Creating a Code of Ethics for Intelligence Analysis

Stephen Marrin
Assistant Professor
Intelligence Studies Department
Mercyhurst College
Erie, PA 16546
smarrin@mercyhurst.edu
Paper Prepared for Roundtable on Intelligence Ethics #3

International Studies Association Conference

Chicago, IL
2 March 2007
Intelligence analysis is currently professionalizing, but a corresponding code of ethics--a
necessary component of every profession--is still in rudimentary stages. Before an
effective code of ethics can be created, analysts and ethicists will have to address the
multiple entities that the analyst has ethical obligations to, and resolve the dilemma
regarding what to do when the interests of those entities conflict.

In a prior article addressing the nature of intelligence analysis professionalization and the
role that a code of ethics plays in this process,1 my co-author—Dr. Jonathan Clemente—
and I advocate the creation of an overarching American Intelligence Analysis Association
(AIAA) modeled on the American Medical Association. We used the AMA as a model
because it played an important in the professionalization of medicine, and we believe the
AIAA could play a similar role for intelligence analysis.

As part of our argument, we observe that an important function of the AIAA would be to
develop a code of ethics for intelligence analysts because “many different kinds of
intelligence analysts—both within and between organizations—can be bound together
through a single code of ethics that can be standardized across the broader intelligence
analysis community.”2 In this way, the code of ethics would “provide a mechanism for
integrating the different intelligence analysis disciplines and specialties into a coherent
whole” in the same way that the AMA’s code of ethics dedicated to improving the health
of the patient provides a mechanism for binding its different specialties together.3

We suggest the AIAA would be an effective way to bring together intelligence analysts
from the national security, law enforcement and business intelligence arenas into a single
coherent profession. An analytic profession is not the only kind of profession that could
develop out of the broader intelligence community, but it is one of them. As Michael
Davis, an expert in professional ethics, observes, “Each profession is a continuing
discussion. . . . To join a profession is, in part, to enter that discussion, gaining some
control over a common enterprise by giving up the right to act as a mere individual.”4

Accordingly, defining the characteristics of the participants in the discussions can be an

important determining factor in the direction of the future professionalization process.
Specifically, intelligence analysis could be considered a profession because its
practitioners use similar techniques to achieve the same goal: providing information to
improve decisionmaking in all of their respective fields.

As of today, however, the code of ethics for intelligence analysts is still quite
rudimentary, consisting in essence of independence and objectivity. But “the CIA has
begun articulating a code of ethics for intelligence analysts based on the doctrine
1
For example, see Marrin and Clemente’s “Modeling an Intelligence Analysis Profession on Medicine.”
International Journal of Intelligence and Counterintelligence. Vol. 19. No. 4. (Winter 2006-2007). 642-665.
Also see: Marrin’s “Intelligence Analysis: Turning a Craft into a Profession.” Proceedings of the 2005
International Conference on Intelligence Analysis. McLean, Virginia. May 2005.
2
Marrin and Clemente, “Modeling…” 657-658.
3
Marrin and Clemente, “Modeling..”, 657.
4
Michael Davis. Codes of Ethics, Professions, and Conflict of Interest. Professional Ethics. V1N1&2. 190.

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espoused by Sherman Kent in the 1950s and 1960s. …Frans Bax, the founding Dean of
the CIA’s Kent School, enumerated a list of principles for intelligence analysis, including
a focus on policymaker concerns, avoidance of a personal policy agenda, intellectual
rigor, a conscious effort to avoid analytical bias, and a willingness to consider other
judgments.5 In sum, the principles form a rudimentary code of ethics that all intelligence
analysts should follow as they do their analysis.”6

Recent “additional work on the applicability of ethics to intelligence analysis—including

the derivation of ethical principles and the development of a professional code of ethics
—is being done by” members of the International Intelligence Ethics Association
(IIEA).7 In addition, the January 2007 Intelligence Community Directive Number 200--
which articulates the principles that govern the ODNI’s oversight of intelligence
community analysis--appears to be an extension of the Kent School’s analytic principles,
thereby expanding and deepening the analytic code.8

One issue that has not yet been addressed is the question of which “client” the analyst has
the greatest obligation to. Dr. Clemente and I have pointed out that a “characteristic of
every profession is a distinctive code of ethics which promulgates ideals of service to a
society’’9 as well as to the client, who, in the case of intelligence analysis, is the decision
maker. But the nature of the code can matter a great deal in terms of the autonomy of the
intelligence analyst and his or her relationship with decision makers.

Specifically, the agency model ‘‘takes the professional to be the assigned agent of the
will or decisions of the client . . . who directs the professional to achieve the client’s
aims’’ within constraints defined by the norms of the profession.10 By way of contrast,
the fiduciary model ‘‘sees the professional as acting in the best interest or for the benefit
of the client’’ with ‘‘authority to act . . . ceded to the professional’’ based on trust.11 In
the absence of a formal code of ethics, controversies have continued to arise over the
appropriate relationship between intelligence and decisionmaking.”12

Most intelligence analysts appear to embrace a fiduciary model, and for the most part so
do most decision makers. But complications for analysts arise when either the decision
maker embraces the agency model—in which the analyst is perceived to be on the staff of
the decision maker, and will provide analysis that supports his or her policy preferences

5
Jack Davis, ‘‘Sherman Kent and the Profession of Intelligence Analysis.’’ The Sherman Kent Center for
Intelligence Analysis, Occasional Papers, Volume 1, Number 5, November 2002. The entire list of these
principles can be found in Marrin’s “CIA’s Kent School: Improving Training for New Analysts.”
International Journal of Intelligence and Counterintelligence. Vol. 16. No. 4. (2003). 630-631.
6
Marrin and Clemente. “Modeling….” 652.
7
Marrin and Clemente, “Modeling…”, 652. Also see the IIEA website at: http://intelligence-ethics.org/
8
For an adaptation of ICD 200 into a code of ethics, see: John Lunstroth. “Analyst’s Code of Ethics.”
Unpublished paper. February 23, 2007.
9
Stephen F. Barker, ‘‘What is a Profession?,’’ Professional Ethics, Vol. 1, Nos. 1&2, 1992, pp. 73–100.
10
Carol Gould, ‘‘New Paradigms in Professional Ethics.’’ Professional Ethics, V1, N1&2, 1992. 144–45.
11
Ibid.
12
Marrin and Clemente. “Modeling…” 648.

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—or when the decision makers may not be using the intelligence analysis in ways that
support the analyst’s other obligations to society.

This latter point raises a separate question regarding who the ultimate ‘client’ of the
analyst is. The analyst writes for the decision maker, but is the focus on the needs of the
decision maker, or the people in whose interests the decision maker is acting? In the
national security context, is the ultimate client the national security decision maker or the
American people writ large? And are there any implications in being able to speak ‘truth
to power’ depending on whom the analyst’s primary obligation is to?

In the national security context, the obligations to society are directly subsumed under the
obligation that the decision maker—elected or appointed—has to the people of the
country to whom his or her service is ultimately in the interest of. In a democracy, the
government has an obligation to act in the interest of the people. But if the decision
makers appear to be trying to advance a more parochial interest that does not appear to be
on behalf of the people, does the analyst have any obligation to inform them of how
decision makers may be ignoring or misusing the analysis they are producing?

There are no hard and fast answers to these questions. Rather, the answers must be
developed organically through continued discussions within the ranks of intelligence
analysts regarding the kind of code of ethics that will enable them to support their
decision making client while at the same time ensuring that support is consistent with
their other obligations to the broader society.

This emphasis on discussion and the participation of the practitioner also highlights the
importance of professional associations as places where these kinds of discussions can
take place. One way to professionalize intelligence analysis at the national level would be
to have the Office of the Director of National Intelligence set standards for intelligence
analysts across the entire intelligence community, focusing on recruitment, hiring,
training, development, and all the other areas of professional practice—including the
development of a code of ethics. And this is already happening to some degree.

However, the downside of this kind of top-down professionalization process is that it

would likely be evolutionary--by building on programs and practices already in
existence-- and would not provide a mechanism for improving intelligence analysis at the
state or local levels or in private industry. So while this method could work for one
particular group of intelligence analysts—those at the national level under the authority
of the DNI--it doesn’t address the needs of the occupation more broadly.

Instead, the needs of the occupation as a whole are better addressed not by any authority,
but bottom-up by the practitioners themselves. If a code of ethics for intelligence analysis
is developed, the practitioners are the ones who should develop it, preferably within the
framework of a professional association. And as professional discussions continue, the
practitioners themselves will be able to decide what they want their code of ethics to be,
and how to balance their obligations to the decision maker as well as to the society at
large.