The Cultural Knowledge Gap and Its Consequences for National Security

U.S. military missions increasingly require substantial interaction with local populations beyond traditional military or counterinsurgency tactics. Senior Fellow Montgomery McFate will discuss the military’s existing cultural knowledge requirements, the extent to which they are being met, and how the incorporation of better knowledge about local culture into planning and training for U.S. military operations could improve their effectiveness in places like Iraq and Afghanistan.

McFate has served as an American Academy for the Advancement of Science fellow at the U.S. Navy’s Office of Naval Research (ONR) and was awarded a Distinguished Public Service Award by the Secretary of the Navy for her work there. McFate also worked at RAND as a social scientist and as a consultant to various government agencies. She holds a J.D. from Harvard Law School and a Ph.D. in anthropology from Yale University.

Speakers

• Montgomery McFate
  Senior Fellow, U.S. Institute of Peace