Multilateralism in Space: Opportunities and Challenges for Achieving Space Security

Human activity in space has, from the dawn of the space age, been characterized by a “push me, pull you” dynamic between competition and cooperation. There is no doubt it was the Cold War rivalry between the United States and the then Soviet Union that drove initial efforts to breech the space frontier, and that military competition has long been, and continues to be, a central factor in states’ pursuit of space capabilities. At the same time, even during the height of tensions between the two superpowers, international cooperation in the space exploration and sciences was considered a high priority. Not only did the United States and the Soviet Union seek to cooperate with each other regarding human space flight, but they also reached out to other less-developed space players

Forwarding Multilateral Space Governance: Next Steps for the International Community

Over the past decade, concerns about ensuring sustainability and security in outer space have led the international community to pursue a range of governance initiatives. Governance issues regarding the use of space are complicated because of the physical realities of the space environment and because of the legal status of space as a global resource. As the number of space users grows and the types of activities in space expand, competition for access to space will only continue to grow. Different space actors have different priorities and perceptions regarding space challenges. As more and more militaries around the world turn to space assets, the potential development of counterspace weapons also increases tensions. Ongoing multilateral work on space governance has concentrated primarily on voluntary measures. There are currently three major multilateral governance initiatives in the field. The three—the EU Code of Conduct, the COPUOS Working Group on the Long-term Sustainability of Outer Space Activities, and the Group of Governmental Experts (GGE) on transparency and confidencebuilding measures—are related to each other, but each aims to address slightly different aspects of the governance problem. This paper reviews these initiatives and elucidates ways to forward their progress, for instance, by fully implementing the GGE recommendations, including a review of implementation of the Outer Space Treaty, the establishment of national focal points for data exchange, and by fully implementing the UN Registry. It also looks to identify additional steps beyond current activities at the multilateral level for establishing a foundational space governance framework, including institutionalizing the UN Space Debris Mitigation Guidelines; establishing a public space situational awareness database; and examining ways to move forward discussion on active debris removal, national legal obligations regarding military activities, and space traffic management

The Beauty of Hatred: The McDonogh Three’s Untold Stories

The Beauty of Hatred is a dissertation written to share the lived experiences of three primary participants of the educational desegregation movement of New Orleans public schools through a qualitative research approach. The methods used in this research were focus group interviews and document analysis. Two interviews were conducted to gather information about the events of the November 14, 1960 desegregation and their reflections on how it shaped their lives. The participants recalled life events from their experiences desegregating McDonough 19 in the lower ninth ward of New Orleans. This study focuses on the primary experiences of Gail Etienne, Leona Tate, and Tessie Prevost. As six year olds, these women faced isolation and hatred unknown to most children their ages. The methodology used in this study to discover themes that emerged and support the historical information from the time period and evidence of Interest Convergence one of the tenets of Critical Race Theorist. The counterstories provided by these women gave an additional perspective to historical information and allowed them to share one of the most important and significant parts of their childhood

Building Confidence in the Cybersphere: A Path to Multilateral Progress

As use of the Internet has become critical to global economic development and international security, there is near-unanimous agreement on the need for more international cooperation to increase stability and security in cyberspace. Several multilateral initiatives over the last five years have begun to spell out cooperative measures, norms of behavior, and transparency and confidence-building measures (TCBMs) that could help improve mutual cybersecurity. These efforts have been painstakingly slow, and some have stalled due to competing interests. Nonetheless, a United Nations (UN) Group of Governmental Experts (GGE) and the Organization for Cooperation and Security in Europe (OSCE) have achieved some high-level agreement on principles, norms, and “rules of the road” for national Internet activities and transnational cyber interactions. Their agreements include commitments to share more information, improve national protective capacities, cooperate on incident response, and restrain certain destabilizing state practices. Voluntary international agreements are worth little, unless states implement their commitments. So far, implementation has been crippled by vague language, national security considerations, complex relations between public and private actors in cyberspace, and privacy concerns. This is particularly true regarding the upfront sharing of information on threats and the willingness of participants to cooperate on incident investigations, including identifying perpetrators. With multilateral forums struggling to find a way forward with norm-setting and implementation, alternate pathways are needed to protect and build on what has been accomplished so far. Different strategies can help advance implementation of measures in the UN and OSCE agreements. Some commitments, such as establishing and sharing information about national points of contact, are best handled unilaterally or through bilateral or regional inter-governmental cooperation. Other objectives, such as protecting the core architecture and functions of the Internet that support trans-border critical infrastructure and underpin the global financial system, require a multi-stakeholder approach that includes not only governments but also private sector service providers, academic experts, and nongovernmental organizations. This paper compares what the GGE and OSCE norm-building processes have achieved so far and what disagreements have impeded these efforts. It identifies several priorities for cooperation identified by participants in both forums. It also proposes three practical projects related to these priorities that members of regional or global organizations might be able to work on together despite political tensions and philosophical disputes. The first would help state and non-state actors share information and communicate about various types of cybersecurity threats using a flexible and intuitive effects-based taxonomy to categorize cyber activity. The second would develop a more sophisticated way for state and non-state actors to assess the risks of different types of cyber incidents and the potential benefits of cooperation. The third would identify aspects of the Internet that might be considered the core of a public utility, worthy of special protection in their own right and for their support of trans-border critical infrastructure

ESTABLISHING SPACE SECURITY: A PRESCRIPTION FOR A RULES-BASED APPROACH

The question of what constitutes the proper military uses of space is not just a debate over space weapons and attacks on satellites. It is a debate that sheds light on the fundamental decisions that states and their citizens will have to make over the next century as we both explore and exploit space for its scientific, strategic, and economic value. Furthermore, the context of this debate changes year to year as the physical and political environment of space changes

Arms Race in Space? U.S. Air Force Quietly Focuses on Space Control

Defense NewsWhile the U.S. Congress was debating the defense budget this summer, Air Force officials were downplaying their efforts to develop small, orbiting weapons to disrupt or destroy enemy satellites. In a June 24 meeting with reporters at the Pentagon, Peter Teets, Air Force undersecretary, denied the Air Force was working on radio-frequency or laser jamming microsatellites. A June 30 article in Space News quoted an Air Force spokesman as saying that the service had "dropped" work on such satellites because the "technology was deemed too immature." Both statements are true, in a narrow sense. Efforts to build attack satellites are currently taking a back seat to ground-based technologies that disrupt enemy space assets and protect our own - what the Air Force calls "space control" and "counterspace operations." But the shift in research priorities does not mean the Air Force has given up plans to put these weapons in space. The service's "Strategic Master Plan for FY 04 and Beyond" makes it abundantly clear that officials intend to deploy a variety of space weapons eventually. The Master Plan calls for development of "defensive and offensive counterspace" capabilities during the next two decades that will produce "active on-orbit protection" and "space-based counterspace" systems between 2016 and 2028. And despite its acknowledgement that the technology is not yet ready, the Air Force continues to pursue the development of microsatellite weapons. The service's 2004 budget request gives a program called Advanced Spacecraft Technology $14.4 million to develop and test a microsatellite "to demonstrate ... operations around a non-cooperative resident space object." The program also contains$14.8 million to "develop microsatellite (10-100 kilogram) technologies ... [that] could enable applications such as space protection, [and] counterspace capabilities." These efforts are part of several microsatellite technology programs, including the Experimental Satellite Series (XSS). Launched Jan. 29, the 28-kilogram XSS-10 successfully demonstrated its ability to move closely around another object to take images. The contract to build its successor, XSS-11, and its more specific sensor payload already has been awarded

Finishing the euchromatic sequence of the human genome

The sequence of the human genome encodes the genetic instructions for human physiology, as well as rich information about human evolution. In 2001, the International Human Genome Sequencing Consortium reported a draft sequence of the euchromatic portion of the human genome. Since then, the international collaboration has worked to convert this draft into a genome sequence with high accuracy and nearly complete coverage. Here, we report the result of this finishing process. The current genome sequence (Build 35) contains 2.85 billion nucleotides interrupted by only 341 gaps. It covers ∼99% of the euchromatic genome and is accurate to an error rate of ∼1 event per 100,000 bases. Many of the remaining euchromatic gaps are associated with segmental duplications and will require focused work with new methods. The near-complete sequence, the first for a vertebrate, greatly improves the precision of biological analyses of the human genome including studies of gene number, birth and death. Notably, the human enome seems to encode only 20,000-25,000 protein-coding genes. The genome sequence reported here should serve as a firm foundation for biomedical research in the decades ahead

Theresa Hitchens

Theresa Hitchens is a Senior Research Associate at CISSM, where she focuses on space security, cyber security, and governance issues surrounding disruptive technologies. Prior to joining CISSM, Hitchens was the director of the United Nations Institute for Disarmament Research (UNIDIR) in Geneva from 2009 through 2014. Among her activities and accomplishments at UNIDIR, Hitchens served as a consultant to the U.N. Group of Governmental Experts on Transparency and Confidence Building Measures in Outer Space Activities, provided expert advice to the Conference on Disarmament regarding the prevention of an arms race in outer space (PAROS), and launched UNIDIR\u27s annual conference on cyber security. From 2001 to 2008, Hitchens worked at the Center for Defense Information, where she served as Director, and headed the center’s Space Security Project, setting the strategic direction of the center and conducting research on space policy and other international security issues. She was also previously Research Director of the Washington affiliate of the British American Security Information Council (BASIC), where she managed the organization’s program of research and advocacy in nuclear and conventional arms control, European security and North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) affairs. Hitchens previously worked for Defense News of Springfield, Virginia, covering transatlantic relations, the European Union, NATO, arms control, USAF issues, and international security. At Defense News, Hitchens served as International Editor on security, covering arms trade issues, nuclear, chemical and biological weapons, and as Editor for two years. Hitchens\u27s latest publications include, “Space Security-Relevant International Organizations: UN, ITU, ISO,” 2014, which was penned for the Handbook of Space Security; “Preserving Freedom of Action in Space: Realizing the Potential and Limits of U.S. Spacepower,” 2011, which was coauthored with Michael Krepon and Michael Katz-Hyman; and “Saving Space: Threat Proliferation and Mitigation,” 2009. Hitchens holds a Bachelor of Science in journalism from Ohio University in Athens, Ohio.https://commons.erau.edu/stm-images/1080/thumbnail.jp