Social-Behavioral Modeling for Complex Systems

39 Future Social Science That Matters for Statecraft

Kent C. Myers

Net Assessments, Office of the Director of National Intelligence, Washington, DC, 20511, USA

Perspective

This chapter is less about my own research than about the perspective of a strategist in the Office of the Director of National Intelligence as he looks across many social science activities with an eye toward their value for intelligence. It not only is a personal account but also reflects conversations with academic scholars and government personnel who are seeking a more fruitful linkage between researchers and decision‐makers. My intent is more one of noting shortcomings and opportunities in the research endeavor than extolling the virtues of what is already solid.

Recent Observations

As of 2018, a study committee at the National Academies of Science (NAS) is identifying lines of social science inquiry that promise to be beneficial to national security over the next 10 years (National Academies of Science 2018). Efforts to survey the next decade have worked well in some fields, such as astrophysics, where a tight‐knit community of scientists needs to set priorities on the design and use of very expensive, shared devices. In social and behavior science, however, such a survey is fiendishly difficult. I see three underlying conditions that lead to this difficulty:

• The interests of social scientists are quite varied and dispersed. They work alone or within relatively isolated groups that maintain ...