National Security Advisor under Bill Clinton - Sandy Berger InfoTalk on Technology

07:34 | Admin | Jul 27th, 2005 1:03am |

Sandy Berger the former National Security Advisor under President Bill Clinton and sat down for a podcast at the AlwaysOn Innovation Summit to talk about the intersection between technology, national security, and the globalization of economies and government.

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Transcript:
John: We had 911 and now four years later - let’s talk about national security and the global environment. What’s your view on national security shaping the technology agenda?

Sandy: the homeland security part and the protection against terrorists - technology will provide us many of our best defenses like sensor technology and biometric technology. Technology will come from entrepreneurs and the private sector. The federal government resource will advance the private entrepreneurship to provide the kind of technology to protect us. In terms of globalization issue the fact is that we live in a global economy and the distinction between domestic and foreign is not meaningful anymore. You can’t grow as a company very far unless you have an international strategy.

John: War on ideas. Is our national security and technology interdependent and is the war counterproductive?

Sandy: The communication revolution and the capacity for people to get messages quickly around the world and communicate with others no matter where they reside is transformation. It is going to be difficult for China to remain a authoritarian society. As its’ people get more advance economically 340m Chinese now have cell phones 7% of the population use the net and that grew by 18% last year. It’s very hard for government to control and surpress messages when people know what’s happening outside their borders. In China for example text messaging was used when the demonstration against Japan began in China about 2 months ago because Japan wasn’t acknowledging their role in World War II – very emotional issue for the Chinese. They got huge crowds out by text messaging to large groups of people. The Chinese government for a week or two was happy to see those demonstrations because it wanted to take a shot across the bow of Japan. The Chinese then got nervous that the same technology could be used to have mass demonstrations against their own government and so they shut it down.

John: It’s hard to control we’re living in a “social grid” with instant communications and some will say the US is falling behind and this may play into national security policy and homeland security.

Sandy: We have to be at the cutting edge. In this day and age our comparative advantage is not manufacturing, it’s no longer services, and it’s no longer technology by itself. Our comparative advantage is our innovation. It’s our ability to design and develop the next big wave. Our entrepreneurs are thinking outside the box and are at conferences like Always On.

John: Big prediction 5 years out relative to world economy

Sandy: The world economy will be far more interlaced than it is today and that will be a good thing. It is very hard to go to war with a country who’s economy you depend on and vice versa. The more we engage with others both on a personal level, a corporate level, and business level the safer and peaceful the world will be.

Sandy BergerNational Security Global Economies PodTech.net PodTechTechnology Podcast Silicon Valley Technology Podcast John Furrier AlwaysOn Podcasts podcast shows Democrat Podcast PodTech.net

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