Author: Itty Abraham
Publisher: Orient Longman
Year: 1999
Language: English
Pages: 180
ISBN/UPC (if available): 8125016155
Description
This book is the first serious historical account of the development of India's nuclear program and of how the bomb came to be made.
In 1974 India exploded an atomic device. In May 1998 the new- right wing BJP government set off several more, encountering in the process domestic plaudits, but also international condemnation and possibly sparking a new nuclear arms race in South Asia. What explains the enthusiasm of the Indian public for nuclear power?
The author questions orthodox interpretations implying that it was a product of international conflict. He argues that in fact the explosions had nothing to do with national security as conventionally understood and everything to do with establishing the legitimacy of the independent nation-state. He demonstrates the linkages that exist between the two apparently separate discourses of national security and national development.
The result is a remarkable book that breaks new ground in integrating comparative politics, international relations and cultural studies. It is also a pioneering exploration of the sociology of science in a Third World context and offers a radically new argument about the Indian state and its post-colonial crisis of legitimacy.
Contents
Acknowledgements
Preface
The Problem
Problems of Studying the Indian nuclear establishment
CHAPTER 1
INTRODUCTION
Atomic energy as a world historical moment
National development and national security
International relations theory and proliferation studies
Keys to the argument : conjuncture, postcolonial, fetish
Autonomy, crisis, and legitimacy in the postcolonial state
Postcolonial visions and science
CHAPTER 2
CREATING THE INDIAN ATOMIC ENERGY COMMISSION
'Colonial' science
Metropolitan science and colonial scientists
Colonial science and the national question
Jawaharlal Nehru and science
Atomic energy and science
The Indian state and science
Territory, resources, and the Atomic Energy Commission
Monopolising science
CHAPTER 3
POSTCOLONIAL MODERNITY : BUILDING ATOMIC REACTORS IN INDIA
Urgency : fending off domestic conflict
Urgency : searching for a reactor
Urgency assuaged ? The British connection
Other international suppliers
Power reactors and national development
A conclusion and an interpretation
CHAPTER 4
LEARNING LOVE THE BOMB : THE 'PEACEFUL' NUCLEAR EXPLOSION OF
The 1962 Atomic Energy Act
Unsafe guarded fissile material
International conflict
The uncertainty within
Non-Proliferation struggles
Demonstration, or, the nuclear explosion of 1974
Jaldi Yeh Hai
CHAPTER 5
FETISH, SECRECY, NATIONAL SECURITY
Fetish
Secrecy
Postscript
Bibliography
Index