The history of intelligence. Future prospects

Abstract

Recently, several flaws in the intelligence studies have been designated. It lacksa proper body of knowledge, it lacks theories, and it fails to be ‘cumulative’.In order to become more academic, intelligence studies should therefore build‘more theories’, it is often heard. In this article, it is argued that in addition tothis social scientific answer, historians should come up with their own solutions.They can contribute to a body of knowledge and interact with the historiography;however, for this purpose, they have to transcend the particular details of theirfindings, and interpret their results in the light of a set of core questions orthemes, in order to let other benefit from their work.