Nuclear Weapons and Disease: The Role of Science, Policy, and the State

• In Event: Poster Session: Women and Politics Research II; Sexuality and Politics; Health Politics and Policy & Representation and Electoral Systems
  In Poster Session: Poster Session: Health Politics and Policy

Abstract

What is the role of science in policymaking? What political identity, if any, can a scientist involved in such policy-making have? There are diverging conceptions of how and when science influences policy, how the interplay between the two should be structured, and what this interplay means for the changing role of the state in international relations. This paper critically analyzes the international relations (IR) and science and technology studies (STS) literatures’ perspectives. It also aims to bring them into dialogue over when science matters in the political world, specifically in the context of Cold War era nuclear weapons policy and the more recent Ebola and Zika epidemics. First, the paper aims to summarize the arguments in the IR and STS literatures on the subject. Second, I analyze the global health governance (GHG) take on how nuclear security and global health security concerns are affecting the traditionally central role of the state in the international system. These approaches are then used to interpret the cases of Cold War nuclear proliferation and the two epidemics, allowing for the IR, STS, and GHG perspectives to weigh in on the importance of science, scientists, and international institutions in influencing nuclear security and global health security policy.

Author

• Renu Singh, Georgetown University