2025/05/09 by Bruce Berkowitz · 1 voice
Arts and Humanities · Social Sciences · #History of Science and Medicine #Intelligence, Security, War Strategy
paper · doi:10.1080/02684527.2025.2497195
openalex publication_date 2025/05/09 · openalex created_date 2025/10/10 · openalex updated_date 2026/06/14
William Playfair (1759–1823) pioneered several ideas accepted as fundamental to intelligence today, including compilations of national capabilities and covert economic warfare. Known primarily as a writer on politics and economics and rediscovered in the twentieth century as the main inventor of statistical graphics, his contributions to the intelligence discipline have been largely overlooked because of the secrecy that intelligence demands and because he operated before the formal establishment of Britain’s intelligence organizations.