Measuring National Power in the Post-Industrial Age
Editorial Reviews
Book Description
The arrival of post-industrial society has transformed the tradiditonal bases of national power, and thus the methods used to measure the relative power requires not merely a meticulous detailing of visible military assests but also a scrutiny of larger c
From the Publisher
The arrival of postindustrial society has given rise to the suspicionthat the traditional bases of national power have been fundamentallytransformed and, as such, that the indices used to measure the rela-tivepower of nations should be reassessed as well. This suspicionhas special resonance given the fact that countries like the SovietUnion and Iraq, classified as relatively significant powers by someaggregate indicators of capability, either collapsed through internalenervation or proved utterly ineffectual when their capabilities wereput to the test in war. Both these examples suggest that appreciatingthe true basis of national power requires not merely a meticulousdetailing of visible military assets but also a scrutiny of larger capabilitiesembodied in such variables as the aptitude for innovation, thenature of social institutions, and the quality of the knowledge base-all of which may bear upon a country's capacity to produce the oneelement that is still fundamental to international politics: effectivemilitary power. To the degree that contemporary intelligence ap-proachesfail to integrate information of this sort, they may be deficientinsofar as visible military indicators will provide important-but still incomplete and perhaps misleading-assessments of "true"national power.This report represents a "first cut" at reconfiguring the notion ofnational power to accommodate a wider understanding of capabilitythan is now used in discussions about international affairs. Theintention here is to advance a conceptual framework that helps theintelligence community develop better evaluative measures of thenational capabilities of countries likely to become potential peercompetitors of the United States. This framework, insofar as it captures a more comprehensive view of national power that helps dis-tinguish"truly" powerful from "apparently" powerful countries, isintended to support the Army's and the intelligence community'sefforts at long-range planning and global forecasting. These effortsobviously seek to assess the capabilities of potential adversaries asaccurately as possible in order to meter appropriate military acquisitions,structures, and development on the part of the United States.The research reported in this document was sponsored by theDeputy Chief of Staff for Intelligence and was conducted in the Strategy,Doctrine, and Resources Program of RAND's Arroyo Center, afederally funded research and development center sponsored by theUnited States Army.
Measuring National Power in the Post-Industrial Age
Measuring National Power in the Post-Industrial Age,Ashley J Tellis,RAND Corporation,0833027921,Development - Economic Development,Industrial capacity,Industrial mobilization,Military Science,Military readiness,Political Freedom & Security - International Secur,Politics - Current Events,Science/Mathematics,Technology,Non-Classifiable
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