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Issue 5 Part 3

Myth, Hiroshima and Fear: How we Overestimated the Usefulness of the Bomb
How Reliance on Nuclear Weapons Erodes and Distorts International Law and Global Order
Re-examining the 1996 ICJ Advisory Opinion: Concerning the Legality of Nuclear Weapons
India’s Disarmament Initiative 1988: Continuing Relevance, Valid Pointers for an NWFW
Nuclear Threats and Security
An Arctic Nuclear-Weapon-Free Zone – Needed Now

Energizing Euro The current crisis is an indictment against the dominant competitive economic theory. To liberate the economy from exponential debt growth, so that it works for people and the planet, we need to change how money works. Our modern debt-based money creates the illusion of continuously growing wealth. But, it only delivers forced trade and labour; forced loss of bio-diversity and... Read more
Savas Hadjikyriacou
The ATOM Project is a new international initiative to build global support for a permanent end to nuclear weapons testing and the total abolition of nuclear weapons. It was launched at a parliamentary assembly in Astana, Kazakhstan on August 29, 2012, the UN International Day Against Nuclear Tests, established in recognition of the closing of the Semipalatinsk nuclear test site on that day in... Read more
Editorial Note None who has witnessed the human suffering inflicted by nuclear radiation at the Semipalatinsk Nuclear Test Site in Kazakhstan can justify the continued existence of nuclear weapons for a single moment longer than is needed to destroy all of them. Statistics do not tell the story, but if ever a statistic makes a compelling narrative, then the 1.5 million Kazakhstanis who have... Read more
Canadian Pugwash organized a Strategic Foresight Workshop on “A Secure World without Nuclear Weapons” in Nova Scotia, Canada, August 16-18, 2012. The workshop was attended by over 30 Pugwashites from all around the world. This workshop included outstanding talks by Senator D. Roche, one of the founders of the Middle Powers Initiative, on “Reasons Why Nuclear Disarmament Has Not Been Achieved”; by... Read more
Humanities and the Contemporary World, Podgorica, Montenegro: The past fivemonths have been among the most fruitful periods of activity for the World Academy inrecent memory. It commenced with the conference hosted by the Montenegrin Academy ofSciences and Arts and co-organized by WAAS on June 7-9, 2012, as reported in the Summer 2012 WAAS Newsletter. WAAS organized special sessions at the... Read more
Forty years after publishing its first Report on The Limits to Growth, the Club of Rome held the 2012 Annual Conference on October 1-2, 2012, in Bucharest, Romania, where it brought together some of the world’s thought leaders to debate the most pressing challenges of our time. In 1972, The Limits to Growth commanded critical attention and sparked debate around the world about the future of... Read more
Adele Buckley
Get Full Text in PDF Climate change and nuclear weapons, the two great security threats of the 21st century, are uniquely influential in the Arctic. Although the current risk of conflict is low, the global future is potentially turbulent. There is a ‘new’ Arctic because of meltdown induced by climate change. Some see great economic opportunities; others see ecological and human security threats... Read more
Garry Jacobs, Winston P. Nagan
Get Full Text in PDF Abstract This article presents highlights and insights from the International Conference on “Nuclear Threats and Security” organized by the World Academy of Art and Science in association with the European Leadership Network and the Dag Hammarskjöld University College of International Relations and Diplomacy and sponsored by NATO at the Inter-University Centre, Dubrovnik on... Read more
Manpreet Sethi
Get Full Text in PDF Abstract The run up to the NPT Review Conference in 2010 brought nuclear disarmament into focus. Transitory though this trend turned out to be, it nevertheless became a trigger for India to re-examine its own position on disarmament. In order to take a considered view on the subject, Prime Minister Manmohan Singh instituted an Informal Group in October 2010 with the... Read more
Jasjit Singh
Get Full Text in PDF Abstract The primary objections raised against total elimination of nuclear weapons are built around a few arguments mostly of non-technical nature. Nuclear weapons and the strategies for their use have resulted in the establishment of a vicious circle within which the international community is trapped. The argument that the world will be unsafe without nuclear weapons is... Read more
John Burroughs
Get Full Text in PDF Abstract Deployment of nuclear forces as an international security mechanism for prevention of major war is far removed from the world envisaged by the United Nations Charter in which threat or use of force is the exception, not the rule. Reliance on nuclear weapons has also distorted the development of major instruments of international humanitarian law and international... Read more
Ward Wilson
Get Full Text in PDF Abstract Recent evidence from World War II and the Cold War shows that nuclear weapons are far less useful as military and political tools than has been believed. Far from giving a madman the power to conquer the world, nuclear weapons are clumsy, dangerous technology with very few real uses — even if you have a monopoly. No one does his best thinking when gripped by fear.... Read more
John Scales Avery
Get Full Text in PDF Abstract It is becoming increasingly clear that the concept of the absolutely sovereign nation-state is a dangerous anachronism in a world of thermonuclear weapons, instantaneous communication, and economic interdependence. Probably our best hope for the future lies in developing the United Nations into a World Federation. The strengthened United Nations should have a... Read more
James Ranney
Get Full Text in PDF Abstract The author sets about re-thinking the old concept of “World Peace Through Law” (WPTL), meaning replacing the use of international force with the global rule of law. He traces the history of the WPTL concept back to the British legal philosopher Jeremy Bentham, whose 1789 ‘Plan for an Universal and Perpetual Peace’ proposed “a plan of general and permanent... Read more
Winston P. Nagan, Garry Jacobs
Get Full Text in PDF Abstract The current international security framework is based on an incomplete, anachronistic conception of sovereignty shaped largely by historical circumstance rather than principles of universal justice. Evolution of the global community over the past half century necessitates a reformulation of the concept to justly represent the rights of individual citizens and the... Read more