New Minerva Grants
The National Science Foundation announced a new round of grants for a controversial program in which social scientists conduct research relevant to the needs of the Department of Defense. Among the research topics receiving funding: "Terror, Conflict Processes, Organizations, and Ideologies: Completing the Picture," "How Politics Inside Dictatorships Affects Regime Stability and International Conflict," "Strategies of Violence, Tools of Peace, and Changes in War Termination" and "Avoiding Water Wars: Environmental Security Through River Treaty Institutionalization." While Defense Department officials have pledged complete academic freedom for the scholars working in the program, and some university officials see this effort as long overdue, some professors have criticized the military connection to the program. Those criticisms led to the enhanced NSF role in the effort.
