Our Cause

Global scale. All hazards.

Global Shield is an international advocacy organization dedicated to reducing all forms of global catastrophic risk.

We believe that humanity’s prospects for security and flourishing depend on today’s governments and global leaders adopting effective policies to reduce the risk of global catastrophe. It will take all of us, which is why Global Shield works all over the world to research, develop, and successfully advocate for the most effective policies to reduce global catastrophic risk.

We also believe that the risk of global catastrophe comes from a range of uncertain and complex threats. Preventing and preparing for all forms of risk enables governments to reduce as a whole. We call this the all-hazards approach. Global Shield works across all these threats, finding synergistic solutions that apply across threats and building a vast coalition of advocates working to ensure a secure and flourishing future.

Our theory of change

Government policy is critical to reducing global risk.

The biggest challenges facing the world over the coming decades simply cannot be resolved or reduced without government buy-in, support, and policy. This is especially true for global catastrophic risk, which will affect many countries. And it will almost certainly require some international cooperation. Governments have the mandate, capabilities, resourcing, and power to manage the risk humanity faces. Moreover, national government policies directly or indirectly contribute to the risk that need reducing. For example, states are the key driver of nuclear and biological weapons, and, by extension, critical in reducing the risk.

Additionally, many governments are already developing and implementing policies on issues such as artificial intelligence, pandemics, synthetic biology, and climate change. The only way to ensure these policies take these grave threats into account is for people with a combination of global catastrophic risk and policy experience to be involved in advocacy. Without the contribution from an organization like Global Shield, the policies will be heavily shaped by other stakeholders who focus on other opportunities and threats, particularly due to policymakers’ significant limitations in time and subject-matter expertise.

The urgency of GCR requires advocacy to scale quickly around the world.

Global catastrophic risk is increasing –particularly due to the threats of advanced technologies, climate change, and weapons of mass destruction –and policymakers are taking notice. This means the next five to ten years will be especially important to begin advocacy efforts that can scale quickly. However, the current growth trajectory of advocacy efforts will not meet the policy demand nor the scale of the challenge. This mismatch will only worsen due to the difficulty of establishing standalone policy advocacy efforts. Individuals and organizations around the world must be well-positioned to engage policymakers with increasing frequency and sophistication. Policy windows could emerge quickly anywhere in the world, involving any one of the global catastrophic threats. Open letters and signed statements, popular or viral outreach efforts, the personal interests of powerful policymakers, and real-world incidents can all create wide but short-lived opportunities to shape policy within countries.

Many countries on all continents have role to play.

To successfully reduce global catastrophic risk, governments of all types – high-income or low-income, North or South, small or large, democracy or otherwise – must take action. Many nations could be global leaders on specific threats and hazards and champion efforts to reduce the risk on a global scale. On major global challenges – such as non-proliferation, environmental protection and human rights – small countries and middle powers have been the critical champions on the global stage. And policy change in one country can have ripple effects across the world. Therefore, advocates on the ground in those locations are needed to shape and engage policy. They will make sure that policies address the issues most relevant to their communities and cultures, while also working in conjunction with bilateral partners, regional institutions and multilateral regimes to shape the behavior of other countries.

Advocating with an all-hazards approach enables greater coalition building and political support.

Global Shield focuses on the full range of global catastrophic threats to build more extensive policy and political coalitions than any threat-specific advocacy group could ever achieve. More political will and power are inherently aggregated by unifying interested policymakers into a cohort that can agree on policies that reduce many or all possible threats. By focusing on all hazards and threats, Global Shield can build and grow this network from one policy issue to the next. Where Global Shield scores a policy win on one threat, it opens doors for the next time we are seeking to shape policy for reducing another catastrophic threat. We can use those relationships and credibility for a policy window that opens for a different issue relevant to global catastrophic risk.

All-hazards policy is a neglected yet powerful approach for reducing global catastrophic risk.

From a policy perspective, an all-hazards approach enables a broader set of policy responses that do not treat the threats and hazards separately. Of course, many of the threats, whether that be nuclear weapons, biotechnology or artificial intelligence, might require specific interventions. Still, a range of policies can be adopted that reduce global catastrophic as a whole. An all-hazards approach also allows for the consideration of policies that impact multiple threats. Certain policies that address planning, preparedness and response can be applicable across many scenarios. An all-hazards approach accounts for the intersection of multiple threats. And it is a failsafe for unknown, emerging or mis-prioritized threats where threat-specific policies are not available or possible.