Performing Nuclear Weapons: How Britain Made Trident Make Sense

ISBN-13: 9783030675783 / Angielski / Miękka / 2022

Paul Beaumont

Opis

This book investigates the UK’s nuclear weapon policy, focusing in particular on how consecutive governments have managed to maintain the Trident weapon system. The question of why states maintain nuclear weapons typically receives short shrift: its security, of course. The international is a perilous place, and nuclear weapons represent the ultimate self-help device. This book seeks to unsettle this complacency by re-conceptualizing nuclear weapon-armed states as nuclear regimes of truth and refocusing on the processes through which governments produce and maintain country-specific discourses that enable their continued possession of nuclear weapons. Illustrating the value of studying nuclear regimes of truth, the book conducts a discourse analysis of the UK’s nuclear weapons policy between 1980 and 2010. In so doing, it documents the sheer imagination and discursive labour required to sustain the positive value of nuclear weapons within British politics, as well as providing grounds for optimism regarding the value of the recent treaty banning nuclear weapons.

Recenzje

"The book draws inspiration from the Foucauldian concept of 'regimes of truth' and analyses ways in which British governments sought to gain the interpretive primacy over the pro-nuclear deterrent narrative. ... By approaching the British nuclear deterrent via its retention and through discourse analysis, Performing Nuclear Weapons makes an original contribution to the existing research on nuclear weapons ... ." (Christoph Laucht, Journal of Peace Research, February 4, 2022)

Spis treści

Chapter 1. Introduction: Problematizing the Maintenance of Nuclear Weapons

Chapter 2. Explaining Britain’s Bomb

Chapter 3. Nuclear Regimes of Truth

Chapter 4. Constructing the Nuclear Weapon Problem

Chapter 5. Blair’s Nuclear Regime of Truth

Chapter 6. Thatcher’s Nuclear Regime of Truth

Chapter 7. Conclusion: Breaking Down Britain’s Nuclear Regime of Truth & Putting it Back Together Again

O autorze

Paul Beaumont is Senior Researcher at the Norwegian Institute of International Affairs. He holds a Ph.D. in International Relations/International Environmental Studies and Development from the Norwegian University of Life Sciences. He has published peer-reviewed articles in Third World Quarterly, Global Affairs, and New Perspectives, policy-orientated research on behalf of the International Law and Policy Institute, and several op-eds in Klassekampen and Aftenposten.

Blurb

This book investigates the UK’s nuclear weapon policy, focusing in particular on how consecutive governments have managed to maintain the Trident weapon system. The question of why states maintain nuclear weapons typically receives short shrift: its security, of course. The international is a perilous place, and nuclear weapons represent the ultimate self-help device. This book seeks to unsettle this complacency by re-conceptualizing nuclear weapon-armed states as nuclear regimes of truth and refocusing on the processes through which governments produce and maintain country-specific discourses that enable their continued possession of nuclear weapons. Illustrating the value of studying nuclear regimes of truth, the book conducts a discourse analysis of the UK’s nuclear weapons policy between 1980 and 2010. In so doing, it documents the sheer imagination and discursive labour required to sustain the positive value of nuclear weapons within British politics, as well as providing grounds for optimism regarding the value of the recent treaty banning nuclear weapons.

Paul Beaumont is Senior Researcher at the Norwegian Institute of International Affairs. He holds a Ph.D. in International Relations/International Environmental Studies and Development from the Norwegian University of Life Sciences. He has published peer-reviewed articles in Third World Quarterly, Global Affairs, and New Perspectives, policy-orientated research on behalf of the International Law and Policy Institute, and several op-eds in Klassekampen and Aftenposten.