Welcome to the Institute.
It is with deep humility and a strong sense of purpose that I formally welcome you to the Institute for the Study of States of Exception (ISSE), a 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization dedicated to advancing scholarship and dialogue on global instances of the misuse and abuse of emergency powers. In real emergencies, “states of exception” are periods when ordinary laws and constitutional rights are temporarily suspended, allowing an executive to act outside of the normal legal framework in order to protect society. ISSE’s focus, however, is on those instances when real or fabricated crisis circumstances are framed as such to conceal intentional democratic backsliding.
This is not to say real emergencies are not occurring around the world–quite the contrary. If the last several decades have taught us anything, it is that crises have become more commonplace, frequently challenging existing norms of democratic governance and rule of law. Whether geopolitical conflicts, a pandemic, or violence- and climate-driven displacements of people, seismic threats to public safety have proliferated. Yet political opportunism with authoritarian characteristics has rapidly evolved in tandem. I spent over two decades working in national security roles within the U.S. government, with over a dozen of those years spent in countries in fragile political states, with the remainder of my service in Washington spent supporting field work in similarly situated contexts.
Why now? Because we live in precarious times. Amid the many global crises we face today, authoritarian leaders and autocrats-in-waiting are increasingly invoking emergency powers, not to manage a crisis but to consolidate power, weaken institutional checks and balances, and stifle legitimate dissent. Their techniques bypass due process, sideline independent judiciaries, and neutralize legislative bodies, rapidly eroding the very institutional guardrails meant to preserve democracy.
The longer these states of exception endure, the harder they are to dismantle. Invariably, such instances lead to the curtailment of fundamental human rights. In the most catastrophic of cases, they create impenetrable zones which the outside world cannot access, evaluate, or effectively respond to, further entrenching authoritarian practices.
This is especially concerning given the increasingly transnational nature of today’s crises. The collective impulse toward securitization in the face of myriad transnational threats creates easy cover for bad actors. Left unchecked, these states of exception become an unconstrained governance infrastructure incompatible with democratic norms.
This is why ISSE exists. We seek to build an informed community dedicated to examining these abuses, raising awareness, and driving necessary discussion across communities of interest around the world. A significant body of scholarship on states of exception already exists across the academic domains of political science, history, legal theory, and philosophy, among others. Our goal is to bring this knowledge together–engaging directly with the diverse thinkers driving this discourse.
But we aim to go even further. We will broaden the conversation beyond academic discussion to include voices and critical perspectives from government and policy practitioners who have confronted these decisions, journalists covering these issues, individuals directly impacted by previous and ongoing abuses, and concerned citizens like you. We believe these valuable intersection points–academic, administrative, legal, investigatory, and personal–will be among ISSE’s greatest strengths.
Given all of this, the stakes could not be higher. ISSE’s mission is not simply to chronicle these abuses, but to identify the specific fault lines where democratic institutions fracture, and to offer blueprints for resilience across as wide an audience as possible. Through research, dialogue, and collaborative engagement, we aim to illuminate risks, inspire deeper understanding of these events, and identify better frameworks for protecting the legal order, especially in times of crisis.
If this speaks to you deeply then please support us with your donations, or volunteer to become a member of our team. And please contribute to our conversations online, join our mailing list, watch our podcasts, participate in our conferences, read our coming journal, and follow all of our postings.
Please join us.
Ed Bogan
Founder/Board Chair
Institute for the Study of States of Exception
