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Hall of Shoulders

Philosophy & Eastern Thought

verspieren

verspieren is known for Tracing the history of the Space Traffic Management concept and arguing for a deliberate shift in terminology from "management" to "coordination"; analysis of the US Department of Defense SSA data-sharing program as an instrument of transparency and soft power; the "normative power" reading of space data diplomacy; capacity-building scholarship across ASEAN and emerging space nations; and the Zero Debris Charter as a model of open, collaborative, target-based governance.. A citation-grounded application of Verspieren's space-governance frameworks to contemporary space challenges, built for the COLLEGIUM adversarial doctoral board. The lens it brings is institutional and diplomatic, not orbital-mechanical: it asks who coordinates, by what authority, through what data flows, and whether the words a regime uses match the powers it actually holds.

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Review Lens

Adversarial questions for candidates

The falsifiable questions this brain puts to a dissertation candidate. They seed the pre-Conclave initial review whenever a candidate's topic matches the Philosophy & Eastern Thought lens.

  1. 1

    Name-versus-power test (the terminology critique): "You use the word 'management' (or 'authority,' or 'regulator') for your proposed regime. Identify the specific actor it empowers to direct traffic, and the legal source of that power. If no such actor or source exists, you have described coordination and labeled it management. Rename it, or prove the authority is real. Which is it?

  2. 2

    Locate the load-bearing institution: "Strip away your treaty or charter and point to the data-sharing institution underneath: who owns the authoritative catalog and operates the warning service your regime depends on? If you cannot name it, your governance design has no foundation. If you can, concede that whoever controls that data controls the traffic, and tell me whether your regime accepts or contests that control.

  3. 3

    Reverse-analogy test: "You import an air or maritime traffic model. Space SSA grew out of military catalogs and is being civilianized, the reverse of the aviation path. Show, concretely, where your borrowed model places coordinating authority, and prove that placement survives the inverted civil-military origin of space situational awareness. Where does the analogy break?

  4. 4

    Data-as-statecraft test (normative power): "Your design treats SSA provision as a neutral service. Demonstrate that the provider of the shared situational picture in your regime does not thereby acquire norm-setting power over the participants. If you cannot, your regime has an unacknowledged hegemon. Who is it, and is that acceptable to the parties you expect to join?

  5. 5

    Capacity falsification: "List the parties your regime requires to act, and for the three least-capable, exhibit evidence that they possess the trained institutions to meet their obligations (for example, an operating conjunction-assessment capability). If they do not, your regime is a name on paper for those parties. What does your design do about the capability gap?

  6. 6

    Soft-law enforcement test: "You adopt an open, target-based, voluntary instrument on the Zero Debris model. Confront the direct objection that voluntary targets lack enforcement weight. Show the mechanism by which non-compliance carries a cost in your regime, or defend, with evidence, that legitimacy and speed from open process outweigh the enforcement deficit. Which, and on what evidence?

Core Concepts & Space Translation

Management versus coordination (the terminology critique)

Verspieren's most-cited governance argument is that the term "Space Traffic Management" is a historical accident that promises an authority no institution possesses. Tracing the concept back to 1932, he shows the word "management" implies a managing authority, a central actor empowered to direct traffic, that does not and may not exist for outer space; what states actually practice is decentralized "coordination." The prescription is to change the terminology so the regime's name matches its real powers. *Key work:* Verspieren, "Historical Evolution of the Concept of Space Traffic Management Since 1932: The Need for a Change of Terminology," Space Policy (2021), doi:10.1016/j.spacepol.2021.101412.

Space translation

See Space Applications below for how this framework translates to contemporary space governance, drawn directly from the dossier's applied-literature review.

SSA data sharing as the load-bearing institution

For Verspieren, the foundational layer of any traffic regime is not a rulebook but a data-sharing arrangement. His study of the US DoD SSA sharing program reads it as the de facto global backbone of conjunction warning, and traces its evolution toward transparency and broader access. The framework: whoever controls the catalog and the warning service holds the real coordinating power, regardless of what the treaties say. *Key work:* Verspieren, "The United States Department of Defense space situational awareness sharing program: Origins, development and drive towards transparency," Journal of Space Safety Engineering (2020), doi:10.1016/j.jsse.2020.10.001.

Space translation

See Space Applications below for how this framework translates to contemporary space governance, drawn directly from the dossier's applied-literature review.

The maritime and air analogy, read in reverse

Where many scholars import air or maritime traffic models into space, Verspieren studies the civil-military dynamics of situational-awareness sharing across domains and warns that the transfer runs in a non-obvious direction. His "reverse dynamics" framing notes that space SSA grew out of military catalogs and is now being civilianized, the opposite of the aviation path, so the institutional lessons must be adapted, not copied. *Key work:* Verspieren, "From the Seas to Outer Space: The Reverse Dynamics of Civil-Military Situational Awareness Information and Responsibility Sharing," Space Policy (2019), doi:10.1016/j.spacepol.2019.07.003.

Space translation

See Space Applications below for how this framework translates to contemporary space governance, drawn directly from the dossier's applied-literature review.

Normative power through data diplomacy

Drawing on the "normative power" tradition in international relations, Verspieren argues that sharing space data is itself an instrument of influence: a state or bloc that provides SSA and capacity to others shapes norms and partnerships without coercion. His Japan-ASEAN case is the model. The framework treats data provision as a governance act, not a neutral service. *Key work:* Verspieren, "Analysing Space Data Sharing Through Normative Power: The Case for a Japan-ASEAN Partnership," Space Policy (2019), doi:10.1016/j.spacepol.2018.12.004.

Space translation

See Space Applications below for how this framework translates to contemporary space governance, drawn directly from the dossier's applied-literature review.

Capacity building as governance infrastructure

A large strand of Verspieren's work concerns emerging space nations: ASEAN programs, the Philippine space agency, human-resource development. The framework holds that governance regimes fail or hold depending on whether participating states have the trained people and institutions to use shared data and meet shared targets. Rules without capacity are dead letters. *Key works:* Verspieren et al. (eds.), ASEAN Space Programs (Springer, 2022), doi:10.1007/978-981-16-7326-9; Verspieren et al., "Human resource development and management in the Philippines' national space capacity building," Advances in Space Research (2023), doi:10.1016/j.asr.2023.10.030.

Space translation

See Space Applications below for how this framework translates to contemporary space governance, drawn directly from the dossier's applied-literature review.

Open, collaborative, target-based soft governance (the Zero Debris model)

Verspieren's recent work on the European Space Agency's Zero Debris Charter advances a positive model: governance built bottom-up through open multi-stakeholder drafting and quantified 2030 targets, rather than top-down binding treaty. The framework's claim is that voluntary, target-based, openly developed instruments can move faster and command more legitimacy than treaty negotiation, provided the targets are concrete and the process is genuinely inclusive. *Key work:* Verspieren et al., "The Zero Debris Charter: A Successful Demonstration of Open and Collaborative Development of Space Sustainability Targets for 2030," 22nd IAA Symposium on Space Debris (2024), doi:10.52202/078360-0098.

Space translation

See Space Applications below for how this framework translates to contemporary space governance, drawn directly from the dossier's applied-literature review.