THERMONUCLEAR MONARCHY

A compelling, provocative, and convincing proposal for the elimination of nuclear weapons.

During his impeachment proceedings, Richard Nixon boasted, “I can go into my office and pick up the telephone and in 25 minutes 70 million people will be dead.” In this incisive, masterfully-argued new book, award-winning social theorist Elaine Scarry demonstrates that the power of one leader to obliterate millions with a nuclear weapon—a possibility that remains very real even in the wake of the Cold War—actually violates constitutional rights and is fundamentally at odds with the principle of democracy. When a leader can single-handedly decide to deploy a nuclear weapon, we live in a state of “thermonuclear monarchy,” not democracy. Scarry’s bold, provocative conclusions also demonstrate that times of crisis require more extensive debate and deliberation, not swift, unilateral, preemptive action or restrictions on civil rights and dissent. Scarry’s bold, provocative conclusions also demonstrate that times of crisis require extensive debate and deliberation, not swift, unilateral, preemptive action or restrictions on civil rights and dissent. Elaine Scarry is the Walter M. Cabot Professor of Aesthetics and the General Theory of Value at Harvard University. In 2005, Foreign Policy/the Prospect named her one of the 100 leading intellectuals in the world. Her book The Body in Pain was a 1985 National Book Critics Circle Award Finalist.