Warren Pulley

Founder & Executive Director · Island Security Policy Institute · 2026

Author profile · ORCID: 0009-0007-8694-0149 · SSRN

ISPI's research is organized across four categories and 21 specific research topics — calibrated to the structural conditions of island communities that continental policy frameworks were not designed to address. Each topic represents a specific research gap that ISPI has either already addressed with published research or is actively developing frameworks for. The ISPI Policy Advisor can engage any of these 21 topics in depth.

Category 01

Core Security

1.1

Insider Threat & Workplace Security

How should a 22-person Pacific Island customs agency implement an insider threat framework when workforce irreplaceability makes segregated access administration structurally impossible?

1.2

Behavioral Threat Assessment

What BTAM calibration adjustments are required for Pacific Islander and Native Hawaiian cultural communication norms that standard ATAP frameworks do not account for?

1.3

Active Threat Response Policy

How should island campus and institutional active threat protocols be designed for 45-minute law enforcement response times rather than the 7-minute continental assumption?

1.4

Critical Infrastructure Protection

What port, airport, power grid, and water system security framework applies to island single-point infrastructure where geographic redundancy does not exist?

1.5

Port & Maritime Security

How does supply chain singularity change maritime security requirements for island communities where one port closure stops all resupply?

1.6

Executive & Diplomatic Security

What anticipatory threat assessment frameworks apply to island compound security environments where the threat population is geographically contained and socially connected?

Category 02

Law Enforcement & Justice

2.1

Public Safety Workforce Development

Why is HPD's staffing crisis a retention failure rather than a recruitment failure, and what specific non-salary interventions have the strongest documented evidence for island law enforcement markets?

2.2

Community Policing in Island Jurisdictions

How should community policing be structured in Pacific Island jurisdictions where officer-community embeddedness is total and the standard officer-community distance assumption does not apply?

2.3

Human Trafficking & Exploitation Policy

What island-specific factors make Pacific trafficking networks structurally different from continental patterns, and what enforcement frameworks account for port vulnerability as a primary trafficking pathway?

2.4

Drug Networks & Community Impact

How has the Pacific drug trafficking surge — 17 tonnes seized in 2026 versus 4.6 tonnes for all of 2025 — changed the community safety threat profile for Pacific Island jurisdictions?

2.5

Juvenile Justice & Youth Intervention

Why are Native Hawaiian and Pacific Islander youth overrepresented in Hawaii's juvenile justice system, and what evidence-based island-specific interventions exist that are not being implemented?

Category 03

Emergency Management

3.1

Emergency Preparedness & Island Resilience

What are the five framework failures the Lahaina wildfire response reveals in continental emergency management applied to island environments, and what island-specific alternatives exist?

3.2

Continuity of Operations Planning

How should island institutions design COOP frameworks when continental assumptions about mutual aid, redundant infrastructure, and resource transit times do not hold?

3.3

Disaster Recovery & Community Resilience

What makes island disaster recovery structurally different from continental recovery, and why do FEMA programs consistently underperform in island post-disaster environments?

3.4

Supply Chain Security

What is supply chain singularity, why did the Pacific Islands Forum invoke the Biketawa Declaration in May 2026 over energy supply disruption, and what does that mean for island operators?

3.5

Climate Security & Emergency Response

How does climate change compound island emergency vulnerability in ways that continental climate security frameworks do not capture — and what Hawaii-specific framework addresses them?

Category 04

Governance & Global Policy

4.1

Pacific Island Governance & Safety

Why did 18 Pacific nations simultaneously face supply chain and energy crises in May 2026, and what does the Biketawa Declaration invocation signal about Pacific governance capacity?

4.2

Democratic Resilience & Small State Governance

Why did Solomon Islands sign the 2022 China security agreement despite knowing its risks — and what does the new PM Wale's failure to cancel it reveal about governance capacity in small island states?

4.3

AI Governance & Public Safety Technology

What disparate impact risks do Native Hawaiian and Pacific Islander communities face from AI systems trained on mainland data, and what governance framework addresses the island-specific calibration gap?

4.4

Corporate Security & ESG Risk Policy

What is the island security premium — the measurable gap between assumed and actual emergency response capacity — and how does the post-Lahaina duty of care standard change what corporate boards with island operations must document?

4.5

Public Health Security

How does island healthcare infrastructure singularity — one hospital, one pharmaceutical supply chain — change emergency management and business continuity requirements for island healthcare operators?

4.6

Campus Safety — Geographically Isolated Institutions

What Clery Act compliance framework, behavioral threat assessment protocol, and active threat response plan applies to an island campus where external law enforcement response takes 45 minutes?

Explore Any of These Questions

The ISPI Policy Advisor draws from the full ISPI research library and five-pillar methodology to answer island security policy questions in depth.

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The 21 Most Important Island Security Policy Questions