The virtual seminar will be held from 12:30 to 2:00 p.m. (E.T.)
The processes that lead non-nuclear weapon states to pursue and sustain dual-use technological capabilities as a means to develop a nuclear weapon option, sometimes known as latent proliferation or nuclear latency, presents a long standing challenge to the nuclear non-proliferation regime. This talk examines views on nuclear proliferation in Brazil, a country that has the capacity to make nuclear weapons but has chosen not to do so, to explore the why, when, how, and to what effect of nuclear latency. It draws on the findings of a representative sample survey in Brazil during the Bolsonaro administration to understand when public support for nuclear proliferation is more likely or less likely to occur. It also will discuss a follow-on elite survey to be fielded soon that seeks to identify the determinants of elite preferences for nuclear latency and elite responses to U.S. counterproliferation policy.
About the speaker: Matias Spektor is the founder and a Professor at the School of International Relations at Fundação Getulio Vargas, Brazil. Currently, he is a visiting scholar with the Princeton Institute for International and Regional Studies and the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace. His work has focused on international security in South America and the politics of nuclear latency, including the 2022 article Public Support for Nuclear Proliferation: Experimental Evidence from Brazil.