The Heyday of Britain’s Cold War Think Tank: Brian Crozier and the Institute for the Study of Conflict, 1970–79

Abstract

In the United Kingdom, the think-tank community devoted to foreign and security policy issues has for decades been dominated by Chatham House, the International Institute for Strategic Studies (IISS) and the Royal United Services Institute (RUSI). However, beginning in the 1970s, this trio nearly became a foursome due to the emergence of the Institute for the Study of Conflict (ISC), headed by the highly controversial Cold War activist Brian Crozier. Officially, the ISC was created to conduct unbiased research into the “social, economic, political and military causes and manifestations of unrest and conflict throughout the world”.1 Unofficially, the Institute’s research and activities were very much shaped by its politically active director. Crozier admitted in his autobiography that “Throughout my period as Director, the ISC was involved in exposing the fallacies of détente and warning the West of the dangers inherent in a policy of illusion.”2 Given Crozier’s anti-Soviet and anti-détente views, as well as his reputation as a frontman for the CIA, the ISC as a whole became a target of the Left. For instance, in their book The “Terrorism” Industry, Edward Herman and Gerry O’Sullivan note that the ISC “provides an especially well-documented case study of the use of a purportedly ‘independent’ institute as a front for propaganda operations of a hidden intelligence agency and corporate sponsors”.3