S. National Security: Why A Paradigm Shift Is Needed, Steven Aftergood Jan 2021

Secrecy In U.S. National Security: Why A Paradigm Shift Is Needed, Steven Aftergood

Secrecy and Society

No abstract provided.


State Secrecy: A Literature Review, Stephane Lefebvre Jan 2021

State Secrecy: A Literature Review, Stephane Lefebvre

Secrecy and Society

What is secrecy? What is a state secret? Which state secrets deserve protection from disclosures? How are state secrets protected from disclosure? In this review, I use these questions as an organizing framework to review the richness of a very disparate, largely US-centric, but also multidisciplinary literature. In doing so, I highlight the social nature of secrecy - that it is a social construct with social effects and consequences - and the need for further research to unveil those rationalities that specific discourses on state secrecy put forward to legitimize the nondisclosure of state secrets.


Questions Of Professional Practice And Reporting On State Secrets: Glenn Greenwald And The Nsa Leaks, Rebecca M. Rice Jan 2021

Questions Of Professional Practice And Reporting On State Secrets: Glenn Greenwald And The Nsa Leaks, Rebecca M. Rice

Secrecy and Society

In 2013, journalist Glenn Greenwald met with Edward Snowden, who leaked the most documents in the history of the U.S. National Security Agency (NSA). Greenwald reported on these documents and proved that the NSA spied on millions of American citizens. However, he also provided commentary about the state of journalism and argued that journalists are often complicit in the keeping of state secrets. Using a rhetorical analysis of Greenwald's writings in The Guardian and his later book, this essay argues that journalists function as a technical audience that debates professional standards for leaking secrets. In Greenwald's case, journalists were …


Review, The New Era Of Secret Law, Patrice Mcdermott Feb 2018

Review, The New Era Of Secret Law, Patrice Mcdermott

Secrecy and Society

In a recent Brennan Center report, The New Era of Secret Law, Elizabeth (Liza) Goitein articulates, examines, and evaluates the claims for and objections to secret law. Under this banner, the report includes any law that is withheld from the public, regardless of whether it may be shared among agencies or with certain members or committees of Congress.” Goitein’s underlying goal is to propose procedural and substantive reforms. Secret Law is a deeply-researched and highly valuable policy brief with an aim of making specific policy recommendations. And readable to boot.


Murky Projects And Uneven Information Policies: A Case Study Of The Psychological Strategy Board And Cia, Susan Maret Feb 2018

Murky Projects And Uneven Information Policies: A Case Study Of The Psychological Strategy Board And Cia, Susan Maret

Secrecy and Society

This case study discusses the Truman and Eisenhower administration's (1951-1953) short-lived Psychological Strategy Board (PSB). Through the lens of declassified documents, the article recounts the history and activities of the Board, including its relationship with the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) and clandestine projects that involve human experimentation. Primary documents of the period suggest that institutional secrecy, coupled with inconsistent information policies, largely shielded CIA's BLUEBIRD, ARTICHOKE, and MKULTRA from the Board. This subject has not been previously reported in the research literature, and supplements existing historical understanding of the PSB's mission under the broad umbrella of psychological warfare.


Trivialized Content, Elevated From: Aesthetics Of Secrecy In Turkish Politics In The 2000s, Doruk Tatar Feb 2018

Trivialized Content, Elevated From: Aesthetics Of Secrecy In Turkish Politics In The 2000s, Doruk Tatar

Secrecy and Society

This essay will first provide a brief history of the Islamist party's coming to power by means of its effective use of a populist imagery. The paper will then focus on the emergence of a new regime of secrecy in Turkish politics by looking at two high-profile legal cases, Ergenekon and the “Cosmic Room,” in which one can observe the blueprints of a struggle between different factions for taking over the state. During the investigations, secret documents about the wrongdoings of the secular establishment were leaked to and widely covered by the media. Sober debates on the contents of such …


Secrecy, Democracy And War: A Review, Brian Martin Nov 2016

Secrecy, Democracy And War: A Review, Brian Martin

Secrecy and Society

No abstract provided.


The Tension Between Privacy And Security, Susan Maret, Antoon De Baets Nov 2016

The Tension Between Privacy And Security, Susan Maret, Antoon De Baets

Secrecy and Society

No abstract provided.


Secrecy, Confidentiality And "Dirty Work": The Case Of Public Relations, Sue Curry Jansen Nov 2016

Secrecy, Confidentiality And "Dirty Work": The Case Of Public Relations, Sue Curry Jansen

Secrecy and Society

No abstract provided.


The Charm Of Secrecy: Secrecy And Society As Secrecy Studies, Susan Maret Nov 2016

The Charm Of Secrecy: Secrecy And Society As Secrecy Studies, Susan Maret

Secrecy and Society

No abstract provided.