Introducing hermeneutics to intelligence analysis

Abstract

In order to train better analysts, then, what is required is the explicit provocation and acknowledgement of biases – which may not necessarily be unfounded biases – through both i) intensive reading of provocative (historical) information, and ii) through developing a constant and incessant penchant for engaging in a radical dialectic with any information provided and encountered. The analyst must first allow his preconceptions to be laid-bare, provoked by the information, acknowledge his preconceptions (foregrounding), suspend their implicit validity and only then endeavour to establish their validity or falsehood through a discipline of question and answer.