The overarching question imparting urgency to this exploration is: Can U.S.-Russian contention in cyberspace cause the two nuclear superpowers to stumble into war? In considering this question we were constantly reminded of recent comments by a prominent U.S. arms control expert: At least as dangerous as the risk of an actual cyberattack, he observed, is cyber operations’ “blurring of the line between peace and war.” Or, as Nye wrote, “in the cyber realm, the difference between a weapon and a non-weapon may come down to a single line of code, or simply the intent of a computer program’s user.”
Biography
Lotem Bassan-Nygate is a Ph.D. candidate in the department of political science at the University of Wisconsin–Madison.
Her interests lie in the intersection of international relations, comparative politics, and political psychology, with a regional focus on Israel. In her research, Bassan-Nygate studies when and how international pressure and condemnations effectively mobilize domestic public support for human rights, and when they backfire. She also studies ways to encourage empathetic behavior and reduce affective polarization. Her work has been published in Comparative Political Science, World Trade Review, and International Relations. She holds a B.A. (Cum Laude) and M.A. (Cum Laude) in International Relations from the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, Israel.
Last Updated: Feb 6, 2023, 3:12pm