We have recently witnessed the e ftieth anniversary of the bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, the only use of nuclear weapons in warfare. The non-use of nuclear weapons since then remains the single most important phenomenon of the nuclear age.Yet we still lack a full understanding of how this tradition arose and is maintained and of its prospects for the future. The widely cited explanation is deterrence, but this account is either wrong or incomplete.Although an element of sheer luck no doubt has played a part in this fortuitous outcome, this article argues that a normative element must be taken into account in explaining why nuclear weapons have not been used since 1945. A normative prohibition on nuclear use has developed in the global system, which, although not (yet) a fully robust norm, has stigmatized nuclear weapons as unacceptable weapons of mass destruction. Without this normative stigma, there might have been more ‘‘use.’’ 1 This article examines this phenomenon in the context of the nuclear experience of the United States. This investigation is motivated by several empirical anomalies in the conventional account—deterrence—of the non-use of nuclear weapons since 1945. First is the non-use of nuclear weapons in cases where there was no fear of nuclear retaliation, that is, wherethe adversary could not retaliate inkind.Thisanomaly includes the e rst ten years or so of the nuclear era, when the United States possessed e rst an absolute nuclearmonopoly andthenan overwhelmingnuclear advantageover theSovietUnion. It also includes non-use by the United States in Vietnam (where the United States dropped tonnage equivalent to dozens of Hiroshima bombs) and in the 1991 Persian

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The Nuclear Taboo: The United States and the Normative Basis of Nuclear Non-Use

Evidence to support the hypothesis that the ratio of fat to body weight in the human female is a determinant of female reproductive ability is presented and the mechanism through which the degree of fatness may operate to increase or decrease reproductive capacity is described. During maturation the proportion of bone muscle and fat changes in the human female. The high proportion of fat at menarche (24%) and the even higher proportion of fat at physical maturity (26%-28%) may influence reproductive ability. Previous investigations indicate that a minimal ratio of fatness to body weight is required before menarche can be achieved and menstrual cycle regularity maintained. The mechanism by which these fat deposits influence reproduction was suggested by a recent study which revealed that androgens are converted to estrogens in the fatty tissue of the breast. Furthermore the degree of fatness apparently determines whether the most potent or least potent form of estrogen will be metabolized. Periodic assessment of the ratio of total body water to body weight (an index of fatness) among 118 females who were followed from menarche to physical maturation at age 16-18 facilitated the identification of minimal fatness thresholds which must be reached in order to establish menarche in cases of primary amenorrhea and to re-establish menstrual cycles in cases of secondary amenorrhea. Dancers and athletes frequently experience amenorrhea and delayed menarche. Although their body weights may be high the ratio of fat to lean in the body may be reduced below the critical level. In populations undergoing food shortages the mechanism whereby body fat regulates reproduction may have an adaptive value. Malnourished women will experience amenorrhea when their body weight is reduced to the critical level. Energy which might otherwise be expended in reproduction will be conserved. Furthermore births are prevented in a population already experiencing food shortages. This hypothesis may also explain why some populations in developing countries have small completed family size. Chronic malnutrition rather than the use of traditional birth control methods may account for their low fecundity.

Body fat, puberty and fertility.

A definition of sustainability as maintaining ‘utility’ (average human wellbeing) over the very long term future is used to build ideas from physics, ecology, evolutionary biology, anthropology, history, philosophy, economics and psychology, into a coherent, interdisciplinary analysis of the potential for sustaining industrial civilisation. This potential is highly uncertain, because it is hard to know how long the ‘technology treadmill’, of substituting accumulated tools and knowledge for declining natural resource inputs to production, can continue. Policies to make the treadmill work more efficiently, by controlling its pervasive environmental, social and psychological external costs, and policies to control population, will help to realise this potential. Unprecedented levels of global co-operation, among very unequal nations, will be essential for many of these policies to work effectively. Even then, tougher action may be required, motivated by an explicit moral concern for sustainability. An evolutionary analysis of history suggests that technology and morality can and will respond to a clearly perceived future threat to civilisation; but we cannot easily predict the threat, or whether our response will be fast enough.

Sustainability: An Interdisciplinary Guide

Cost-benefit models derived from evolutionary ecology have led to the general expectation that territoriality will be found where resources are most abundant and predictable. Literature sources for four Bushman groups, however, indicate that the most territorial of these groups are found where resources are sparsest and most variable. This paper has as its aim the extension of the animal models of territoriality to make them more widely applicable to human foragers. The Bushmen control access to territorial resources in ways not found in other animals, and it is argued that these differences in the means of territorial defense may alter the expected relationships between environmental variables and territorial costs and benefits. The seemingly anomalous findings concerning Bushman territoriality are shown to be consistemt with cost-benefit theory only when this and other factors are taken into a account.

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Territoriality Among Human Foragers: Ecological Models and an Application To Four Bushman Groups

Why have nuclear weapons not been used since Hiroshima and Nagasaki in 1945? Nina Tannenwald disputes the conventional answer of 'deterrence' in favour of what she calls a nuclear taboo - a widespread inhibition on using nuclear weapons - which has arisen in global politics. Drawing on newly released archival sources, Tannenwald traces the rise of the nuclear taboo, the forces that produced it, and its influence, particularly on US leaders. She analyzes four critical instances where US leaders considered using nuclear weapons (Japan 1945, the Korean War, the Vietnam War, and the Gulf War 1991) and examines how the nuclear taboo has repeatedly dissuaded US and other world leaders from resorting to these 'ultimate weapons'. Through a systematic analysis, Tannenwald challenges conventional conceptions of deterrence and offers a compelling argument on the moral bases of nuclear restraint as well as an important insight into how nuclear war can be avoided in the future.

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The Nuclear Taboo: The United States and the Non-Use of Nuclear Weapons Since 1945

(1983). The military role of nuclear weapons: Perceptions and misperceptions. Survival: Vol. 25, No. 6, pp. 261-271.

The Military Role of Nuclear Weapons: Perceptions and Misperceptions

The military role of nuclear weapons: Perceptions and misperceptions

Population in the form of overpopulation poses as a cynosure, an object of many eyes. Especially has this been true since the residential figure reached one billion persons on the world stage in 1830. Progres sively this concern has been intensified by the population statistics of two billion persons and three billion persons in 1930 and 1960 respectively. The claimants of the dire consequences of population excess hold that food supply, air and water purity and sheer survival itself will be at stake. The vital question is, does overpopulation serve an awesome notice to the general welfare of world societies? In trying to answer this ques tion the writer wishes to explore problematical areas.

Robert S. McNamara

Papers

The Military Role of Nuclear Weapons: Perceptions and Misperceptions

The military role of nuclear weapons: Perceptions and misperceptions

The population problem

The limitations of military power

Reducing the Risk of Nuclear War: Is Star Wars the Answer?