Journal Articles

Nuclear Weapons Scholarship as a Case of Self-Censorship in Security Studies

Benoît Pelopidas — Tue, 22 Nov 2016 19:45:33 +0000

Nuclear Weapons Scholarship as a Case of Self-Censorship in Security Studies

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Benoît Pelopidas Tue, 11/22/2016 - 14:45

Security studies scholarship on nuclear weapons is particularly prone to self-censorship. In this essay, Pelopidas argues that this self-censorship is problematic. The vulnerability, secrecy, and limits to accountability created by nuclear weapons (Deudney 2007, 256–57; Born, Gill, and H^anggi 2010; Cohen 2010, 147) call for responsible scholarship vis-a-vis the general public. This need for renewed and expanded scholarly responsibility is especially pressing given current plans among nuclear-weapon states to “modernize” their nuclear arsenals, committing their citizens and children to live in nuclear-armed countries and, a fortiori , a nuclear armed world (Mecklin 2015). Despite this need, the existing reflexive literature in security studies—calling for greater scholarly responsibility (see Steele and Amoureux 2016; Waever 2015, 95–100)—has neither specifically focused on nuclear weapons nor explored the forms of self-censorship identified here as shaping a modality of responsibility. In making this case, Pelopidas defines self-censorship in nuclear weapons scholarship as unnecessary boundaries on scholarly discourse within security fstudies

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Pelopidas_2016_JGSS_self-censorship.pdf

Security Competition and Denuclearization: The North Korean Nuclear Crisis and International Strategic Choices

ZZhong — Thu, 12 May 2016 00:15:00 +0000

Security Competition and Denuclearization: The North Korean Nuclear Crisis and International Strategic Choices

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Journal Articles

ZZhong Wed, 05/11/2016 - 20:15

Differing approaches by key stakeholders to the North Korean nuclear issue is a manifestation of the security competition among some of them, especially the two Koreas, the United States, and China. These major players have competing visions of national security objectives and priorities, including regional peace, regime stability, alliance relationship, security assurance, and denuclearization. Some objectives are overlapping, while others might be conflicting. For some countries, the pursuit of some objectives might be contradictory to the pursuit of other objectives. In past nuclear crises, these players tended to have different hierarchies of preferences, and pursued different and at least partially contradictory approaches to realize them. However, closer exploration of the previous nuclear crises find that it is possible for these key players to curb their competition, so as to reach security cooperation and avoid a transformation from security competition to security dilemma. In achieving that goal, it is imperative for the key players to build mutual trust, to moderate their security competition, and to resume multilateral negotiation based on a combination of coercive means and pertinent incentives. It is also necessary for the key players in the nuclear issue, especially the United States and China, to initiate discussion on how to cooperate and respond to potential future unexpected scenarios.

Bibliography

Zhong Zhenming
Associate Professor, School of Political Science and International Relations, Tongji
University, Shanghai, 200092, China

Related Files

Zhong - POSSE 2015 paper.pdf

Sharing the Bomb: Nonproliferation, Deterrence, and Foreign Nuclear Deployments

TSechser — Thu, 12 May 2016 00:15:00 +0000

Sharing the Bomb: Nonproliferation, Deterrence, and Foreign Nuclear Deployments

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Journal Articles

TSechser Wed, 05/11/2016 - 20:15

When the United States dropped an atomic bomb on Hiroshima, Japan in August 1945, it launched a grand contest between two forces: nations determined to prevent the spread of nuclear weapons, and those determined to acquire their own. Early hopes of a long-lasting American atomic monopoly were dashed by the Soviet Union’s first atomic test in 1949, followed by Great Britain in 1952, France in 1960, and China in 1964. Three more nations (Israel, India, and South Africa) successfully crossed the nuclear threshold by 1980, and by 1990 Pakistan had joined the nuclear club as well.

Bibliography

Todd S. Sechser
Associate Professor of Politics,
University of Virginia

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Sechser - Sharing the Bomb - 2015.pdf

Low Numbers and the Role of Verification

NPerfilyev — Thu, 12 May 2016 00:15:00 +0000

Low Numbers and the Role of Verification

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Journal Articles

NPerfilyev Wed, 05/11/2016 - 20:15

Arms control treaties deal with sensitive issue of national security. States that come to an agreement through a compromise balancing their interests want to make sure that the other party is fulfilling its obligations and that fulfilling your own obligations does not put you at a relative disadvantage. That is why arms control agreements are rarely self-executing. Even though it is generally believed that states enter international treaties in good faith and are expected to abide by their commitments, contracting parties usually verify that the obligations are observed. A negotiated verification regime becomes an integral part of an arms control agreement. In this context, verification can be described as the “process of gathering and analyzing information to make a judgement about parties' compliance or non-compliance with an agreement.”2 In the absence of a verification regime, such treaties can become a mere declaration of intent.

Bibliography

Nikita Perfilyev

Re-imagining global nuclear ordering beyond proliferation and deterrence

Benoît Pelopidas — Thu, 12 May 2016 00:15:00 +0000

Re-imagining global nuclear ordering beyond proliferation and deterrence

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Journal Articles

Benoît Pelopidas Wed, 05/11/2016 - 20:15

This article analyzes nuclear weapons related scholarship as a subset of security studies particularly prone to self-censorship, even in the post-Cold War era. It argues that self-censorship effects come from the joint use of the notions of deterrence and non-proliferation and the invocation of an expected veto player. The effects of the words 'proliferation' and 'deterrence' and the assumption that a supposedly important player in nuclear policy will veto proposals for change, create avenues for self-censorship and delegitimize transformative thinking. This is because the utterances including 'proliferation' and 'deterrence' do double work: they want, simultaneously, to describe the world as it is and to have an impact on it. This tension shapes a space in which transformative thinking appears to be either incompetent or dangerous. Furthermore, the invoked existence of an important player inexorably reluctant to change makes critical thinking look futile: it prevents some actors inclined to accept change in principle from actually modifying their practice. To show how these delegitimizing mechanisms and the self-censorship effect operate, the article analyzes the op-ed piece of Harold Brown and John Deutsch rejecting the policy shift towards nuclear disarmament, on the one hand, and more briefly those of George Shultz, William Perry, Henry Kissinger and Sam Nunn advocating it, on the other. Finally, it provides a strategy to create space for transformative thinking about nuclear weapons in security studies.

Bibliography

Benoit Pelopidas

Lecturer in International Relations at the University of Bristol, Affiliate of CISAC, Stanford University and visiting fellow at the Princeton Institute for International and Regional Studies for 2015-2016.

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Pelopidas_Re-imagining_POSSE2015.pdf

Governing North-East Asia Security: Nuclear Non-proliferation & Strategic Reconciliation

HLiu — Wed, 20 Apr 2016 14:49:16 +0000

Governing North-East Asia Security: Nuclear Non-proliferation & Strategic Reconciliation

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Journal Articles

HLiu Wed, 04/20/2016 - 10:49

Nuclear proliferation issue has occupied the central position of the North East Asia area for more than 20 years. Besides nuclear proliferation problem, there are still many other quarrels and disputes among the countries of this region. Instead of discussing the proliferation issue technically and tactically, this paper would like to place this issue under a wider strategic context to find a way out and mainly focus on the relationships between or among China, ROK and Japan. The major hypothesis is that the nuclear proliferation issue must be settled under the condition of genuine strategic reconciliation among these nations. If the three nations can build mutual-confidence, it would doubtlessly in turn create a favorable environment for the Korea peninsular internal reconciliation. More importantly, such reconciliation can also push the US- DPRK relationship improved which is the key to denuclearization in the region.

Bibliography

Huaping Liu

School of International Relations

Beijing Language and Culture University

hp_liu@hotmail.com

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Huaping Liu Paper for POSSE Yr 6.pdf

How Leaders Assess Intentions Under Uncertainty: Costly Signaling, Leader Background Experiences, and Nuclear Diplomacy

Anonymous — Tue, 19 Apr 2016 21:04:34 +0000

How Leaders Assess Intentions Under Uncertainty: Costly Signaling, Leader Background Experiences, and Nuclear Diplomacy

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Journal Articles

Anonymous (not verified) Tue, 04/19/2016 - 17:04

How do leaders assess the intentions of their counterparts under uncertainty? This study
addresses this question by analyzing the development of nuclear programs. The technology
needed to build nuclear weapons and produce nuclear energy is indistinguishable. How,
then, can leaders identify a nuclear developer’s true intentions? An influential body of
literature suggests that costly signals play a key role in shaping states’ beliefs about whether a
developer of nuclear technology covets energy or bombs. I argue, however, that leader-centric
factors could also play a role in how states assess intentions. In particular, the background
experiences of leaders – particularly whether they are former rebels – might influence how
they are perceived. Leaders with rebel experience are generally seen as aggressive, revisionist,
and unreliable, making states more likely to conclude that their intentions are sinister. I test
the observable implications of these arguments for military conflict. The findings indicate
that former rebels who develop nuclear capacity are significantly more likely than their
non-rebel counterparts to be targeted in military disputes, suggesting that countries form
impressions about others’ intentions based on leader backgrounds. Costly signals, on the
other hand, do not seem to influence whether states believe that nuclear-capable states
covet bombs or energy. These findings carry implications for the role of costly signaling in
world politics and for leader-centric approaches to the study of IR.

Bibliography

Matthew Fuhrmann
Texas A&M University
mfuhrmann@tamu.edu

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Fuhrmann.pdf

Putin's Syria Strategy: Russian Airstrikes and What Comes Next

Dima Adamsky — Tue, 19 Apr 2016 20:56:15 +0000

Putin's Syria Strategy: Russian Airstrikes and What Comes Next

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Journal Articles

Dima Adamsky Tue, 04/19/2016 - 16:56

Dima Adamsky, Associate Professor, School of Government, and Institute for Policy and Strategy, at IDC Herzliya, provides a concise undertsanding of Putin's strategy in Syria.

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Adamsky - “Putin's Syria Strategy”.pdf

Cyber (In) Security: A Challenge to Reckon With

sitara.noor — Sun, 04 Oct 2015 09:08:51 +0000

Cyber (In) Security: A Challenge to Reckon With

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Journal Articles

sitara.noor Sun, 10/04/2015 - 05:08

Recent developments in the cyber domain have exposed the dangers of a largely apathetic behaviour towards the looming threats of cyber warfare. Calls for more rigorous corrective measures have been made, as some states have begun to view such breaches as a top national security threat. Such threats have also changed the dynamics of state behaviour, giving way to subtle aggressions with potentially destabilising and far-reaching consequences. These transgressions have also brought to the fore numerous challenges of cyber security that find their origin in scant technical understanding, the absence of a legal framework, and an overall complex strategic environment. This calls for the institution of some rules of the game to ensure the freedom of the Internet, while at the same time protecting critical cyber infrastructure through a normative approach that can pave the way for some concrete measures for regulating state behaviour.

Bibliography

Noor,Sitara,(2015), "Cyber (In) Security: A Challenge to Reckon With" Strategic Studies, Vol. 34, Islamabad

http://issi.org.pk/wp-content/uploads/2015/02/Journal-title-and-content-page-2015.pdf

The Vision and the Steps: Iran, Weaponless Nuclear Deterrence and a World Free of Nuclear Weapons

cmcdermott6 — Fri, 17 Jul 2015 19:19:44 +0000

The Vision and the Steps: Iran, Weaponless Nuclear Deterrence and a World Free of Nuclear Weapons

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Journal Articles

cmcdermott6 Fri, 07/17/2015 - 15:19

From Anne Harrington's latest article, she writes, "From its inception, nuclear strategy has been a profoundly ahistorical field. Only recently have scholars begun to exploit the wealth of evidentiary knowledge generated during the Cold War, whether that be in the form of diplomatic history or creating data sets against which to test rational choice models. Mining that data has revolutionary potential. Providing an evidentiary basis against which to assess theories of nuclear deterrence and nonproliferation holds out the possibility not only of reinvigorating a stale intellectual debate, but of fundamentally reconfiguring what we believe to be true about nuclear deterrence and how it operates."

She then asks the question: "How do we grab hold of the revolutionary potential of the knowledge now available to us without becoming imprisoned within the boundaries of the past?"

Bibliography

Dr. Anne I. Harrington

ETH Zurich