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Tom Vaughan

Aberystwyth University, UK (CAT Program)
Theories of Change and Nuclear Disarmament
14 October 2024 - 18 October 2024
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Tom Vaughan is a Lecturer in Strategy and Intelligence in the Department of International Politics, Aberystwyth, UK, and the Principal Investigator of the TCND project. He publishes on the politics entailed in imagining and discounting different visions of the (post-) nuclear future, and on the politics of nuclear technology in the continent of Africa.

He joins the Paris IAS in October 2024 for a group research stay as part of the CAT collaborative program, working with researchers Lyndon Burford, Kjølv Egeland, Heba Taha, and Jana Wattenberg.

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Research Interests

The politics of imagining nuclear futures, the politics of nuclear technology in the continent of Africa

Theories of Change and Nuclear Disarmament
(Collaborative project, awarded a NetIAS Constructive Advanced Thinking grant, 2021-2024)

Theories of Change and Nuclear Disarmament (TCND) seeks to initiate interdisciplinary conversations between researchers on the question of nuclear disarmament and how it might be achieved. Scholarly conceptions of 'change' as a concept are relatively limited within the fields of international relations (IR) and security studies, with mainstream theories often reproducing an implicit methodological 'continuationism' which discounts the possibility of meaningful change of, or within, the international system. Nuclear weapons are therefore too often accepted as an inevitable presence in world politics. TCND engages researchers from diverse disciplines on the concept of 'change’ and asks whether accounts of change processes from outside of IR might allow us to think about nuclear disarmament in a new light. Questions include: how much must change—is nuclear disarmament possible only in the context of much wider, sweeping changes in world socio-economic order, or can it be achieved through smaller, targeted interventions? Would the advent of a more just and peaceful world guarantee nuclear disarmament, or would nuclear weapons somehow remain? How can lower-order social changes be leveraged to feed into this process? How can interdisciplinarity contribute to answering these questions?

Key Publications

Vaughan, Tom (2024) 'Post-nuclear worldmaking and counter-hegemony: Against catastrophic failures of imagination'. European Journal of International Security, first view, pp. 1-20. https://doi.org/10.1017/eis.2024.4

Pretorius, Joelien and Vaughan, Tom (2024) 'Complexity, depoliticisation, and African nuclear ordering agency: a meso-level exploration'. Cambridge Review of International affairs, first view, pp. 1-20. https://doi.org/10.1080/09557571.2024.2356729

Pelopidas, Benoit, Taha, Hebatalla, and Vaughan, Tom (2024) 'How dawn turned into dusk: Scoping and closing possible nuclear futures after the Cold War'. Journal of Strategic Studies, first view, pp. 1-12. https://doi.org/10.1080/01402390.2023.2290441

32540
2024-2025