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The Future of Violence: Robots and Germs, Hackers and Drones-Confronting A New Age of Threat Hardcover – March 10, 2015

by Benjamin Wittes (Author), Gabriella Blum (Author)

42 ratings

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Two legal scholars explore the security and political implications of revolutionary new technologies from drones to 3-D printers, and explain how governments must adapt to our brave new world of dispersed threats.

From drone warfare in the Middle East to digital spying by the National Security Agency, the U.S. government has harnessed the power of cutting-edge technology to awesome effect. But what happens when ordinary people have the same tools at their fingertips? Advances in cybertechnology, biotechnology, and robotics mean that more people than ever before have access to potentially dangerous technologies-from drones to computer networks and biological agents-which could be used to attack states and private citizens alike.

In The Future of Violence, law and security experts Benjamin Wittes and Gabriella Blum detail the myriad possibilities, challenges, and enormous risks present in the modern world, and argue that if our national governments can no longer adequately protect us from harm, they will lose their legitimacy. Consequently, governments, companies, and citizens must rethink their security efforts to protect lives and liberty. In this brave new world where many little brothers are as menacing as any Big Brother, safeguarding our liberty and privacy may require strong domestic and international surveillance and regulatory controls. Maintaining security in this world where anyone can attack anyone requires a global perspective, with more multinational forces and greater action to protect (and protect against) weaker states who do not yet have the capability to police their own people. Drawing on political thinkers from Thomas Hobbes to the Founders and beyond, Wittes and Blum show that, despite recent protestations to the contrary, security and liberty are mutually supportive, and that we must embrace one to ensure the other.

The Future of Violence is at once an introduction to our emerging world -- one in which students can print guns with 3-D printers and scientists' manipulations of viruses can be recreated and unleashed by ordinary people -- and an authoritative blueprint for how government must adapt in order to survive and protect us.

Print length

336 pages
Language

English
Publisher

Basic Books
Publication date

March 10, 2015
Dimensions

6.5 x 1 x 9.5 inches
ISBN-10

0465089747
ISBN-13

978-0465089741
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Editorial Reviews

Review

"A book that manages to meld Hobbes, James Bond, science fiction, and Supreme Court decisions is a rare read. All the more impressive when it takes a complex set of urgent questions about the intersection of technology, security, and liberty, and offers insights and at least the beginnings of answers. Violence will be always with us, but its forms are changing in ways that challenge our ability to respond to and regulate it."―Anne-Marie Slaughter, President and CEO of New America

"Benjamin Wittes and Gabriella Blum have written a compelling and provocative book about an important topic we have not adequately faced: managing catastrophic risk in a technologically advanced society. I strongly recommend this book even for people who will not agree with the authors' conclusions."―ruce Schneier, author of Data and Goliath: The Hidden Battles to Collect Your Data and Control Your World

"What the authors achieve in this work is to raise the profile of issues at the intersection of biology, technology, and government policy.... Recommended to readers of governmental policy and the ethics of technology, who will be especially interested in this timely work."―Library Journal

"Citing Hobbes Locke, and Weber, the authors offer an impressive analysis of how the state will need to change to counter these threats. Publishers are competing to put out increasingly dire warnings about the fast-changing threats from cyber attacks, but The Future of Violence is original and insightful in turning to political theory for answers."―Financial Times

"A lively and often terrifying exploration of the dark side of our technological age."―Washington Post

"A careful, sophisticated analysis...In discussing how to combat [cybercrimes], the authors transcend clichés about tradeoffs between liberty and security, patiently explaining how without security, there is rarely much liberty."―Foreign Affairs

"An alarming and informative new book.... The Future of Violence is a frightening book, but it's not an exercise in fear-mongering. Rather than arousing fear in order to advocate some dogmatic ideological agenda, Wittes and Blum offer a good example of a productive response to the world's multiplying horrors: thoughtful and realistic analysis of potential solutions.―Daily Beast

About the Author

Benjamin Wittes is a senior fellow in governance studies at the Brookings Institution and the editor-in-chief of Lawfare. He lives in Washington, D.C.

Gabriella Blum is the Rita E. Hauser Professor of Human Rights and International Humanitarian Law at Harvard Law School. She lives in Cambridge, Massachusetts.

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Product details

Publisher ‏ : ‎ Basic Books (March 10, 2015)
Language ‏ : ‎ English
Hardcover ‏ : ‎ 336 pages
ISBN-10 ‏ : ‎ 0465089747
ISBN-13 ‏ : ‎ 978-0465089741
Item Weight ‏ : ‎ 1.2 pounds
Dimensions ‏ : ‎ 6.5 x 1 x 9.5 inches

Best Sellers Rank: #1,146,025 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
- #1,082 in Computer Hacking
- #1,842 in Terrorism (Books)
- #2,069 in Violence in Society (Books)

Customer Reviews:
42 ratings

Customer reviews

5 star		61%
4 star		14%
3 star		9%
2 star		6%
1 star		10%

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Top reviews from the United States

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Ken

Most Important - Read It!

Reviewed in the United States on October 25, 2015

Verified Purchase

I found this book important in that it details a number of vulnerabilities for our species in this current contest of loner crazies and suicidal cultures bent on ruling or destroying the world - sending us all to paradise or hell. Our species too often can only focus on one thing, the shiny object immediately before us - the one threat presented as the other five or ten threats fade into the fog of inattention. This collection delivers a clear battery, not a complete list, of our most serious Red Queen threats, a reminder of what we and our premium law enforcement faces, and an idea that Hack Backers, the equivalent of Lisbeth Salanger, internet vigilantes, might become those strange tattooed knights who save us from International Governance and management manipulating who will survive and who must be delivered that dose of 'mouse pox' [analogy].

5 people found this helpful

Helpful

MH

Excellent, in-depth coverage of emerging trends and international legal issues surrounding technologies of violence

Reviewed in the United States on April 8, 2018

Verified Purchase

Excellent, extensive coverage of emerging technologies and applications and (unlike most books on the topic) extensive coverage of international legal and economic considerations. It should be no surprise a book on these topics does not read like a thriller. The material can be dense and dry at points, but the positive tradeoff is the reader gets more meat. So many books on emerging technologies, science, and resulting trends are barely more than breezy lists and shallow prognostications. This book balances span of coverage with depth to better inform the reader with relevant information on sometimes complex, interacting topics.

Reviewed in the United States on July 12, 2016

Verified Purchase

Bought after recommendation from Greg Gutfled on the Five. First few chapters interesting but then just seemed too much like reading a college textbook (which it may well be) and never finished the book (one of only a handful of books I never finished).

One person found this helpful

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A. Dixon

Smaller and smaller vehicles of destruction means BIGGER and BIGGER chances of destruction

Reviewed in the United States on November 22, 2015

Verified Purchase

This book gives insight that you might not want, BUT THAT YOU NEED; based on the methods used by terrorists in our world today. it is no longer the State who can protect you from ill, because the ill is too pervasive. Read and learn!!

One person found this helpful

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WTF2016

Five Stars

Reviewed in the United States on September 16, 2017

Verified Purchase

Read it before it's all over.

Helpful

Brent Stanley

Excellent read, very eye-opening

Reviewed in the United States on November 16, 2015

Verified Purchase

Excellent read, very eye-opening. Also pretty wordy, so be prepared. Certainly makes you wonder about the new age of violence and where the trend is going.

One person found this helpful

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