2025/09/30 by Jack Duffield · 2 voices
Social Sciences · #Global Peace and Security Dynamics #Political Conflict and Governance #Peacebuilding and International Security
paper · pdf · doi:10.1080/02684527.2025.2561505
openalex publication_date 2025/09/30 · openalex created_date 2025/10/10 · openalex updated_date 2026/06/14
This study argues that Anglocentrism in the study of covert action is driven by factors unique to the discipline, requiring novel mitigations which differ from those already recommended for wider international relations and the social sciences. To demonstrate this, it presents a systematic literature review of 401 journal articles on covert action, estimated to represent over 80 per cent of published research on the subject. The findings highlight an overwhelming Anglocentrism, with 86 per cent of studies focusing exclusively on Western states and significantly higher citation rates for Western-focused research, acutely focused on the USA and UK. This is notably higher than comparable benchmark datasets from international relations and the social sciences. The study finds that an ‘evidence bias’ proposed by Cormac is supported by available data but does not fully account for all observed Anglocentrism. In addition, it argues that conceptual biases built around highly Westernised terminology and categorisations create unconscious barriers to scholarship of non-Western covert action. It proposes measures including a comparative approach to analysis and a composite framework for definitions to address these specific biases. Adopting these measures will allow scholars to broaden the study of covert action beyond its present Anglocentric research base.