This article has two aims: first, to examine the future of cyber conflict studies and how the study of cyber security can develop in a more interdisciplinary way; second, to assess the meaning of “offensive” and “defensive” cyber security from the perspective
of a variety of different academic disciplines. The article argues that a more holistic and nuanced understanding of cyber offence and defence can be achieved if some of the intellectual silos and disagreements that have characterised the debate so far can be deconstructed and overcome. The article is in three parts. The first section briefly outlines some of the definitional fog that has plagued the cyber security discipline, including over what constitutes cyber offense and defence. The paper then summarises four different subcultures of cyber conflict studies that understand
and study cyber security in different ways: International Relations (IR), Political Psychology, International Law, and Computer Science. The concluding section discusses how the cyber conflict studies discipline can move forward, be made more rigorous, and less prone to pathology and dead ends, including through the formation of a cohesive but heterogenous epistemic community.