ABSTRACT
In this chapter, students will learn about intelligence, a concept that since 9/11 has rarely been off the front pages of our newspapers. Little of this coverage has been flattering and a word association game might quickly link intelligence with terms such as ‘snooping’, ‘failure’ and ‘torture’. This chapter introduces students to the competing concepts of intelligence, the arguments over whether its performance can be substantially improved and whether intelligence services stabilize or disrupt the international system. It concludes that the field is dominated by an outdated concept of intelligence as a strategic process designed to produce refined information for policymakers. This traditional approach fails to capture intelligence activity elsewhere in the wider world, which is more about regime security and surveillance. It is also fundamentally unsuited for the twenty-first century, wherein the very idea of intelligence is merging with information, ‘big data’ and cybersecurity.
