The virtual seminar will be held from 12:30 to 2:00 p.m. (E.T.)

The Russian capture of Crimea in 2014, its larger war against Ukraine beginning in February 2022, and related US policies, have fueled European elite debates and policy shifts on nuclear weapons. It is often claimed that due to these events the European public has become more supportive both of nuclear weapons and policies to threaten nuclear use against Russia for deterrence. This presentation will use public opinion polls from 2019 and 2024 in nine European countries (Belgium, France, Germany, Italy, Netherlands, Poland, Sweden, Turkey and the UK) to show Europeans have not become more in favor of nuclear weapons in this period. It also will show that a majority of these European publics express powerlessness regarding nuclear weapon policies and underestimate their fellow citizens' support for nuclear disarmament.

About the speaker: Benoît Pelopidas is Professor of political science at Sciences Po, Paris, and the founding director of its Nuclear Knowledges program. His research focuses on the processes that make possible the construction of knowledge about nuclear weapons, shape nuclear weapons policy choices by nuclear-armed states, and constrain democratic choices concerning nuclear weapons. Pelopidas has been a visiting researcher at Princeton's Program on Science and Global Security, and at Stanford's Center for International Security and Cooperation, and was on the faculty at Bristol University's School of Sociology, Politics, and International Studies. He received his PhD in politics from Sciences Po (Paris) and the University of Geneva.