Danièle Saint-Ville-Leplé - Entry No 3 (Masco)

The first impression given by this article was rather funny. Its simplistic title is not something academic readers usually expect. This tiny detail illustrates that somehow pedagogical aspect of Joseph Masco’s piece of writing. Joseph Masco is a rising contemporary anthropologist, who has been published only recently, that is to say, in the past decade. He has worked on a broad range of topics. His works tend to testify to an obvious tropism on weapons of mass destruction, though. 

This article is an attempt to explain the ambivalent attitude of Americans toward nuclear policy. His approach combines a typical History of Ideas analysis of the actors, their context and the diffusion of the ideas  – a direct influence of the field he graduated in – with refreshing considerations on aesthetics and, more significantly, on communication strategies (1). 

He ends up with anthropological concepts that allow decoding the American society.  It is, for instance, the national/post-national view of security and power, the psychosocial effects of the atomic bomb on American security culture, or the rivalry between the scientists and the government to sensitize the public opinion to their opposed definitions of threat and security.

Joseph Masco proceeds by distinguishing three pivotal moments in time, starting with 1953. The first period of importance has three characteristics. The government and the society are led by a triumphant national view of security. Yet, early Cold War sciences about the ecological effects of the atomic bomb begin to emerge, in a quite ambivalent way (2). In the meantime, under the influence of emotional propaganda, the public tends to assimilate nuclear to every unusual natural disaster. 

The second period is the Nuclear Winter of 1983. This decade is truly a turning point. Turco, Toon, Ackerman, Pollack and Sagan (TTAPS) decide to join forces in a research program to promote a completely different view of security: the planet itself is endangered. They aim at sensitizing directly the population through communication. That alternative definition of security is less nation-centred, more global, advocating nuclear disarmament.

The last period deals with the 2000’s. The government (Bush) has not really changed its mind, but the average citizen feels more and more concerned about the future of the planet. Paradoxically, the government’s ability to handle hypothetical situation of nuclear emergency is still of utmost importance to the citizens. So much so that the theme pops up constantly, even in unrelated matters. Masco’s explanation is that the bomb has profoundly reshaped the American security culture and the American definition of being a powerful country. 

It is undoubtedly tempting to look at this work from a political science perspective. It is full of powerful ideas that need to be investigated further. Are any of those observations generalizable? The author’s approach reminds me of several authors we have already read. Like Latour, Masco acknowledges to some extent the influence of small groups of scientists on the trajectory of a society. Just like Foucault, there is this thought about a direct linkage between knowledge and power. The great difference is that Masco emphasizes more the role of communication. Governing by imposing in the public debate one’s definition of what to fear.  This idea suggests nothing less than the power of fear.



(1) For example, that of the TTAPS. They chose to subvert the aesthetic perspective offered by the Apollo mission photographs of the earth in order to promote their anti-proliferation ideas.

(2) “The early Cold War period is the moment many of the key scientific institutions were established that would ultimately provide the evidence for climate change”, even if they were meant to support the action of the government in the beginning.