Abstract
This chapter serves as the introduction to the volume Crossing Nuclear Thresholds: Leveraging Sociocultural Insights into Nuclear Decisionmaking, introducing the key conceptual and policy issues addressed in the text and providing an overview of the structure and content of the book. The concept of nuclear thresholds, those associated with decisions both to acquire nuclear weapons and to use them, is developed and situated in the existing nuclear literature; and the unique contributions of turning a sociocultural analytic lens to the question of nuclear decisionmaking are explored. In particular, the author evaluates the novel concept of “sacred values,” as it might apply to nuclear aspirations, and gives attention to the strength or fragility of the so-called nuclear taboo. Finally, this chapter provides an overview of the structure and contents of the book by introducing the authors and the principal contributions of each chapter.
This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.
Access this chapter
Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout
Purchases are for personal use only
Notes
- 1.
In fact, this is the definition of the phrase given in two popular modern dictionaries. The Oxford Dictionary defines “nuclear threshold” as “a point in a conflict at which nuclear weapons are or would be brought into use.” A similar definition is provided in the Collins English Dictionary. Available at https://www.collinsdictionary.com/us/dictionary/english/nuclear-threshold, accessed 26 August 2017.
- 2.
This distinction dates from the very dawn of the nuclear age. See Bernard Brodie, et al., The Absolute Weapon: Atomic Power and World Order (New York: Harcourt, Brace, 1946).
- 3.
See, for example, the thorough treatments of this taboo threshold in Nina Tannenwald, The Nuclear Taboo: The United States and the Non-Use of Nuclear Weapons Since 1945 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2007); and T.V. Paul, The Tradition of Non-Use of Nuclear Weapons (Stanford University Press, 2009). An excellent essay on US nuclear trends that may jeopardize this taboo is given in George H. Quester, “The End of the Nuclear Taboo?” in Jeffrey A. Larsen and Kerry M. Kartchner, eds., Limited Nuclear War in the Twenty-First Century (Stanford University Press, 2014), pp. 172–190.
- 4.
A third meaning, used in the phrase “to raise or lower the nuclear threshold,” refers to actions and rhetoric exchanged during a crisis for the purpose of escalation management intended to make the use of nuclear weapons either easier and more likely to be undertaken, or to make that use less likely. This meaning, while it has important nuclear policy implications, is outside the scope of this book.
- 5.
Avner Cohen, “Crossing the Threshold: The Untold Nuclear Dimension of the 1967 Arab-Israeli War and Its Contemporary Lessons,” Arms Control Today, June 2007. Available at: https://www.armscontrol.org/act/2007_06/Cohen, accessed 26 August 2017.
- 6.
This is the clear meaning in, for example, “Pakistan Seen Ready to Cross Nuclear Threshold.” Available at https://www.theatlantic.com/international/archive/2011/06/pakistan-seen-readying-to-cross-nuclear-threshold/239817/, accessed 26 August 2017.
- 7.
Jim Walsh, “Surprise Down Under: The Secret History of Australia’s Nuclear Ambitions,” The Nonproliferation Review (Fall 1997), p. 14.
- 8.
Jacques E.C. Hymans , “When Does a State Become a ‘Nuclear Weapon State’? An Exercise in Measurement Validation,” Nonproliferation Review, Vol. 17, No. 1 (March 2010), pp. 161–180. Available at https://www.nonproliferation.org/wp-content/uploads/npr/npr_17-1_hymans.pdf, accessed 26 August 2017. See also, Jacques E.C. Hymans and Matthew S. Gratias, “Iran and the Nuclear Threshold,” The Nonproliferation Review, Vol. 20, No. 1 (2013), pp. 13–38. Available at: http://www-bcf.usc.edu/~hymans/Hymans%20and%20Gratias%20Nonproliferation%20Review%20FINAL-1.pdf, accessed 26 August 2017. Hymans and Gratias argue that ballistic missile testing is a proxy for nuclear weapons testing, and that the two often go hand-in-hand, and therefore assert that such testing should be considered the definitive “threshold” of nuclear weapons acquisition.
- 9.
One exception is the excellent discussion of alternative metrics for crossing nuclear thresholds in Jacques E.C. Hymans and Matthew S. Gratias, “Iran and the Nuclear Threshold,” The Nonproliferation Review, Vol. 20, No. 1 (2013), pp. 13–38. Available at http://www-bcf.usc.edu/~hymans/Hymans%20and%20Gratias%20Nonproliferation%20Review%20FINAL-1.pdf, accessed 13 August 2017. Hymans and Gratias make a case for using the occurrence of a nuclear test as the point at which the nuclear “rubicon” has been crossed, as opposed to the accumulation by a state of a “significant quantity” of bomb-making material.
- 10.
Matthew Kroenig, Exporting the Bomb: Technology Transfer and the Spread of Nuclear Weapons (Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 2010); and Matthew Fuhrmann, “Taking a Walk on the Supply Side,” Journal of Conflict Resolution, Vol. 53, Issue 2 (January 2009), pp. 181–208.
- 11.
Article IV, para. 1. The term is used in the secular sense of irrevocable, not in the US Constitutional sense of “God given,” although some countries may be tempted to invoke that connotation.
- 12.
Maria Rost Rublee , Nonproliferation Norms: Why States Choose Nuclear Restraint (Athens: University of Georgia Press, 2009), p. 202.
- 13.
Ibid., p. 201. See also Feroz Hassan Khan’s story of the extreme sacrifices nations can make in pursuing nuclear weapons in Eating Grass: The Making of the Pakistani Bomb (Stanford University Press, 2012).
- 14.
Note the reference to “a subtle debate going on [in Iranian elite circles] regarding the wisdom of crossing the nuclear threshold” in Ray Takeyh, “Iran’s Nuclear Calculations,” World Policy Journal, Vol. 20, No. 2 (2003), p. 21. See also Jael Espinoza, “North Korea and Iran: Crossing the Nuclear Threshold,” 26 April 2017, Western Free Press. Available at: http://www.westernfreepress.com/2017/04/26/north-korea-iran-crossing-nuclear-threshold/, accessed 26 August 2017.
- 15.
In addition to Maria Rost Rublee’s Nonproliferation Norms, see also Mitchell Reiss, Bridled Ambition: Why Countries Constrain Their Nuclear Capabilities (Washington, DC: Woodrow Wilson Center Press, 1995).
- 16.
Rublee, Nonproliferation Norms, p. 10.
- 17.
Ibid., p. 202.
- 18.
These thresholds utilize and expand on the four key WMD decision areas originally identified and discussed in Kerry Kartchner, “Strategic Culture and WMD Decision Making,” in Jeannie L. Johnson, Kerry M. Kartchner, and Jeffrey A. Larsen, eds., Strategic Culture and WMD Decision Making (New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2009), pp. 55–67.
- 19.
The literature has benefited from several essays that survey the state of the field, and compare the several theories of proliferation that have been advanced. Among the most helpful are the following: Dong-Joon Jo and Erik Gartzke. “Determinants of Nuclear Weapons Proliferation,” Journal of Conflict Resolution, Vol. 51, No. 1 (February 2007), pp. 167–194; Harald Müller and Andreas Schmidt, “The Little Known Story of Deproliferation: Why States Give Up Nuclear Weapon Activities,” in Forecasting Nuclear Proliferation in the Twenty-First Century: The Role of Theory, edited by William C. Potter and Gaukhar Mukhatzhanova (Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press, 2010); Tanya Ogilvie-White, “Is There a Theory of Nuclear Proliferation? An Analysis of the Contemporary Debate,” The Nonproliferation Review, Vol. 4 (1996), pp. 43–60; William C. Potter and Gaukhar Mukhatzhanova, “Divining Nuclear Intentions: A Review Essay,” International Security, Vol. 33, No. 1 (Summer 2008), pp. 139–169; Jacques E. C. Hymans , “Theories of Nuclear Proliferation,” The Nonproliferation Review, Vol. 13, No. 3 (2006), pp. 455–465; and, Alexander H. Montgomery and Scott D. Sagan , “The Perils of Predicting Proliferation,” Journal of Conflict Resolution, Vol. 53 (2009), pp. 302–328.
See also the extensive literature review and critique in a series of online commentaries and responses that were part of an International Studies Quarterly online symposium, headlined by the essay from Todd S. Sechser, “A Pivotal Moment in Proliferation Research,” International Studies Quarterly, posted 9 February 2016. Available at www.isanet.org/Publications/ISQ/Posts/ID/5012/A-Pivotal-Moment-in-Proliferation-Research, accessed 27 August 2017.
Excellent reviews of the literature on nuclear proliferation can also be found in the following books: Alexandre Debs and Nuno P. Monteiro, Nuclear Politics: The Strategic Causes of Proliferation (Cambridge University Press, 2017); Jacques C. Hymans , The Psychology of Nuclear Proliferation: Identity, Emotions, and Foreign Policy (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2006); K. P. O’Reilly, Nuclear Proliferation and the Psychology of Political Leadership: Beliefs, Motivations, and Perceptions (New York: Routledge, 2015); Ursula Jasper , The Politics of Nuclear Non-Proliferation: A Pragmatist Framework for Analysis (London: Routledge, 2014); Robert Rauchhaus, Matthew Kroenig, and Erik Gartzke, eds., Causes and Consequences of Nuclear Proliferation (London: Routledge, 2011); and Etel Solingen, Nuclear Logics: Contrasting Paths in East Asia & The Middle East (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2007).
- 20.
Scott Sagan , “Why Do States Build Nuclear Weapons?: Three Models in Search of a Bomb, International Security, Vol. 21, No. 3 (Winter, 1996–1997), pp. 54–86. Available at: https://fsi.stanford.edu/sites/default/files/Why_Do_States_Build_Nuclear_Weapons.pdf, accessed 27 August 2017.
- 21.
Scott Sagan , “Three Models in Search of a Bomb.”
- 22.
This section draws on and supplements the excellent discussion of identity, values , norms, and perceptual lens in Jeannie L. Johnson, “Conclusion: Toward a Standard Methodological Approach,” in Jeannie L. Johnson, Kerry M. Kartchner, and Jeffrey A. Larsen, eds. Strategic Culture and Weapons of Mass Destruction: Culturally Based Insights into Comparative National Security Policymaking (London, New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2009), pp. 243–257.
- 23.
See especially William Bloom, Personal Identity, National Identity and International Relations (Cambridge University Press, 1990); Yosef Lapid and Friedrich Kratochwil, eds., The Return of Culture and Identity in IR Theory (Boulder, CO: Lynne Rienner, 1996); and Part 2: Identity, in Peter Katzenstein, ed., The Culture of National Security: Norms and Identity in World Politics (New York: Columbia University Press, 1996), pp. 271–447.
- 24.
Jeannie L. Johnson, “Conclusion: Toward a Standard Methodological Approach,” in Jeannie L. Johnson, Kerry M. Kartchner, and Jeffrey A. Larsen, eds. Strategic Culture and Weapons of Mass Destruction: Culturally Based Insights into Comparative National Security Policymaking (London, New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2009), pp. 245.
- 25.
Johnson, “Conclusion: Toward a Standard Methodological Approach,” p. 246.
- 26.
Gregory F. Giles, “Continuity and Change in Israel’s Strategic Culture,” in Jeannie L. Johnson, Kerry M. Kartchner, and Jeffrey A. Larsen, eds. Strategic Culture and Weapons of Mass Destruction: Culturally Based Insights into Comparative National Security Policymaking (London, New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2009), pp. 100–101. Giles, in turn, derives his description of these subcultures from Baruch Kimmerling, The Invention and Decline of Israeliness: State, Society, and the Military (Berkeley, CA: University of California Press, 2001).
- 27.
Ursula Jasper , The Politics of Nuclear Non-Proliferation: A Pragmatist Framework for Analysis (London: Routledge, 2014), p. 4.
- 28.
Beatrice Heuser, “Beliefs, Culture, Proliferation and Use of Nuclear Weapons,” Journal of Strategic Studies: Special Issue on Preventing the Use of Weapons of Mass Destruction,” Vol. 23, No. 1 (March 2000), p. 75.
- 29.
Jacques E.C. Hymans , The Psychology of Nuclear Proliferation: Identity, Emotions, and Foreign Policy (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2006).
- 30.
Ibid., p. 2.
- 31.
Johnson, “Conclusion: Toward a Standard Methodological Approach,” p. 247.
- 32.
The most important recent exploration of sacred values can be found in Scott Atran, Talking to the Enemy: Violent Extremism, Sacred Values, and What it Means to be Human (London: Allen Lane, 2010). For a sampling of other relevant literature, see Scott Atran, “Genesis of Suicide Terrorism,” Science, Vol. 299 (2003), pp. 1534–1539; Scott Atran, “Sacred Values, Terrorism and the Limits of Rational Choice,” in J. McMillan, ed., In The Same Light As Slavery: Building A Global Antiterrorist Consensus (Washington, DC: Institute for National Strategic Studies, National Defense University Press, 2007); S. Atran, R. Axelrod, and R. Davis, “Sacred Barriers to Conflict Resolution,” Science, 317 (2007), pp. 1039–1040; Baron, J. and M. Spranca. “Protected Values,” Organizational Behavioral and Human Decision Processes, Vol. 70 (1997), pp. 1–16; H. Bazerman, A. Tebrunsel, and K. Wade-Benzoni, “When Sacred Issues are at Stake,” Negotiation Journal, Vol. 24, No. 1 (2008), pp. 113–117; and, J. Ginges, S. Atran, D. Medin, and K. Shikaki, “Sacred Bounds on Rational Resolution of Violent Political Conflict,” Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, Vol. 104 (2007), pp. 7357–7360.
- 33.
Philip E. Tetlock, “Thinking the Unthinkable: Sacred Values and Taboo Cognitions,” Trends in Cognitive Sciences, Vol. 7, No. 7 (July 2003), pp. 320–324; Atran, 2010.
- 34.
Daniel M. Bartels and Douglas L. Medin, “Are Morally-Motivated Decision Makers Insensitive to the Consequences of their Choices?” Northwestern University, Psychological Science, Vol. 18, No. 1 (2007), pp. 24–28. Available at http://home.uchicago.edu/bartels/papers/Bartels-Medin-2007-PsychSci.pdf, accessed 9 September 2017.
- 35.
See Morteza Dehghani, Scott Atran, Rumen Iliev, Sonya Sachdeva, Douglas Medinand Jeremy Ginges, “Sacred Values and Conflict over Iran’s Nuclear Program,” Judgment and Decision Making, Vol. 5, No. 7, December 2010, pp. 540–546. Available at http://journal.sjdm.org/10/101203/jdm101203.pdf, accessed 9 September 2017.
- 36.
Johnson, “Conclusion: Toward a Standard Methodological Approach,” p. 248.
- 37.
Peter J. Katzenstein, “Introduction: Alternative Perspectives on National Security,” in Peter J. Katzenstein, ed., The Culture of National Security: Norms and Identity in World Politics (New York: Columbia University Press, 1996), p. 5.
- 38.
Theo Farrell , “Constructivist Security Studies: Portrait of a Research Program,” International Studies Review, Vol. 4, No. 1 (Spring 2002), p. 54.
- 39.
Richard Price and Nina Tannenwald, “Norms and Deterrence: The Nuclear and Chemical Weapons Taboos,” in Peter J. Katzenstein, ed., The Culture of National Security: Norms and Identity in World Politics (New York: Columbia University Press, 1996), pp. 114–152.
- 40.
Johnson, “Conclusion: Toward a Standard Methodological Approach,” p. 252.
- 41.
Dominic D. P. Johnson, and Dominic Tierney, Failing to Win: Perceptions of Victory and Defeat in International Politics (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 2006).
- 42.
Robert Jervis , Perception and Misperception in International Politics (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1976).
- 43.
Robert Jervis , How Statesmen Think: The Psychology of International Politics (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2017).
- 44.
Jervis , How Statesmen Think, p. 3.
- 45.
Ursala Jasper , The Politics of Nuclear Non-Proliferation: A Pragmatist Framework for Analysis (London: Routledge, 2014), p. 2.
- 46.
Ibid., p. 6.
- 47.
Ibid., p. 4.
- 48.
Ibid., p. 6.
- 49.
John Baylis and Kristan Stoddart , The British Nuclear Experience: The Role of Beliefs, Culture, and Identity (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2015).
- 50.
Ibid., p. 207.
- 51.
Ibid., p. 9.
- 52.
Ibid., p. 208.
- 53.
Ibid., p. 209.
- 54.
Norman Cigar , Saudi Arabia and Nuclear Weapons: How Do Countries Think about the Bomb? (New York: Routledge, 2016), p. 1.
- 55.
Ibid., p. 215.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Editor information
Editors and Affiliations
Rights and permissions
Copyright information
© 2018 The Author(s)
About this chapter
Cite this chapter
Kartchner, K.M. (2018). Introduction: Sociocultural Approaches to Understanding Nuclear Thresholds. In: Johnson, J., Kartchner, K., Maines, M. (eds) Crossing Nuclear Thresholds. Initiatives in Strategic Studies: Issues and Policies. Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-72670-0_1
Download citation
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-72670-0_1
Published:
Publisher Name: Palgrave Macmillan, Cham
Print ISBN: 978-3-319-72669-4
Online ISBN: 978-3-319-72670-0
eBook Packages: Political Science and International StudiesPolitical Science and International Studies (R0)