RAND conducts a broad array of national security research for the U.S. Department of Defense and allied ministries of defense. RAND's three U.S. federally funded research and development centers (FFRDCs) explore topics from acquisition and technology to personnel and readiness.
This article enumerates challenges facing efforts to inform, influence, and persuade in pursuit of national policy objectives first for the U.S. government in general, and then specific to the Department of Defense.
Open innovation has gained increased attention as a potential paradigm for improving innovation performance. This paper addresses crowdsourcing, an under-researched type of open innovation that is often enabled by the web.
Collaborative care models for depression designed and implemented by VA primary care practices using evidence based quality improvement increased patients' use of antidepressants.
About one-third of veterans report using alcohol, street drugs, or medication prescribed for others to manage pain.
Longitudinal studies examining care for seriously ill patients are needed to understand patients' experience of illness, evaluate interventions, and improve quality of care. Unfortunately, such studies face substantial methodological challenges. This article describes such challenges and the strategies used to overcome them in a successfully implemented palliative care intervention trial for veterans.
Good COIN practices tend to "run in packs" and the balance of selected good and bad practices predicts insurgency outcomes. Data confirm the importance of popular support, but show that the ability to interdict tangible support (such as new personnel, materiel, and financing) is the single best predictor of COIN force success.
This article reviews the research literature on group-level phenomena that are most relevant to the work of intelligence analysts.
Discusses the demonstrated efficacy of the COIN principles embodied in FM 3-24, historical evicence and data collected from 30 case studies for recent resolved insurgencies. The vast majority of governments and COIN forces that adhered to multiple tenets of the field manual prevailed over the insurgencies they opposed.
The 15 % of veterans with mental health illness accounted for about one-third of total VA costs, mostly for non-mental health conditions. VA quality of care was generally better than care in private plans, but quality varied across VA regions.
This study simulated the social costs and savings of providing universal access to care for depression and PTSD to troops returning from Operations Enduring Freedom and Iraqi Freedom.
Despite routine pain screening in VA, providers seldom documented elements considered important to evaluation and treatment of pain.
Surveys the subject of air power as an area of research in international security studies and provides a bibliography of significant works and useful online resources.
Discusses military transformation across the eight years of the George W. Bush administration, particularly those in which Donald Rumsfeld was secretary of defense.
Much of the current debate concerning civil liberties and security is adversarial, and little robust research data informs these arguments.This paper outlines the results of a study that attempts to objectively understand the real privacy, liberty and security trade-offs made by individuals, so that policymakers can be better informed about the preferences of individuals with regard to these important issues.
Peer support techniciansindividuals recovering from mental health problemsand clinicians at the VA have developed consensus about key elements of the peer support technician role.
Interventions developed to remove barriers to mental health care for returning veterans should address motivation for seeking treatment as well as traditionally targeted structural barriers.
The literature on conflict and terrorism has paid little attention to the economic costs of terrorism for the perpetrators. This article aims to fill that gap by examining the economic costs of harboring suicide terror attacks.
This paper describes the conceptual framework and research design of a national evaluation of the quality of mental healthcare provided to veterans by the Veterans Health Administration, and present results on the reported availability of evidence-based practices.
Medical decision making in the context of serious illness ideally involves a patient who understands his or her condition and prognosis and can effectively formulate and communicate his or her care preferences.
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