Uranium exposed at Expo 58: the colonial agenda behind the peaceful atom

IF 1 1区历史学 Q1 HISTORY

History and Technology Pub Date : 2021-04-03 DOI:10.1080/07341512.2021.1960074

Dennis Pohl

引用次数: 1

Abstract

ABSTRACT This research focuses on the staged contrast between atomic modernity and colonial backwardness at Expo 58 in Brussels, as a strategic promise of the peaceful nuclear, powered by Congolese uranium. I analyze the management of nuclear power – ranging from household technologies to European (post)colonial infrastructures of uranium resources and nuclear power plants – to reveal architecture as a geopolitical technology. The article argues that the ‘domestication of the atom’ goes hand in hand with the domestication of power, exercised through architecture on various levels, affecting the politics of visibility, knowledge, and imagination. The article examines Expo 58 as a case study, where global uranium agents such as the Union Minière du Haut-Katanga (UMHK), the US Atomic Energy Commission (USAEC), the Belgian Centre d’Études pour les applications de l’Energie Nucléaire (SKC-CEN), and the European Atomic Energy Community (Euratom) met in a setting that constructed both a Western scientific gaze and colonial backwardness.

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第58届世博会曝光的铀:和平原子背后的殖民议程

摘要本研究聚焦于第58届布鲁塞尔世博会上原子现代化与殖民落后之间的阶段性对比，这是和平核能的战略承诺，由刚果铀提供动力。我分析了核能的管理——从家用技术到欧洲(后)殖民时期的铀资源和核电站的基础设施——以揭示建筑作为一种地缘政治技术。这篇文章认为，“原子的驯化”与权力的驯化密切相关，通过建筑在各个层面上发挥作用，影响着可见性、知识和想象力的政治。这篇文章将第58届世博会作为一个案例研究，全球铀代理机构，如上加丹加联邦部(UMHK)、美国原子能委员会(USAEC)、比利时Études核能能源应用中心(SKC-CEN)和欧洲原子能共同体(Euratom)，在一个既构建了西方科学的目光，又构建了殖民落后的环境中会面。

本文章由计算机程序翻译，如有差异，请以英文原文为准。

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来源期刊

History and Technology HISTORY-

CiteScore

1.60

自引率

16.70%

发文量

期刊介绍： History and Technology serves as an international forum for research on technology in history. A guiding premise is that technology—as knowledge, practice, and material resource—has been a key site for constituting the human experience. In the modern era, it becomes central to our understanding of the making and transformation of societies and cultures, on a local or transnational scale. The journal welcomes historical contributions on any aspect of technology but encourages research that addresses this wider frame through commensurate analytic and critical approaches.