This paper examines the role of computer security incident response teams (CSIRTs) in the emerging cyber regime complex and asks what might be driving the lack of trust and information sharing within the community. ThePow commercialization of cyber security and threat vulnerabilities, the Internet’s development as a new power domain, the growth of the CSIRT community and the emergence of a cyber regime complex are examined as factors that are giving rise to and exacerbating existing problems around information sharing and trust.
Topic:
National Security, Science and Technology, International Security, and Cybersecurity
Actions taken to mitigate and adapt to the adverse impacts of climate change must be centred on human rights. This paper analyzes a few examples of national, subnational and corporate climate change policies to show how they have either enshrined human rights principles, or failed to do so. It also examines the challenge of integrating human rights principles in climate change actions. Climate change policies, if they are to respect all human rights, must actually use human rights language to articulate adaptation or mitigation measures.
Topic:
Climate Change, Development, Human Rights, and Politics
Carbon taxes become relevant for international trade when they are coupled with border tax adjustment (BTA) legislation for imported products. BTAs are intended to level the playing field between domestic and foreign products, but such tax schemes, if not designed properly, can be found to violate a country’s international commitments before the World Trade Organization (WTO). This paper argues that environmentally conscious governments can impose a WTO-compatible BTA to offset domestic CO2 legislation, and that federal governments need to engage in coordinated efforts to harmonize treatment of high CO2 emitters domestically, since domestic industries will not bear the burden of environmental regulation alone.
Topic:
Climate Change, Environment, International Trade and Finance, and World Trade Organization
Access to and timely diffusion of green technologies required for adaptation and mitigation are among the major challenges faced by the international community. The role of the patent system has become the subject of increased attention in climate change discussions on technology transfer. New mechanisms for collaborative innovation are required to foster the green technology sector.
Topic:
Climate Change, Economics, Environment, Markets, and Science and Technology
How do we reconcile self-government with national security and analyze claims of national security? There should be little doubt that many assertions of "national security" have left the nation less secure. Consider the case of Ellen Knauff, a German woman who married a U.S. soldier and came to New York City to meet his parents in 1948. Instead of being allowed to disembark with other passengers, she was held at Ellis Island for three years and threatened with deportation as a security risk. At no time was Knauff or her attorney told why she was a risk. Her case reached the Supreme Court in Knauff v. Shaughnessy (1950). The Court, divided 6 to 3, found no objections to the procedures used by the executive branch. In a dissent, however, Justice Robert Jackson said: “Security is like liberty in that many are the crimes committed in its name.” No one has better underscored the danger of automatically bowing down to claims of security.
The 2015 Aspen-Nicholas Water Forum, brings together each year a select group of water experts with diverse knowledge - from finance and policy to technology and ecosystems - to explore the future of our water system; the role of corporations and municipalities in managing water risk; and the innovations in, and convergence of, water policy, finance, and technology to identify potential game changers. The forum this year specifically focused on water and big data to understand how the emergence of large, but dispersed, amounts of data in the water sector can best be utilized to improve the management and delivery of water for a more sustainable future. Understanding what water data we have, how we collect it, and how to standardize and integrate it may well be a prerequisite to taking action to address a wide range of water challenges.
Topic:
Climate Change, Environment, Science and Technology, Natural Resources, Water, and Global Markets
The 2015 Forum on Global Energy Economy and Security, “The New Pricing Reality in Global Oil and Gas Markets,” was co-chaired by Claire Farley, Member at Kohlberg Kravis Roberts & Company, and Bill White, Senior Advisor and Chairman of Lazard Houston and former Mayor of Houston. Topics discussed included the current and future drivers of global supply and demand for petroleum; specific regional changes and challenges; the global LNG market and market penetration for natural gas; environmental challenges that may impact oil and gas development; and the effect of new technology and data changing planning and investment.
Topic:
Economics, Energy Policy, Environment, Oil, and Global Markets
In New York City on October 16-17, 2014, the Aspen Institute Business & Society Program hosted a Symposium focused on exemplary teaching at the business and society interface with a particular emphasis on sourcing and employment practices-leveraging increased consumer demand for "responsible" labor practices and supply chains, and employer demand for graduates with strong operational skills.
This meeting brought together an impressive roster of corporate, academic and non-profit leaders, and identified ways for business schools to effectively prepare future leaders for the challenges of our complex economy, and to lead companies in ways that help build a vibrant economy for all.
Topic:
Economics, Education, International Trade and Finance, Politics, and Labor Issues
The 2014 Dialogue on Diplomacy and Technology took place August 3-6, 2014 in Aspen, Colorado. The Dialogue, Reforming American Public Diplomacy, explored whether the US Government’s apparatus for global discourse is adequate to the times.
Topic:
Diplomacy, Human Welfare, Science and Technology, Governance, and Global Markets
This report summarizes key findings from recent research on links between higher education and the workforce. Featuring eight brief papers from leading education and workforce experts from around the country, the report offers practical advice for institutional leaders, policymakers, students and their advisers about how to use the increasingly available information on the economic value of higher education. Specifically, the authors’ papers and the opening summary explore what various audiences can learn from emerging evidence about: variations in labor market outcomes by program and institution; the value of degrees to jobs both in and out of fields studied; returns to the completion of certain course clusters that don’t add up to a degree; and distortions that may result from examining returns to individual degrees rather than “stacked” degrees.
Topic:
Economics, Education, Labor Issues, Global Markets, and Employment