New Poll Shows Nuclear Taboo Remains Strong Among Americans, Both Civilians and Military

Human Security Lab at University of Massachusetts has launched preliminary toplines from a new survey on American public attitudes toward the legality and use of nuclear weapons this week. 

The data was collected as part of a new interdisciplinary research project by Human Security Lab Director Charli Carpenter, a Professor of Political Science at UMass Amherst, with Eleonora Mattiacci, Associate Professor of Political Science at Amherst College plus a team of under-graduate researchers. 

According to Dr. Carpenter, “The Nobel Prize Committee recently expressed deep concern about whether the nuclear taboo is getting stronger or weaker when they honored the role of Japanese nuclear bomb survivors in promoting a world where these weapons would never again be used. We’re working to understand how those laws shape norms and attitudes and if they’re getting stronger or weaker.” 

The project was funded through a partnership between Swiss Philanthropy Foundation and Lex International, a Swiss-based NGO which collaborates with civil society, governments, industry, and the scientific community to “drive meaningful change” through research, coordination and communication.  

The survey was carried out by survey research firm YouGov between July and August this year, and asked 1500 Americans their opinions on the lawfulness of nuclear strikes, their view of when (if ever) nuclear weapons should be used, and whether or not the nuclear chain of command should evolve to include clearer limits or safeguards. Many questions also allowed participants to elaborate their responses in their own words.  

The Human Security Lab team will be analyzing both the closed and open-ended answers this year to construct a more detailed picture of how the U.S. public views nuclear use and legality. And some experiments in the data might allow the team to determine how messaging about international laws, such as the Geneva Conventions or Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons, could impact some respondents’ answers. 

That is all still under analysis, says Dr. Carpenter. But even the initial topline results, without any treatments, show a large majority (83%) of both the general population and military-trained Americans already believe it would never be legally permissible to launch a nuclear strike against a civilian populated area. Moreover, more than half of respondents in both the military-trained sample and general population prefer far stricter conditions for any nuclear launch than that allowed by current US policy. Of those, approximately ⅓ said they preferred additional oversight authority besides the President.  

When asked about the most important reasons never to use nuclear weapons, the most frequent responses from both groups were environmental catastrophe and indiscriminate effects on civilians. Equal numbers of both groups feared nuclear strikes would cause unnecessary suffering to troops even if used away from civilians, or would violate international treaties. Military- trained Americans were more likely than the general population to cite the risk of nuclear retaliation against Americans, and the risk of undermining the nuclear non-use norm. By contrast, the general public was more concerned than the military sample with mass starvation and the effects of fire and radiation.  

A group of undergraduate students associated with Human Security Lab’s Undergraduate Research Engagement Program  - political science majors Grace Bernheart, Joseph Mara and Zahra Marashi - are assisting the research team with the qualitative data analysis and visualization, and will spend the rest of the semester helping rigorously code the open-ended comments to understand the nuances of how different Americans view the current nuclear era.  

Much of the work remains to be done, but according to Dr. Carpenter, the initial findings already challenge recent claims that the nuclear taboo is eroding in the face of increased nuclear saber-rattling. “We still need to analyze the data fully,” she says, “but so far if anything, this new era of nuclear threats seems to be strengthening the public desire - including among active-duty military and veterans - for stronger nuclear norms and safeguards.”