Nuclear Realism

2021 ◽  
pp. 190-218
Author(s):  
David L. Pike
Keyword(s):  
Political Philosophy ◽  
Everyday Life ◽  
Human Nature ◽  
Social World ◽  
American Democracy ◽  
Nuclear War ◽  
The Third ◽  
Nuclear Age ◽  
The Cold War ◽  
Near Future

The forms collected here as “nuclear realism” seek ways to imagine what everyday life in the ontological bunker of the ’80s created by the nuclear age would look like if stripped of the ideological obfuscations of the nuclear imaginary of the Cold War. This chapter explores the tensions of survival in near-future speculations about life during wartime imagined through realist, often oppositional modes of writing and filmmaking. There are three sections: the first examines the melancholy and liberatory workings of memory in dramas of nuclear war created in the realist mode; the second studies the related forms of nuclear satire; the third looks at pop music’s reaction to the nuclear condition. In all forms of nuclear realism in the ’80s, the shelter and accompanying bunker fantasy play small but emblematic and always ultimately futile roles within the broader social world they both partake of and split apart. Despite their adherence to reality effects and avoidance of overt fabrication, the anti-bunker fantasies of nuclear realism are as “fantastic” and stylized in their own way as the survivalist scenarios discussed in Chapter 7. Each form affords to the present different arguments about the basis of society: fellowship and community or neo-barbarian Hobbesianism. Even the most defeatist form of the bunker fantasy uses doomsday to argue political philosophy: when the bombs drop, we’ll finally discover once and for all who was right about human nature and American democracy.

scholarly journals Why Arms Control?

Daedalus ◽  
2020 ◽  
Vol 149 (2) ◽  
pp. 101-115
Author(s):  
Jon Brook Wolfsthal
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
Cold War ◽  
Soviet Union ◽  
Arms Control ◽  
Good Deal ◽  
The United States ◽  
Nuclear War ◽  
Nuclear Age ◽  
The Soviet Union ◽  
The Cold War

America survived the nuclear age through a complex combination of diplomatic and military decisions, and a good deal of luck. One of the tools that proved its value in both reducing the risks of nuclear use and setting rules for the ongoing nuclear competition were negotiated, legally binding, and verified arms control agreements. Such pacts between the United States and the Soviet Union arguably prevented the nuclear arms racing from getting worse and helped both sides climb off the Cold War nuclear precipice. Several important agreements remain in place between the United States and Russia, to the benefit of both states. Arms control is under threat, however, from domestic forces in the United States and from Russian actions that range from treaty violations to the broader weaponization of risk. But arms control can and should play a useful role in reducing the risk of nuclear war and forging a new agreement between Moscow and Washington on the new rules of the nuclear road.

Political Geography

2004 ◽  
Author(s):  
Gerard Toal ◽  
Fred M. Shelley
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
Cold War ◽  
Everyday Life ◽  
Political Geography ◽  
Terrorist Attacks ◽  
The Internet ◽  
Nuclear War ◽  
Post Cold War ◽  
The Soviet Union ◽  
The Cold War

The decade and a half since the last review article on political geography by Reynolds and Knight (1989) in Geography In America has been one of extraordinary geopolitical transformation and change. Not only did the Cold War come to an end with the fall of the Berlin Wall and the dissolution of the Soviet Union but the spectacular terrorist attacks of September 2001 brought the “post-Cold War peace” to an end also. In the early 1990s the threat of superpower nuclear war faded as an omnipresent nightmare in international relations. Yet new threats and dangers quickly emerged to take the place of those imagined during the Cold War. Concern grew about “rogue states,” genocidal ethnonationalism, global warming, and the dangers of nuclear proliferation (Halberstam 2001; Klare 1995; Odom 1998). Fears about terrorism also grew with a series of bombings, from Paris, London, and Moscow to Oklahoma City, New York, and Atlanta. United States troops and embassies in Saudi Arabia, Tanzania, Kenya, and Yemen were the targets of terrorist attacks. But it was only after the disruption, shock, and panic of the devastating terrorist attacks of 11 September 2001 and subsequent incidents of bioterrorism that world politics was given new definition and clarity by the world’s most powerful state. The new metanarrative of geopolitics is the “war against terror.” Beyond the high dramas of geopolitics, already existing trends in everyday economic and political life deepened in the last decade and a half. New social movements have forced questions concerning the politics of identity and lifestyles onto the political agenda. The globalization of financial markets, telecommunication systems, and the Internet further rearranged governing notions of “here” and “there,” “inside” and “outside,” “near” and “far.” With global media networks broadcasting news twenty-four hours a day and the Internet spreading a world wide web, the “real” geographies of everyday life were becoming strikingly virtual as well as actual (Wark 1994; Mulgan 1997). Informationalization, and the relentless pace of techno-scientific modernity were transforming everyday life and education in the United States’ colleges and universities. Celebrated by the culture of transnational corporate capitalism, these tendencies brought enormous wealth to some, further polarizing income inequalities across the planet while also introducing unprecedented vulnerabilities and uncertainties into what was becoming “global everyday life.”

scholarly journals Open Society According Henri Bergson: Its Political Expressions and Anthropological Substantiation

Politologija ◽  
2020 ◽  
Vol 99 (3) ◽  
pp. 41-63
Author(s):  
Povilas Aleksandravičius
Keyword(s):  
Political Philosophy ◽  
International Relations ◽  
Human Nature ◽  
Dynamic Process ◽  
Henri Bergson ◽  
Open Society ◽  
The Third

The paper seeks to reveal the Bergson’s conception of open society. In the first part, three concrete political expressions of the open society are identified that are sprea­ding in international relations and inside the society. The second part is aimed at showing that the open society is not a society without borders or limits and it does not pose any dangers to cherishing of identities: Bergson’s concept of duration, the source of his political philosophy, establishes identities by providing the foundation for the dynamic process of their maturation through openness. The anthropological substantiation of the open society that was begun in this part is continued in the third part of the paper that analyses the factors of closing and opening, their roots in nature, human nature and vital impetus.

The Evolution of American Civil Defense Film Rhetoric

2012 ◽  
Vol 14 (4) ◽  
pp. 93-121
Author(s):  
Arnold Ringstad
Keyword(s):  
Cold War ◽  
Everyday Life ◽  
Civil Defense ◽  
Rhetorical Strategies ◽  
Nuclear War ◽  
Narrative Structures ◽  
The 1950S ◽  
The Cold War ◽  
Point Of Departure ◽  
The U.S

In the 1950s and 1960s, the U.S. government oversaw the production of civil defense films designed to educate the population about what to do in the event of nuclear war. This article uses films from two distinct periods—the early 1950s and the early 1960s—as a point of departure for discussing U.S. civil defense policies during the Cold War. The article traces four key shifts in the film program's rhetorical strategies. First, an early focus on ideological matters was replaced with an emphasis on practical steps citizens could take. Second, the early conventionalizing of nuclear dangers was replaced by a more subtle integration of those dangers into everyday life. Third, the early films' narrative structures were replaced by a straightforward, documentary-style approach. Finally, the early flippancy with which nuclear war was treated was replaced by a deadly seriousness. These rhetorical shifts indicate that the civil defense establishment was capable of reacting to scientific, political, and popular pressures.

BALBIR MADHOPURI. KORE KĀĠAZ KĪ GAHRĪ LIKHAT / INSCRIPTIONS ON A TENDER MIND (A CHAPTER FROM CHĀNGIĀ RUKH / AGAINST THE NIGHT)

2020 ◽  
pp. 249-264
Author(s):  
A. V. Bochkovskaya ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Everyday Life ◽  
Social Activist ◽  
Good Education ◽  
Social Oppression ◽  
The Third ◽  
Home Village ◽  
To Receive

The commented translation from Hindi of a chapter from the Chāṅgiā rukh (Against the Night) autobiography (2002) by Balbir Madhopuri, a renowned Indian writer, poet, translator, journalist and social activist, brings forward episodes from the life of low-caste inhabitants of a Punjab village in the 1960–1970s. Following the school of hard knocks of his childhood in the chamar quarter of Madhopur, a village in Jalandhar district, Balbir Madhopuri managed to receive a good education and take to literature. In 2014 he was awarded the Translation Prize from India’s Sahitya Academy for contribution to the development and promotion of Punjabi, his mother language. Narrating the story, Balbir Madhopuri shares memories, thoughts and emotions from early days that determined his motivations to struggle against poverty, deprivation and injustice. The chapter Kore kāġaz kī gahrī likhat (Inscriptions on a Tender Mind [Madhopuri, 2010]) tells readers about joys and sorrows, hopes and fears, delights and regrets that were part of his childhood in Madhopur. Scenes from everyday life in the home village, episodes highlighting complex relations between its inhabitants — predominantly Sikhs and Hindus — intertwine with Balbir Madhopuri’s reflections on social oppression and caste inequality that still remain in contemporary India’s society. This commented translation is the third in a series of four chapters from Balbir Madhopuri’s autobiography scheduled for publication in this journal in 2020.

Brokering Peace in Nuclear Environments

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Moeed Yusuf
Keyword(s):  
Cold War ◽  
Third Party ◽  
Bargaining Theory ◽  
The Third ◽  
China And India ◽  
International Setting ◽  
Multiple Audiences ◽  
Crisis Behavior ◽  
The Cold War ◽  
Shed Light

This book is the first to theorize third party mediation in crises between regional nuclear powers. Its relevance flows from two of the most significant international developments since the end of the Cold War: the emergence of regional nuclear rivalries; and the shift from the Cold War’s bipolar context to today’s unipolar international setting. Moving away from the traditional bilateral deterrence models, the book conceptualizes crisis behavior as “brokered bargaining”: a three-way bargaining framework where the regional rivals and the ‘third party’ seek to influence each other to behave in line with their crisis objectives and in so doing, affect each other’s crisis behavior. The book tests brokered bargaining theory by examining U.S.-led crisis management in South Asia, analyzing three major crises between India and Pakistan: the Kargil conflict, 1999; the 2001-02 nuclear standoff; and the Mumbai crisis, 2008. The case studies find strong evidence of behavior predicted by the brokered bargaining framework. They also shed light on several risks of misperceptions and inadvertence due to the challenges inherent in signaling to multiple audiences simultaneously. Traditional explanations rooted in bilateral deterrence models do not account for these, leaving a void with serious practical consequences, which the introduction of brokered bargaining seeks to fill. The book’s findings also offer lessons for crises on the Korean peninsula, between China and India, and between potential nuclear rivals in the Middle East.

Introduction

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Tim Lewens
Keyword(s):  
Social Sciences ◽  
Human Nature ◽  
Potential Functions ◽  
Human Psychology ◽  
Human Culture ◽  
The Third ◽  
Current State ◽  
Large Numbers ◽  
The Social ◽  
Compare And Contrast

Many evolutionary theorists have enthusiastically embraced human nature, but large numbers of evolutionists have also rejected it. It is also important to recognize the nuanced views on human nature that come from the side of the social sciences. This introduction provides an overview of the current state of the human nature debate, from the anti-essentialist consensus to the possibility of a Gray’s Anatomy of human psychology. Three potential functions for the notion of species nature are identified. The first is diagnostic, assigning an organism to the correct species. The second is species-comparative, allowing us to compare and contrast different species. The third function is contrastive, establishing human nature as a foil for human culture. The Introduction concludes with a brief synopsis of each chapter.

Domestic Everyday Life, Manners, and Customs in the Ancient World

1876 ◽  
Vol 4 ◽  
pp. 364-415
Author(s):  
George Harris
Keyword(s):  
Everyday Life ◽  
Human Nature ◽  
Ancient World ◽  
The People ◽  
History Of

Thereis nothing which contributes more fully to throw light on the manners and habits of a people, or more forcibly to exhibit to us the tone of thought which prevailed among them, than the rites and ceremonies that they adopted connected with their religion. And the wilder and more extravagant the superstitions which in such a nation prevailed, the more strikingly do they evince the tone of thought and feeling that animated the people. Potent everywhere, and under whatever phase, as was the influence of these notions, they served in each case to develop the whole mind and character of the nation; as each passion, and emotion, and faculty, were exerted to the very utmost on a subject of such surpassing interest to them all. Imagination here, relieved from all restraint, spread her wings and soared aloft, disporting herself in her wildest mood; and the remoter the period to which the history of any particular country reaches, and the more barbarous the condition in which the people existed, the more striking, and the more extraordinary to us, appear the superstitions by which they were influenced. Human nature is by this means developed to the full, all its energies are exerted to the utmost, and the internal machinery by which its movements are impelled, is stimulated to active operation. We gaze with wonder and with awe upon the spectacle thus exhibited. However involuntarily, we respect a people—misguided and erring as they were—whose eagerness to follow whatever their conscience prompted, urged them to impose such revolting duties on themselves; while we regard, with pity and with horror, those hideous exploits which were the fruit of that misguided zeal.

The Four Paradoxes of Nuclear Strategy

1964 ◽  
Vol 58 (1) ◽  
pp. 23-35 ◽  
Author(s):  
Hans J. Morgenthau
Keyword(s):  
Middle Ages ◽  
Nuclear Weapons ◽  
Use Of Force ◽  
Nuclear War ◽  
Nuclear Strategy ◽  
Nuclear Age ◽  
Modern Age ◽  
Modes Of Thought ◽  
The Impact ◽  
The Middle Ages

The nuclear age has ushered in a novel period of history, as distinct from the age that preceded it as the modern age has been from the Middle Ages or the Middle Ages have been from antiquity. Yet while our conditions of life have drastically changed under the impact of the nuclear age, we still live in our thoughts and act through our institutions in an age that has passed. There exists, then, a gap between what we think about our social, political, and philosophic problems and the objective conditions which the nuclear age has created.This contradiction between our modes of thought and action, belonging to an age that has passed, and the objective conditions of our existence has engendered four paradoxes in our nuclear strategy: the commitment to the use of force, nuclear or otherwise, paralyzed by the fear of having to use it; the search for a nuclear strategy which would avoid the predictable consequences of nuclear war; the pursuit of a nuclear armaments race joined with attempts to stop it; the pursuit of an alliance policy which the availability of nuclear weapons has rendered obsolete. All these paradoxes result from the contrast between traditional attitudes and the possibility of nuclear war and from the fruitless attempts to reconcile the two.

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