The Failure To Confront: How The Fear of Confrontation Enables Espionage In The United States Intelligence Community

This thesis addresses the following research question: How is espionage enabled in the United States Intelligence Community? The thesis concludes that the answer to this question is twofold. First, espionage is enabled by the failure of managers and coworkers to confront the activities of their fellow employees when those activities might be indicative of espionage. Second, professionals within the Intelligence Community have significantly more difficulty with confrontation than do groups outside of the IC. Research indicates that the reason behind the failure to confront espionage is a complex combination of entrenched bureaucratic practices and the innate human tendency to avoid confrontation.