Fallout Suits and Human Rights: Disrupting the Technocratic Narrative

Richards, Linda M.

doi:10.1111/pech.12003

Cited by 2 publications

(1 citation statement)

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“…Exposures were cumulative and not discrete events, especially if internal. Hot particles could act like bullets to break bonds to dispel the sense of radiation ever being “low” level or safe at any dose (Pauling 1983 [1958]; Richards 2013 , 2014 ). By 1959 there was a “full scale radiation scare” with no denying that fallout contamination could be much more dangerous than supposed (Hacker 1994 :198; Walker 2000 : 22–3; Creager 2013 : 173–77; US Congressional Hearing 1957 : 16).…”

Section: Who’s Human Right To Healthmentioning

confidence: 99%

1945–1964 WHO’s Right to Health?

Richards

2022

N.T.M.

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United States Atomic Energy Commission (USAEC) and UN agencies utilized techniques of power and negotiation to implement radiation exposure regulations. USAEC affiliated scientists’ expertise was cultivated while establishing a radiation protection regime based on classified experiments. World Health Organization (WHO) leadership sought to manifest a human right to health, including a right to protection from radiation contamination. The careers of a few technical experts and interagency UN correspondence shows how American risk models of radiation regulation traveled and ultimately inhibited WHO attempts to frame radiation as a public health threat. The USAEC and the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) navigated WHO’s way of perceiving radiation with technical experts and bureaucratic and legislative means. This paper shows the underpinning at the UN of competing models of radiation regulation, one state centric and the other, an individual right to health. This narrative provides insights into the nature of the UN’s current conceptualization of radiation regulation and argues for further research into UN, radiation, and human rights history.

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Section: Who’s Human Right To Healthmentioning

confidence: 99%