The Surveillance Imperative: Geosciences during the Cold War and Beyond

by S. Turchetti, P. Roberts

Overview

Surveillance is a key notion for understanding power and control in the modern world, but it has been curiously neglected by historians of science and technology. Using the overarching concept of the "surveillance imperative," this collection of essays offers a new window on the evolution of the environmental sciences during and after the Cold War.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781137438744
Publisher:	Palgrave Macmillan
Publication date:	09/17/2014
Series:	Palgrave Studies in the History of Science and Technology
Sold by:	Barnes & Noble
Format:	eBook
Pages:	278
File size:	4 MB

About the Author

Matthew Adamson, McDaniel College, Hungary Soraya Boudia, University Paris-Est, Marne la Vallée, France. Lino Camprubí, University Autónoma of Barcelona, Spain. Roberto Cantoni, University of Manchester, UK. James R. Fleming, Colby College, USA. Sebastian Grevsmühl, UPMC, France. Néstor Herran, UPMC, France Roger Launius, Smithsonian Institution, USA. Robert Poole, University of Central Lancashire, UK. Sam Robinson, CHSTM, University of Manchester, UK.

Table of Contents

Introduction: Knowing the Enemy, Knowing the Earth; Simone Turchetti and Peder Roberts PART I: SURVEILLANCE STRATEGIES TO CONTROL NATURAL RESOURCES 1. From The Ground Up: Uranium Surveillance and Atomic Energy in Western Europe; Matthew Adamson, Lino Camprubì and Simone Turchetti 2. Underground and Underwater: Oil Security in France and Britain during the Cold War; Roberto Cantoni and Leucha Veneer PART II: MONITORING THE EARTH: NUCLEAR WEAPON PROGRAMS 3. 'Unscare' and Conceal: the United Nations Scientific Committee on the Effects of Atomic Radiation and the Origin of International Radiation Monitoring; Nèstor Herran  4. 'In God We Trust. All Others We Monitor': Seismology, Surveillance and the Test Ban Negotiations; Simone Turchetti PART III: SEEING THE SEA - FROM ABOVE AND BELOW 5. Stormy Seas: Anglo-American Negotiations on Ocean Surveillance; Sam Robinson  6. Scientists and Sea Ice under Surveillance in the Early Cold War; Peder Roberts PART IV: SURVEILLANCE TECHNOLOGIES 7. SpaceTechnology and the Rise of the U.S. Surveillance State; Roger D. Launius 8. Serendipitous Outcomes in Space History: From Space Photography to Environmental Surveillance; Sebastian Vincent Grevsmühl PART V: FROM SURVEILLANCE TO ENVIRONMENTAL MONITORING 9. Observing the environmental turn through the Global Environment Monitoring System; Soraya Boudia 10. What was whole about the whole Earth? How the Earth sciences saw their subject during the Cold War and beyond; Robert Poole

Editorial Reviews

Individual essays could be useful assigned reading in advanced university courses in history of science, technology, and the Cold War … . Academic historians and policy analysts will find in this text a trove of information about the remarkably expansive use of planetary science data during the Cold War and valuable context for the current, politically charged debate over big data surveillance that represents the legacy of these earlier programs.” (Lisa Ruth Rand, Quest, Vol. 23 (1), 2016)

From the Publisher