Blind Trust

A provocative exploration of the corrosive impact of secrecy on Australian intelligence organizations' effectiveness and operations

Secrecy is central to popular understandings of intelligence and how intelligence services operate. Intelligence agencies generally resist oversight and transparency, arguing that decreases in secrecy come at the cost of intelligence efficacy.

In Blind Trust, Melanie Brand challenges this view. Using archival research examining the role, functions, and public perceptions of the Australian Security Intelligence Organization (ASIO), she shows that operating in secrecy did not ensure intelligence efficacy in Cold War Australia. With little oversight from the government, ASIO's products became increasingly irrelevant to policymakers, and politicians lost sight of ASIO's value. With no external guidance or requirement to be accountable for its actions, secrecy allowed ASIO's staff to break the law and become involved in overtly partisan affairs. Finally, excessive secrecy asks for society's blind trust in an intelligence service, and ASIO lost the public's trust during the Cold War because it was able, for a time, to cover up its mistakes and exceed its authority.

This groundbreaking history of Australia's domestic spy agency is relevant to the security experiences of other democratic nation-states. Blind Trust will inform students, scholars, and professionals in the fields of intelligence studies, international relations, security studies, and history.