Knowledge management and institutional development within the British Nuclear Weapons Programme, 1947-1993

Abstract

Can nuclear weapons be uninvented? This thesis provides new insights into how this was a longstanding worry for the British nuclear weapons establishment and how it understood and responded to its knowledge management concerns. This thesis demonstrates how, from a sense of its own fragility, the British nuclear weapons establishment developed an understanding of the importance of personally embodied skills. Process tracing is used to highlight a cyclical pattern of the establishment believing itself to be in a morale crisis where it needed extra measures to retain tacit knowledge. In response, Aldermaston repeatedly promoted its institutional interests by raising the risk of nuclear weapons ‘uninvention’ through the loss of its skilled workforce unless more work could be obtained. Although not always successful, this argument was first deployed in 1954 and used as late as 1993. These efforts had a direct impact on nuclear policy; the Polaris Improvement Programme was initially justified based on maintaining the research momentum at Aldermaston. The inability to contest arguments premised on secret and incommunicable skills meant that successive governments were faced with the principal-agent problem of imposing enough oversight to ascertain Aldermaston’s minimum manpower requirements yet also affording enough autonomy for the weapons establishment to manage its own workforce freely. To find an optimal balance, multiple different management models have been imposed upon Aldermaston. Nonetheless, this thesis demonstrates that claims relating to nuclear skill loss have and continue to serve as a driver for vertical nuclear weapons proliferation and may prove particularly influential in states less able to provide effective oversight.

Date of Award	1 Jan 2021
Original language	English
Awarding Institution	King's College London
Supervisor	Chris Hobbs (Supervisor) & Susan Martin (Supervisor)