Award Date
1-1-1998
Degree Type
Thesis
Degree Name
Master of Arts (MA)
Department
History
First Committee Member
David S. Tanenhaus
Number of Pages
284
Abstract
An unprecedented combination of imagination and capital resulted in the most profound, and profane, achievement in modern history--the atom bomb--but the strategies that empowered its development caused inestimable suffering in peacetime America. Discrete practices of secrecy, media manipulation, and the devaluation of scientific opinion evolved and coalesced during the cold war, permeating institutions and pre-empting any protection of the unwary from exposure to radioactive fallout. While the atomic testing program and its consequences are often considered in light of national policy, this analysis alternatively reveals the character, fusion, and trajectory of practices that culminated in the collision of the government with the health and lives of the innocent.
Keywords
Atomic; Chain; Governance; Reaction; Tragedy
Controlled Subject
Public policy; Political science
File Format
File Size
10076.16 KB
Degree Grantor
University of Nevada, Las Vegas
Language
English
Permissions
If you are the rightful copyright holder of this dissertation or thesis and wish to have the full text removed from Digital Scholarship@UNLV, please submit a request to digitalscholarship@unlv.edu and include clear identification of the work, preferably with URL.
Repository Citation
Wammack, Mary Dawn, "Chain reaction: The tragedy of atomic governance" (1998). UNLV Retrospective Theses & Dissertations. 1033.
http://dx.doi.org/10.25669/deig-t3pk
Rights
IN COPYRIGHT. For more information about this rights statement, please visit http://rightsstatements.org/vocab/InC/1.0/
COinS