Providing expert coverage and analysis on issues threatening the planet https://grants.dudleytdoughertyfoundation.org/proposals-2020/providing-expert-coverage-and-analysis-on-issues-threatening-the-planet https://grants.dudleytdoughertyfoundation.org/@@site-logo/sitelogo-75x75.png

Providing expert coverage and analysis on issues threatening the planet

Additional Information
Used for	The Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists respectfully requests $10,000 from The Dudley T. Dougherty Foundation to support its continuing efforts to provide expert coverage and analysis on the issues that threaten the safety of the planet. The grant will be used to help Bulletin efforts to increase monthly columnists focused on nuclear risk, climate change, and disruptive technology, and to publish a Special Issue of the magazine, free and open to the public for two months, featuring experts on ways to reduce the risks of nuclear war, and analysis of the size and cost of the US nuclear arsenal.
Benefits	The Bulletin equips the public, policymakers, and scientists with the information needed to reduce man-made threats to our existence. The Bulletin is positioned to have an outsized impact on engaging our audience, providing them with unrivaled analysis, and supporting their efforts to act. At this moment of renewed civic activism, a raging global pandemic, and considerable global political change, the Bulletin’s efforts are urgently needed to combat the rise of “fake news,” restore the role of science and expertise, and provide fact-based reporting on the issue effecting the safety and security of our planet.
Proposal Description	At this moment of renewed civic activism, a raging global pandemic, and considerable global political change, the Bulletin’s efforts are urgently needed to combat the rise of “fake news,” restore the role of science and expertise, and provide fact-based reporting on the issue effecting the safety and security of our planet. Our audience is finding us in greater numbers, and Bulletin content and public conversation, at multiple points of engagement, are promoting advocacy and action. The Bulletin was founded 75 years ago by the world’s most influential scientists, including Albert Einstein, Robert Oppenheimer, Hans Bethe, among others. Their goals, according to founding editor Eugene Rabinowitch were three-fold: to educate the public about the true risks of nuclear energy; to create a space for scientists to emerge from the ivory tower of academia and engage in the policy process in areas where they had a unique ability to contribute; and, perhaps most importantly, to manage “the dangerous presents of Pandora’s Box of modern science.” All three goals remain important today. The Bulletin asks how these goals balance against a potential $1.8 trillion expansion of nuclear weapons over the next 30 years - a ludicrous investment unnecessary from a military standpoint, that reveals a highly regrettable insufficiency of federal response to the current triple threat of a global pandemic, economic disaster, and public outrage of Black Lives Matter and racial inequality. Is it too much to expose these disastrous choices and demand our government spends wisely and spends responsibly? Seventy-five years after the Bulletin’s founding, scientific advancement continues to present tough challenges that require new political and ethical responses. The convergence of cyber, artificial intelligence, biological threats, nuclear risk, and climate change requires serious and intense attention. The Bulletin is the only outlet devoted to the study of existential threats that was established to specifically engage the public. This is why audiences around the world turn to the Bulletin during times of significant stress, including the nuclear standoff between North Korea and the United States in 2017, the wildfires in Australia in early 2020, and the current global pandemic. In March of 2020, more than a million visitors came to the Bulletin’s website to better understand the coronavirus and how to respond. Nearly as many visited in April. Over the last twelve months, the Bulletin has seen traffic to its content jump from an average of 240,000 to 450,000 pageviews per month. The Bulletin does not take its role lightly, nor does it rest on its track record of bringing the voices of leading experts to the front lines of civic discourse. We constantly sift through the science and data, consider how issues merge and combine to result in new and sometimes greater threats, and boldly state our position on the possibilities of global disaster and how best to avert it. To continue to engage our growing audience, the Bulletin is rethinking what it means to be a 21st century media organization. To be responsible, trustworthy, and reflect the views and values of a diverse audience, the Bulletin is committed to diversity within our organization and leadership, advocating for diversity in the broader fields of peace and security, and we have begun focusing time and resources to codify and put into practice diversity, equity, and inclusion policies and initiatives. This will not be easy nor quick, and we recognize we have a long way to go. At our founding in 1945, a magazine was the most effective way to reach a growing and engaged audience. Today, engagement requires strong content, and technology equips us with the ability to provide opportunities for our followers to engage directly with our experts and contributors – adding substantial support to their local advocacy efforts for a safer more secure future. We have launched a Bulletin store, that helps engage the younger generation by allowing them to contribute to the Bulletin and wear their commitment to our mission with pride. We have also started hosting teleconferences and webinars that are free of charge for those supporters who want to engage our content at a deeper level. All of these activities make the Bulletin more accessible, draw greater numbers and help broaden our impact. Below are some recent examples of the eight free webinars that have attracted over 2000 registrations and nearly 800 attendees from around the world, they include: • A February 11, 2020 global teleconference on the coronavirus with Bulletin Science and Security Board members Asha George, Executive Director of the Bipartisan Commission on Biodefense, and Suzet McKinney, CEO/Executive Director of the Illinois Medical District, and moderated by Bulletin president and CEO Rachel Bronson. • A March 2, 2020 global teleconference with authors from the Bulletin’s special magazine edition, “Nuclear Weapons Policy and the U.S. Presidential Election” featuring Bulletin editor-in-chief, John Mecklin who moderated a conversation between John P. Holdren, former science advisor to President Obama, and Alexandra Bell, senior policy director at the Center for Arms Control & Non-Proliferation. • A July 14th 2020 global webinar, hosted two days before the 75th anniversary of Trinity, the first ever test of nuclear weapons, on “The Button,” featuring William J. Perry, former US Secretary of Defense and Chair of the Bulletin Board of Sponsors; Tom Collina, Policy Director, Ploughshares Fund; and moderated by Kennette Benedict, Senior Advisor to the Bulletin. Over 500 registered, many of them leading experts, academics, activists, and policy makers from all over the world. • An August 3, 2020 global webinar held three days before the 75th anniversary of the dropping of the atomic bomb on Hiroshima, on “Why the Dropping of the Atomic Bomb on Hiroshima Would be Illegal Today,” with Bulletin Science and Security Board member Scott Sagan, Stanford professor Allan Werner, and moderated by Bulletin columnist Sara Kutchesfahani. Other efforts to engage audiences directly have included: • Creating a virtual reality tour of the “Turn Back the Clock” exhibit, that was on display for two years at Chicago’s renowned Museum of Science and Industry, to support newly minted homeschooling parents, suddenly at home because of the coronavirus, with educational material for the whole family. Nearly 2,000 visitors took the virtual tour within the first two days after its release. • Bulletin President and CEO, Rachel Bronson, was in Iowa, ahead of the state’s Democratic caucuses and in partnership with the Nuclear Threat Initiative (NTI), to make the case why nuclear weapons should be a focus in the 2020 campaign. Bronson’s visit, and argument, were featured in press throughout the state including the Iowa City Press-Citizen, Cedar Rapids Gazette and Des Moines Register. The Bulletin’s strategic choices have put it at the center of a fast-changing digital public square that is advocating for change. Our global audience is looking for reputable evidence-based answers to long-standing and emerging technical challenges. We are determined to meet our growing audience with the content they are looking for, on the platforms they are using, and at the moment that they want it. We are grateful to The Dudley T. Dougherty Foundation for the support that has helped us grow to our current levels. With additional support, we expect to continue this growth trajectory and increase the Bulletin’s offerings and impact. The Bulletin Audience With the help of The Dudley T. Dougherty Foundation, the Bulletin’s audience has grown 250 percent over the last five years. Half of our audience is younger than 35, and our gender demographic has shifted from 25% to 35% female. Total visits, unique visitors and pageviews from January through August ‘20 were already more than double the same period in ’19 – and each month continues to outpace the previous year’s comparison. The 2020 Doomsday Clock announcement drove monthly pageviews above 1 million, and drew 7,580 earned media stories in the first two weeks, and coverage of the COVID-19 pandemic continues to draw huge traffic, over one million visitors in March and nearly that number in April, and continues to perform above average each month. Activities Supported by the Grant Throughout 2021, our 75th anniversary year, we plan to build on past successes to continue to engage and grow our audience, remaining intensely focused on a younger, more diverse, global audience. As next steps in our effort, we will: 1. Significantly increase monthly columnists focused on nuclear risk, climate change, and disruptive technology The Bulletin seeks to expand monthly columnists to include three columnists in each of its key fields: nuclear risk, climate change, and disruptive technology. Funding would support: • increasing compensation for two existing columnists in nuclear risk to fair and equitable rates; • hiring and compensating one new columnist in nuclear risk; • and hire and compensate two new columnists in disruptive technology. The Bulletin will continue to recruit younger voices from underrepresented communities, with varied experiences, public and private positions, and approaches to the issues. The Bulletin’s unique position at the center of the digital public square can serve as a platform to promote new, diverse voices writing on nuclear risk and disruptive technology. Currently, the Bulletin provides a platform for several leading experts in these areas: Laura Kahn on bio-security, Duyeon Kim and Sara Kutchesfahani on nuclear risk, Michael Horowitiz and his colleagues at the Perry World Center on Disruptive technology. Their columns bring fresh insights and help to draw and maintain a dedicated audience. We are not able to compensate them appropriately, and we would like to do so as we grow this effort. To meet the demands of a diverse audience we need to expand the Bulletin’s monthly columns on nuclear risk, climate change, and disruptive technology – there are simply too many issues and perspectives we are leaving on the table to responsibly and equitably reflect a diverse readership. This expansion also reflects the Bulletin’s dedication to addressing the lack of diversity in science and technology reporting, and in the broader fields in general. We intend to actively recruit and compensate a broad range of leading experts who will bring fresh analysis to issues concerning the safety of our planet. 2. Publish a Special 2021 issue of the magazine, free and open to the public for two months, featuring experts on ways to reduce the risks of nuclear war and analysis of the size and cost of the US nuclear arsenal. Early in 2021, the Bulletin will publish a special issue of its bimonthly magazine, free and open to the public for two months, that offers fact-based arguments and advice to the incoming US president about nuclear weapons, climate change, and other major global risks, including the current pandemic and mitigating future potential crises. In the nuclear policy portion of the issue, prominent and emerging experts will write both short- and long-form articles about ways to reduce the risks of nuclear war and about the size and cost of the US nuclear arsenal. The issue will assert, generally, that cost reductions in nuclear and other defense programs are not only required of the United States, but the most logical step to provide much needed funding to deal successfully with climate change, pandemics, and other emerging global threats that are becoming increasingly visible as the 21st century matures. Conclusion The media landscape in which the Bulletin operates is changing. Every think tank maintains its own platforms to disseminate information to a large audience. Issue-based organizations can dive deep on each of the Bulletin’s core issue-areas and often have resident experts who can produce content and address constituent queries. Nonetheless, the Bulletin is positioned to have an outsized impact on engaging the interested public, providing them with unrivaled analysis, and supporting their efforts to act. But we cannot do it without growing our own activities. If not now, when?