The events of Hurricane Katrina have become a textbook example of system failures at multiple and intersecting levels. One unexplored dimension of this tragedy is the role of infrastructure performance data and modeling studies in aiding stakeholders in understanding this and future crises in order to promote resilience.
By Laura Steinberg, Nicholas Santella, and Corrine Zoli
Nick Catrantzos reflects on today’s security professional and the protection business.
By Nick Catrantzos
What do the concept of homeland security and the intellectual program surrounding that concept contribute to the nation’s security? The failure of public safety disciplines to prevent the September 11, 2001 attack gave “homeland security” its chance to emerge as a competing paradigm for organizing the nation’s security.
By Christopher Bellavita
Hurricane Ike’s winds and storm surge devastated rural coastal communities of Texas and Louisiana, many still recovering from severe damage caused by past Gulf Coast hurricanes, particularly Hurricane Rita in 2005.
By Sharon Caudle and Ernest Broussard Jr.
This essay, the winner of the Center for Homeland Defense and Security (CHDS) Essay Contest in 2010, looks at how homeland security could benefit from crowd-sourced applications accessed through social networking tools such as Twitter and Facebook.
By Christopher M. Ford
This article describes the history of the challenges in developing structures and processes to integrate military forces during domestic disaster response, and the recent progress made with regard to employing a Dual Status Command construct for no-notice events.
By Ludwig J. Schumacher
It has long been debated whether a community is better off before or after being struck by a natural disaster. The aim of this study is to utilize the instance of Americus, Georgia, which was devastated by a tornado in 2007, as a case study to provide evidence for one opposing argument or the other.
By Marc Hyden and Charley English
Successful terrorist groups can evolve to gain national power. This article consists of three case studies: the overthrow of the Russian Czar, the overthrow of the Shah of Iran and Hezbollah’s rise to power in Lebanon.
By Thomas Myers
