"Envisioning Modern Civilizational Collapse" A PIIRS GSR Public Lecture with Paul Stockton
PIIRS Global Systemic Risk Research Community------------With the goal of exposing vulnerabilities that exist in our current society, Professor Stockton looks at our world through a lens from a future in which the global structure as we know it has collapsed in the 21st century. Looking back from the year 2500, Stockton provides an historical retrospective analysis to understand how a civilization as complex and technologically advanced as our own could have collapsed with such speed and devastating consequences. Stockton will discuss how and why the "ancients" from the 21st century continued to increase systemic risk by deepening cross-sector interdependencies, especially in water, energy and other "lifeline systems" on which megacities depend. These complexities increased despite warnings from Charles Perrow's Normal Accidents in 1984 that when systems are technologically advanced, complexly interactive, and tightly coupled, they can produce cascading failures that are sudden, unexpected, and catastrophic. Stockton's research envisions a task force report examining the forces that have driven the growing fragility of infrastructure. His report also analyzes the initial steps taken to prevent cascading failures by government agencies - including FEMA, DHS, and DOD - and what more might have been done to forestall our civilizational collapse.----------------------------Paul Stockton served as the Assistant Secretary of Defense for Homeland Security from 2009 to 2013, and is currently the Managing Director of Sonecon LLC, a security and economic advisory firm in Washington, DC. Prior to being confirmed as Assistant Secretary, Dr. Stockton served as a Senior Research Scholar at Stanford University's Center for International Security and Cooperation (CISAC), and as Associate Provost of the Naval Postgraduate School (NPS). While at NPS, Dr. Stockton also founded and led its School of International Graduate Studies, the Center for Homeland Defense and Security, and the Center for Civil-Military Relations.----Dr. Stockton was twice awarded the Department of Defense Medal for Distinguished Public Service, DOD's highest civilian award. Dr. Stockton holds a Ph.D. from Harvard University and a B.A. from Dartmouth College. His recent publications include the Resilience for Grid Security Emergencies: Opportunities for the Industry-Government Collaboration (August 2018). Dr. Stockton serves on the Homeland Security Advisory Council, the Strategic Advisory Committee of the Idaho National Laboratory, and numerous other public and private sector boards.--------------For More Information:risk.princeton.edu