Yemen

Foreign Policy Research Institute (FPRI)

In April 2011, FPRI posted the most extensive survey done to date of Yemen’s population. Conducted by Glevum Associates, a firm run by FPRI Senior Fellow Andrew Garfield, the survey indicated a disquieting level of support for Al Qaeda among Yemen’s populous as well as a profound resistance to US intervention in the country.

In response to the enormous interest in the survey, and rising tensions in the country, FPRI brought together a group of experts to discuss the survey as well as recent developments, including the reported shift in US policy toward a public role in easing Yemen’s President out of office despite his cooperation in fighting Al Qaeda.

Audio

• Dowmload 2011 Yemen Stability Survey (40 pages, 1.12 MB )

Of Related interest

• From Periphery to Core: Foreign Fighters and the Evolution of Al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula. Christopher Swift

About the Panelists

Andrew Garfield is a Senior Fellow at the Foreign Policy Reseearch Institute and founder of Glevum Associates, which conducts extensive face-to-face social science research in several countries on behalf of the Department of Defense and other clients. He is former European Director of the Terrorism Research Center, Deputy Director of International Policy Institute (IPI) at King’s College London, and Senior Director of Influence and Insight for the Lincoln Group. Mr. Garfield is also a former senior British military then civilian intelligence officer and former senior policy advisor at the UK Ministry of Defense. While serving in the UK Defense Intelligence Staff he led two major studies that reviewed key aspects of that organization’s approach to post-Cold War intelligence analysis and recommended radical changes to policy and organization that were subsequently implemented in full. After moving into academia with King’s College London, he devised and successfully led three major projects for the U.S. Department of Defense focusing on the terrorist threat; likely adversary asymmetric warfare strategies; and the development of U.S. strategic influence operations and cultural intelligence.

Christopher Swift is an attorney and political scientist specializing in international law and contemporary armed conflict. A fellow at the University of Virginia Law School’s Center for International Security Law, he has travelled to Afghanistan, the Middle East, and the former Soviet Union to examine al-Qaeda’s relationships with indigenous Muslim insurgencies. Dr. Swift’s legal practice focuses on complex international disputes, compliance with U.S. foreign trade and investment laws, and various aspects of public and private international law. Prior to joining the University of Virginia, he served in the U.S. Treasury Department’s Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC), where he enforced economic sanctions programs targeting terrorist syndicates, weapons proliferators, and other specially designated entities. Between 2006 and 2007, he served an international law fellow at the U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom, where he examined armed conflict and sectarian violence in Iraq. He was previously affiliated with organizations including Freedom House, where he worked on Russian affairs, and the Center for Strategic & International Studies, where he served as an aide to former national security advisor Zbigniew Brzezinski. A term member of the Council on Foreign Relations,

Dr. Swift is the author of The Fighting Vanguard: Local Insurgencies in the Global Jihad, which addresses the deficiencies in, and the growing need to, distinguish between different strains of Islamic militancy. He holds an A.B. in Government and History from Dartmouth College, a M.St. in International Relations of the University of Cambridge, and a J.D. from Georgetown University. He successfully defended his Ph.D. thesis in Politics & International Studies at the University of Cambridge in October 2010.

Curtis Cobb is a sociologist who does research on attitude formation, change, and effects, on the psychology of political behavior, and on survey research methods. He is a research scientist at Glevum Associates, LLC. Cobb received his B.A. degree in psychology from the University of Southern California, an M.A. from Columbia University, and his PhD in sociology from Stanford University. Prior to graduate school, he was a policy and budget consultant to the California State Senate. He has lectured on survey methodology at universities and for corporations and has served as a survey consultant to such organizations as the National Science Foundation, American Bar Foundation, and Stanford University. He has collaborated on surveys with the Associated Press, Yahoo News, and the Los Angeles Times.

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