The Third Nuclear Age: Will our luck finally run out?

Summary:
For this seminar, Alexandra Bell will discuss recent developments in nuclear proliferation, arms control, and strategy. Many in the nuclear policy community now say we are at the start of a third nuclear age. What this age will look like is a matter of debate. What is clear is that academics, experts, and policy makers thinking about the future of nonproliferation, arms control, deterrence, and disarmament policy will face new and unprecedented challenges. They will need to understand how other existential risks—climate change and emerging disruptive technologies that include synthetic biology and artificial intelligence, among others—will affect their work, for good and for bad. Further, given that a common long-term consensus about the future of nuclear weapons will take time and effort to forge, the short-term common goal should be the prevention of nuclear war. The question that then follows is whether the system of controls we have created to prevent nuclear war is fit for purpose or whether our luck will finally run out.

Bio:
Alexandra Bell is the president and CEO of the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists. A noted policy expert and former diplomat, she oversees the Bulletin‘s publishing programs, management of the Doomsday Clock, and a growing set of activities around nuclear risk, climate change, and disruptive technologies.

Before joining the Bulletin, Bell served as the Deputy Assistant Secretary for Nuclear Affairs in the Bureau of Arms Control, Deterrence, and Stability at the US State Department, where she managed the Offices of Strategic Stability and Deterrence and Multilateral and Nuclear Affairs. From 2017 to 2021, Bell was the Senior Policy Director at the Center for Arms Control and Non-Proliferation and the Council for a Livable World. Previously, Bell served as a Senior Advisor in the Office of the Under Secretary of State for Arms Control and International Security and as an Advisor in ADS, then named the Bureau of Arms Control, Verification and Compliance. Before joining the State Department in 2010, she worked on nuclear policy issues at the Ploughshares Fund and the Center for American Progress.

Bell has been quoted or published in The Washington Post, The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, the Los Angeles Times, USA Today, The Guardian, the Raleigh News and Observer, The Seattle Times, Bloomberg, Politico, Vox, The Daily Beast, Time Magazine, Bustle, Huffington Post, Sinclair, Inkstick, and more. She has also provided commentary for CNN, MSNBC, CNBC, NPR, and the BBC. Bell received a Master’s degree in International Affairs from the New School and a Bachelor’s degree in Peace, War and Defense from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. From 2001-2003, she was a Peace Corps Volunteer in Saint Elizabeth, Jamaica. Bell is a Member of the Council on Foreign Relations.