| This research work examines the social construction of the nuclear safety institution in France, and the concurrent increased focus on the nuclear risk issue. Emphasis on risk and safety, as primarily technical issues, can partly be seen as a strategy. Employed by power elites in the nuclear technostructure, this diverts emphasis away from controversial and normative questions regarding the political and social consequences of technology to questions of technology which appear to be absolute to the technology itself.;Nuclear safety, which started from a 'preoccupation' with risk related to the nuclear energy research and development process, is examined using the analytic concept of 'field'. As a social arena which is patterned to achieve specific tasks, this field is dominated by a body of state engineers recognized to have high level scientific and administrative competences. It is structured by procedures and administrative hierarchies as well as by technical rules, norms and standards. These are formalized and rationalized through technical, economic, political and social needs; over time, they consolidate the field into an institution.;The study documents the nuclear safety institution as an integral part of the nuclear technostructure, which has historically used the specificity of its expertise as a buffer against outside interference. A lack of institutional channels to allow outside groups to influence decisions reinforces this isolation.;Finally, the nuclear safety institution is studied both as a symbol of an anti-democratic technocracy and a model of work organization commendable for its precision and its range of competences.;The study is based on the analysis of empirical data: written materials--specialized journals, official reports, internal documents--and interviews with engineers who work with the government and the large-scale organizations involved in nuclear energy, and with anti-nuclear opponents. The inquiry shows how heterogeneous forces--political forces, international markets, social movements, state technical bodies--all contribute, in conflictual and sometimes contradictory ways, to the formation of a field of safety and to its institutionalization. |
