Nuclear issues in the shadow of Fukushima

Just as nuclear power advocates were celebrating a “nuclear renaissance” as part of the solution to global warming, the catastrophe at Fukushima reminded the world of the dangers reliance on nuclear energy implies. Like so many issues of the first importance, the Fukushima events received a few weeks attention in the U.S. media, resulting in coverage that did more to educate the public about the character of modern government and corporate propaganda campaigns than about the role of nuclear technology in the global economy and its impact on our lives. Mr. Lichterman will examine the broader implications of the ongoing Fukushima nuclear crisis, ranging from the relationships between the immense organizations that deploy and sustain the world’s nuclear weapons and nuclear power complexes to the ways information about their activities and effects are produced and controlled. Andrew Lichterman is a lawyer and activist based in the San Francisco Bay area. As a lawyer, he has represented peace and environmental activists in a variety of settings, and also taught law at alternative law schools for many years. In recent years his work has focused on the purposes and impacts of U.S. nuclear and other strategic weapons programs, including their effect on global disarmament efforts, and on the relationship between nuclear technologies, militarism, and the global economy. He is a member of the Global Council of the Abolition 2000 Global Network to Eliminate Nuclear Weapons and a member of the boards of the Oakland, California based Western States Legal Foundation and of the Los Alamos Study Group, an Albuquerque, New Mexico based disarmament organization.