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" Afrikanerdom and nuclear weapons : "
McNamee, Terence.
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Latin Dissertation
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| Record Number
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1095925
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TLets417613
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| Main Entry
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McNamee, Terence.
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| Title & Author
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Afrikanerdom and nuclear weapons :\ McNamee, Terence.
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| College
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London School of Economics and Political Science (University of London)
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| Date
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2003
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| student score
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2003
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| Degree
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Ph.D.
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| Abstract
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This thesis focuses on the history of nuclear weapons proliferation and rollback in South Africa.The main challenge it poses relates to statements and written accounts by former South Africanofficials published since 1993, which emphasize new external threats as the sole incentive forbuilding the weapons and their disappearance as a necessary condition for dismantling them. Thisstudy contends that their strict focus on national security considerations has obscured vitalinfluences and incentives that shaped nuclear decision making. The alternative perspectivedeveloped in this study argues that certain core tenants of Afrikaner culture significantly enhancedthe lure of the nuclear weapons option and informed nuclear decision making, from the beginningof South Africa's nuclear weapons programme until its termination. The focus on culture generatesquestions about the veracity of key aspects of the official account, such as the start-date of theprogramme and the reasons for nuclear rollback, which have not been subject to thoroughscholarly investigation due to the destruction of all nuclear weapons-related documents.Underlying this study is the now widely-held assumption in IR that states' strategicpostures are not derived solely, or perhaps even primarily, from crude 'material interests' orrational calculations. Rather, actors are sensitive to material conditions (e. g., relative capabilities) ina culturally unique way. South Africa's nuclear weapons programme is presented as an outcome ofa dynamic interplay between the culture of the state's former ruling minority, the Afrikaners, andstructural or external factors. The Security Culture approach developed by Keith Krause in hiswork on arms control issuesi s adopted to systematically assessh ow the Afrikaners' collectiveunderstandings, values, traditions, beliefs, perceptions and self-perceptions were implicated inSouth Africa's nuclear history.
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London School of Economics and Political Science (University of London)
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