International Security in a Changing World has been CISAC’s signature course since its inception in 1970. Thousands of Stanford students have taken the popular class, which has changed over time from a course focused on U.S.-Soviet arms control to one that analyzes an array of international security challenges and includes a two-day simulation of an emergency session of the U.N. Security Council. 

Now, with support from the Vice Provost of Online Learning and the Flora Family Foundation, CISAC co-director and intelligence expert, Amy Zegart, and terrorism authority and CISAC Senior Fellow Martha Crenshaw have teamed up to bring the course online.

In a series of videotaped lectures packaged on a new YouTube channel, Security Matters, some of Stanford’s leading professors, former government officials and other scholars from around the world lecture on everything from cybersecurity to lessons learned from the Cold War.

The 30 classroom and office lectures – broken into 157 shorter clips – are free and are for curious minds of all ages and professions. The lectures come almost entirely from the 2014 winter term of International Security (PS114S), co-taught by Zegart and Crenshaw.

“This series is the first in what we hope will be a continuing experiment of new modes and methods to enhance our education mission,” said Zegart. “We have two goals in mind: The first is to expand CISAC's reach in educating the world about international security issues. The second is to innovate inside our Stanford classrooms.”

The lectures survey the most pressing security issues facing the world today. Topics include cybersecurity, nuclear proliferation, insurgency and intervention, terrorism, biosecurity, lessons learned from the Cold War and Cuban Missile Crisis – as well as the future of U.S. leadership in the world.

Guest speakers include former Secretary of Defense William Perry and former U.S. Ambassador to Afghanistan Karl Eikenberry; former FBI Director Robert Mueller gives us an Inside-the-Beltway look at the day after the 9/11 terrorist attacks. 

Other lectures are by notable Stanford professors such as plutonium science expert Siegfried Hecker, political scientist Francis Fukuyama, nuclear historians and political scientists David Holloway and Scott Sagan. Abbas Milani explains Iran’s nuclear ambitions; Eikenberry lectures on the Afghanistan War and the future of Central Asia; and former Deputy Secretary of Homeland Security Jane Holl Lute talks about the importance of building the nation’s cybersecurity infrastructure.

Zegart, the author of “Spying Blind,” argues in one lecture that the CIA and the FBI missed the signals of the impending attacks on 9/11 due to outdated bureaucratic norms and organizational structures. Crenshaw, who established the Mapping Militant Organizations project at CISAC, goes over the key questions regarding terrorism today and how responses have changed since the 9/11 attacks.

CISAC co-director David Relman, a Stanford professor of microbiology and immunology, co-chaired a widely cited study by the National Academy of Sciences on globalization, biosecurity and the future of the life sciences. In his lecture, “Doomsday Viruses,” Relman talks about the dark side of the life sciences revolution and his concerns that biological knowledge in the wrong hands could threaten human life on a large scale.

The video modules are part of a new living-lecture library that would enable future Stanford students to learn from lectures that came before them.

“Imagine comparing what Martha Crenshaw had to say about terrorism in 2005 to 2015,” Zegart said, “or assigning an online module from one speaker as homework and hearing a contending perspective from an in-person lecture the following class. These modules make it possible for us to capture analysis of pressing international security issues at key moments in time and harness them for future learning.” 

Zegart, who is also a senior fellow at the Hoover Institution, notes that all the lecturers involved in the Security Matters series volunteered their time so that not only Stanford students could learn from them, but viewers from around the world.

“Whether you’re a policymaker or an interested citizen, an avid follower of politics or a curious newcomer … this series is intended for you,” she tells prospective online students in this lecture overview:

Each lecture is introduced with a brief overview of the key points and a bit of background about the speaker.

The Security Matters videos have been packaged under these five themes:

Into the Future: Emerging Insecurities

Insurgency, Asymmetrical Conflict and Military Intervention

Terrorism and Counterterrorism

The Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons

International Security and State Power

Crenshaw, who has been teaching for more than four decades, said this is her first foray into the world of online education.

“We hope that you’ll find these discussions as stimulating as we do and as generations of Stanford students have done over the years,” she tells prospective online students in the series overview. “But unlike our Stanford students – you won’t have to take a final exam.”

Follow the Twitter hashtag #SecurityMatters for updates on the @StanfordCISAC Twitter feed as we roll out the lectures. Or dip into the entire lecture series here on our YouTube channel, Security Matters, and then check the playlist for topics.

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Stanford Law Professors Rob MacCoun and Michelle Mello say that marijuana edibles, which look like snacks and are often highly potent, should be better regulated in an effort to protect young children.

States that have legalized marijuana need to put strong restrictions on the drug's edible products, according to two Stanford law professors.

In a new article in the New England Journal of Medicine, Robert MacCoun and Michelle Mello of Stanford Law School wrote that one of the most notable features of the rollout of state-legalized retail sales of marijuana has been the tremendous popularity of edible products.

The problem is that marijuana edibles – which often look like candy or cookies and are frequently potent – increase the chances that children will overdose, they wrote in the article. MacCoun studies social psychology, and Mello, health policy.

"As legalization of marijuana spreads, new adopters (states) should ensure that their regulatory scheme for marijuana edibles is fully baked," wrote Mello and MacCoun, who is a senior fellow at Stanford's Freeman Spogli Institute for International Studies.

Marijuana use for adults over 21 is fully legal in Colorado, Washington and Alaska. Oregon passed a similar law that will take effect in July. Several other states have legalized marijuana for medicinal use or have decriminalized it. A notable feature of state-legalized retail sales of marijuana has been the popularity of edibles.

Attractive nuisance

In an interview, MacCoun explained that the original marijuana laws were based on ballot initiatives, without legislative give-and-take processes. "As a result, they were not rigorous and detailed in their approach to issues like edibles," he said

Colorado and Washington put extremely modest rules on edibles, therefore making it easy to sell and market edible products, he said.

"Both states require child-resistant packaging, a warning to 'keep out of the reach of children,' and labeling describing a standard serving size. Neither requires warnings that ingested marijuana can have different effects from smoked marijuana," wrote MacCoun and Mello.

While both Colorado and Washington generally prohibit packaging and advertising that targets children, neither state requires packaging that would clearly distinguish edibles from ordinary food products, MacCoun said. Some of the edibles look like Hershey or KitKat bars, and the drinks resemble the major brands of non-marijuana colas.

Mello said the issue brings to mind the tort-law concept of an "attractive nuisance," which describes a hazardous condition that is likely to attract children who are unable to appreciate the risk involved.

"It also evokes tobacco companies' use of advertising campaigns with youth appeal," MacCoun and Mello wrote.

They acknowledge that marijuana is associated with a long history of "public misinformation" about the effects of the drug. But the scientific record is clear on the documented risk of edibles, especially for children. "Some of these products contain four or more times the level of tetrahydrocannabinol (THC) that is considered to be a safe dose," they noted.

Taken in large doses, THC can produce serious anxiety attacks and psychotic-like symptoms, according to MacCoun and Mello. Strong differences exist in the pharmacokinetic and metabolic effects of marijuana when it is ingested rather than smoked.

Case reports document respiratory insufficiency in young children who have ingested marijuana through edibles, MacCoun said. A recent study showed that the proportion of ingestion-related emergency department visits by children in Colorado associated with marijuana ingestion increased after legal restrictions were eased. The majority of identified sources in those cases were marijuana edibles.

Other factors are important to consider as well. "The availability of child-friendly edibles could increase the probability of initiation to marijuana use, reduce the average age of initiation, and increase the frequency and intensity of use among users of all ages," according to MacCoun and Mello.

States, not feds, have the power

States have created a wide berth for marketing of marijuana edibles that federal agencies are unwilling or unable to narrow, MacCoun and Mello said. That is why they can enact stronger, more effective regulations on the formulation, packaging and marketing of edible marijuana products. And it is best to do this when those laws are being written, either at the ballot or in legislative chambers – not later on.

"We're advocating some fairly modest regulations that would not restrict the ability of adults to use marijuana," MacCoun said.

MacCoun and Mello wrote that child-resistant packaging is necessary but not sufficient – "Older children can easily defeat it." They suggested the following measures:

• Clear labeling and standardization of THC doses and recommended serving sizes
• Warning labels about the risks that edible marijuana poses for overintoxication
• Regulations to ensure that edibles do not look like familiar non-marijuana sweets

Also, the courts may serve as another avenue of regulation, as well as food companies that perceive trademark infringement issues with the edibles. The authors know of at least one such lawsuit already under way, with additional ones on the way.

The federal government does not regulate marijuana edibles, or marijuana at all, they wrote. As a Schedule I controlled substance – which means it has a high potential for abuse – marijuana is not recognized by the federal government for sales or usage.

This is why it is up to the states. "Once you legalize it, you can regulate it," MacCoun said.

Rob MacCoun is interviewed in this video by Stanford Law magazine about the challenges of marijuana legalization.

Media Contact

Robert MacCoun, Stanford Law School: , maccoun@law.stanford.edu

Michelle Mello, Stanford Law School: , mmello@law.stanford.edu

Clifton B. Parker, Stanford News Service: , cbparker@stanford.edu

Paul Kalanithi wrote essays for The New York Times and Stanford Medicine reflecting on being a physician and a patient, the human experience of facing death, and the joy he found despite terminal illness. The Stanford neurosurgeon died of lung cancer March 9. He was 37.

Elizabeth Blake, Habitat for Humanity International’s General Counsel and team leader of its Government Relations and Advocacy operations, spoke to students at the Freeman Spogli Institute on February 25 as part of the Program on Human Rights Winter Speaker Series that examined U.S Human Rights NGO’s and International Human Rights. 

Habitat for Humanity is a Christian not-for-profit organization that started in 1974 with the credo that every person has a human right to secure shelter and tenure of land. Most of its work is overseas, where Habitat for Humanity has built homes for over 3 million people in over 70 countries. Using security of tenure as its cornerstone, it especially assists women and children who are the most vulnerable to homelessness and insecure tenure. Habitat for Humanity has also recently expanded into housing microfinance, water and sanitation, risk reduction and response, and in creating Habitat Resource Centers.    

Blake’s provocative starting salvo was that “NGOs often do harm and frequently waste money.” Instead, they need to work better among themselves and invite partnerships with other NGOs, governments, and multi-lateral partners. This is not simply a moral imperative but also a practical necessity given the size of the U.S. not-for-profit sector, which as an employer of 13 million people is a significant part of the national economy.   

Habitat for Humanity’s approach maximizes its impact abroad through four principles:

1.     Community development starts with its people – people are the true assets;

2.     International community development must be based upon priorities set by the local community itself;

3.     The test of success of any community development is that local capacity is improved; and

4.     “Accompaniment” – a term first coined by Paul Farmer of Partners in Health: Habitat for Humanity works with and works for the people of that community.

This last principle is the most important: Habitat for Humanity has 1 million volunteers each year who work together with communities, or as Blake says, “scraping walls together with people from a local community is a different relationship to handing out soup” and ensures “going from aid to empowerment.”

Responding to questions from Dana Phelps, program associate for the Program on Human Rights and moderator of the event, Blake emphasized the relevance of her corporate background to working in the non-profit world.  As a graduate of Columbia University’s School of Law, she brings her extensive corporate experience to her work at Habitat, and stressed that “non-profits are businesses – a major corporate undertaking” for which her business background had trained her “not to take no for an answer.” 

Blake also explained that while Habitat for Humanity is a multi-denominational Christian organization, it is not registered as a church.  This means it is subject to anti-discrimination laws in its hiring practices and daily operations. It does not engage in prosthletyzing but instead sees itself as a morals-based organization.   

When Blake was further pressed on how “accompaniment” works in practice, she emphasized that Habitat for Humanity does not impose its values and morals on communities, but instead has intentionally slow processes that ensure communities adapt new practices in their own time. For example, when questioned on the impact of gender-equality housing improvements, Blake said, “Habitat for Humanity doesn’t make the first running – it tends to go in to communities that are already taking the running on gender equality.” 

Helen Stacy, Director of the Program on Human Rights