Pandora's Box (British TV Series)
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''Pandora's Box'', subtitled ''A Fable From the Age of Science'', is a
BBC The British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) is a British public service broadcaster headquartered at Broadcasting House in London, England. Originally established in 1922 as the British Broadcasting Company, it evolved into its current sta ...
television
documentary A documentary film (often described simply as a documentary) is a nonfiction Film, motion picture intended to "document reality, primarily for instruction, education or maintaining a Recorded history, historical record". The American author and ...
series by
Adam Curtis Adam Curtis (born 26 May 1955) is an English documentary filmmaker. Curtis began his career as a conventional documentary producer for the BBC throughout the 1980s and into the early 1990s. The release of '' Pandora's Box'' (1992) marked the in ...
looking at the consequences of political and
technocratic Technocracy is a form of government in which decision-makers appoint knowledge experts in specific domains to provide them with advice and guidance in various areas of their policy-making responsibilities. Technocracy follows largely in the tra ...
rationalism In philosophy, rationalism is the Epistemology, epistemological view that "regards reason as the chief source and test of knowledge" or "the position that reason has precedence over other ways of acquiring knowledge", often in contrast to ot ...
. It won a
BAFTA The British Academy of Film and Television Arts (BAFTA, ) is an independent trade association and charity that supports, develops, and promotes the arts of film, television and video games in the United Kingdom. In addition to its annual awa ...
for Best Factual Series in 1993. Curtis deals with, in order:
Communism Communism () is a political sociology, sociopolitical, political philosophy, philosophical, and economic ideology, economic ideology within the history of socialism, socialist movement, whose goal is the creation of a communist society, a ...
in the
Soviet Union The Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. (USSR), commonly known as the Soviet Union, was a List of former transcontinental countries#Since 1700, transcontinental country that spanned much of Eurasia from 1922 until Dissolution of the Soviet ...
,
systems analysis Systems analysis is "the process of studying a procedure or business to identify its goal and purposes and create systems and procedures that will efficiently achieve them". Another view sees systems analysis as a problem-solving technique that ...
and
game theory Game theory is the study of mathematical models of strategic interactions. It has applications in many fields of social science, and is used extensively in economics, logic, systems science and computer science. Initially, game theory addressed ...
during the
Cold War The Cold War was a period of global Geopolitics, geopolitical rivalry between the United States (US) and the Soviet Union (USSR) and their respective allies, the capitalist Western Bloc and communist Eastern Bloc, which lasted from 1947 unt ...
, economy of the
United Kingdom The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, commonly known as the United Kingdom (UK) or Britain, is a country in Northwestern Europe, off the coast of European mainland, the continental mainland. It comprises England, Scotlan ...
during the 1970s, the insecticide DDT,
Kwame Nkrumah Francis Kwame Nkrumah (, 21 September 1909 – 27 April 1972) was a Ghanaian politician, political theorist, and revolutionary. He served as Prime Minister of the Gold Coast (British colony), Gold Coast from 1952 until 1957, when it gained ...
's leadership in
Ghana Ghana, officially the Republic of Ghana, is a country in West Africa. It is situated along the Gulf of Guinea and the Atlantic Ocean to the south, and shares borders with Côte d’Ivoire to the west, Burkina Faso to the north, and Togo to t ...
in the 1950s, and the history of
nuclear power Nuclear power is the use of nuclear reactions to produce electricity. Nuclear power can be obtained from nuclear fission, nuclear decay and nuclear fusion reactions. Presently, the vast majority of electricity from nuclear power is produced by ...
. The documentary makes extensive use of clips from the short film '' Design for Dreaming'', especially in the title sequence. Curtis's later series ''
The Century of the Self ''The Century of the Self'' is a 2002 British television documentary series by filmmaker Adam Curtis. It focuses on the work of psychoanalysts Sigmund Freud and Anna Freud, and PR consultant Edward Bernays. In episode one, Curtis says, "This se ...
'' and '' The Trap'' have similar themes to ''Pandora's Box''.


Background

Adam Curtis explained the background to the series: "I grew up in the late Fifties and Sixties. To me, the scientist was a heroic figure in a white coat, who stood proudly in a gleaming laboratory. Everyone was captivated by the idea that science could be used to build a better world ... since then, the image has been severely tainted, and for me, ''Pandora's Box'' will aim to find out why". ''Pandora's Box'' was the first work by Adam Curtis to showcase his subsequently distinctive visual style. He explained: "in ''Pandora’s Box'' I wanted to make a sort of funny film about economics. I was just starting out in TV and was almost in tears when editing because I could find nothing to illustrate it and I thought I was going to be sacked. Out of that desperation I started raiding the BBC archive, I remember I even had talking squirrels in it at one point. Stylistically, a lot was born out of that necessity to get things done to a deadline."


Episodes


Part 1. 'The Engineers' Plot'

This episode, originally broadcast on 11 June 1992, details how the
Bolshevik The Bolsheviks, led by Vladimir Lenin, were a radical Faction (political), faction of the Marxist Russian Social Democratic Labour Party (RSDLP) which split with the Mensheviks at the 2nd Congress of the Russian Social Democratic Labour Party, ...
revolutionaries A revolutionary is a person who either participates in, or advocates for, a revolution. The term ''revolutionary'' can also be used as an adjective to describe something producing a major and sudden impact on society. Definition The term—bot ...
who came into power in 1917 attempted to industrialise and control the
Soviet Union The Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. (USSR), commonly known as the Soviet Union, was a List of former transcontinental countries#Since 1700, transcontinental country that spanned much of Eurasia from 1922 until Dissolution of the Soviet ...
with rational scientific methods. The Bolsheviks wanted to turn the Soviet people into ''scientific beings''. Aleksei Gastev used social engineering, including a social engineering machine, to make people more rational. But Bolshevik politicians and
bourgeois The bourgeoisie ( , ) are a class of business owners, merchants and wealthy people, in general, which emerged in the Late Middle Ages, originally as a "middle class" between the peasantry and Aristocracy (class), aristocracy. They are tradition ...
engineers came into conflict.
Lenin Vladimir Ilyich Ulyanov ( 187021 January 1924), better known as Vladimir Lenin, was a Russian revolutionary, politician and political theorist. He was the first head of government of Soviet Russia from 1917 until Death and state funeral of ...
said, "The
communists Communism () is a sociopolitical, philosophical, and economic ideology within the socialist movement, whose goal is the creation of a communist society, a socioeconomic order centered on common ownership of the means of production, d ...
are not directing anything, they are being directed."
Stalin Joseph Vissarionovich Stalin (born Dzhugashvili; 5 March 1953) was a Soviet politician and revolutionary who led the Soviet Union from 1924 until Death and state funeral of Joseph Stalin, his death in 1953. He held power as General Secret ...
arrested 2000 engineers in 1930, eight of whom were convicted in the Industrial Party show trial. Engineering schools gave those loyal to the party only limited training in engineering, to minimise their potential political influence. Industrialised America was used as a template to develop the Soviet Union.
Magnitogorsk Magnitogorsk ( rus, Магнитого́рск, p=məɡnʲɪtɐˈɡorsk, ) is an industrial city in Chelyabinsk Oblast, Russia, on the eastern side of the extreme southern extent of the Ural Mountains by the Ural River. Its population is curre ...
was built to closely replicate the steel mill city
Gary, Indiana Gary ( ) is a city in Lake County, Indiana, United States. The population was 69,093 at the 2020 United States census, 2020 census, making it Indiana's List of municipalities in Indiana, eleventh-most populous city. The city has been historical ...
. A former worker describes how they went so far as to create metal trees since trees could not grow on the
steppe In physical geography, a steppe () is an ecoregion characterized by grassland plains without closed forests except near rivers and lakes. Steppe biomes may include: * the montane grasslands and shrublands biome * the tropical and subtropica ...
. By the late 1930s, Stalin-faithful engineers like
Leonid Brezhnev Leonid Ilyich Brezhnev (19 December 190610 November 1982) was a Soviet politician who served as the General Secretary of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union from 1964 until Death and state funeral of Leonid Brezhnev, his death in 1982 as w ...
,
Alexei Kosygin Alexei Nikolayevich Kosygin (–18 December 1980) was a Soviet people, Soviet statesman during the Cold War. He served as the Premier of the Soviet Union from 1964 to 1980 and, alongside General Secretary Leonid Brezhnev, was one of its most ...
and
Nikita Khrushchev Nikita Sergeyevich Khrushchev (– 11 September 1971) was the General Secretary of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union, First Secretary of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union from 1953 to 1964 and the Premier of the Soviet Union, Chai ...
grew in influence, due to Stalin eliminating many earlier Bolshevik engineers. They aimed to use engineering in line with Stalin's policies to plan the entire country. At
Gosplan The State Planning Committee, commonly known as Gosplan ( ), was the agency responsible for economic planning, central economic planning in the Soviet Union. Established in 1921 and remaining in existence until the dissolution of the Soviet Unio ...
, the head institution of central planning, engineers predicted future rational needs. Vitalii Semyonovich Lelchuk, from the
USSR Academy of Sciences The Academy of Sciences of the Soviet Union was the highest scientific institution of the Soviet Union from 1925 to 1991. It united the country's leading scientists and was subordinated directly to the Council of Ministers of the Soviet Union (u ...
, describes the level of detail as absurd, "Even the
KGB The Committee for State Security (, ), abbreviated as KGB (, ; ) was the main security agency of the Soviet Union from 1954 to 1991. It was the direct successor of preceding Soviet secret police agencies including the Cheka, Joint State Polit ...
was told the quota of arrests to be made and the prisons to be used. The demand for coffins, novels and movies was all planned." The seemingly rational benchmarks began to have unexpected results. When the plan measured tonnes carried per kilometer, trains went on long journeys simply to meet the quota. Sofas and
chandelier A chandelier () is an ornamental lighting device, typically with spreading branched supports for multiple lights, designed to be hung from the ceiling. Chandeliers are often ornate, and they were originally designed to hold candles, but now inca ...
s increased in size to meet requirements of material usage. When
Nikita Khrushchev Nikita Sergeyevich Khrushchev (– 11 September 1971) was the General Secretary of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union, First Secretary of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union from 1953 to 1964 and the Premier of the Soviet Union, Chai ...
took over after Stalin, he tried to make improvements, including considering prices in the plan. The head of the USSR State Committee for Organization and Methodology of Price Creation is shown with a tall stack of price logbooks declaring, "This shows quite clearly that the system is rational." Academician Victor Glushkov proposed the use of
cybernetics Cybernetics is the transdisciplinary study of circular causal processes such as feedback and recursion, where the effects of a system's actions (its outputs) return as inputs to that system, influencing subsequent action. It is concerned with ...
to control people as a remedy for the problems of planning. In the 1960s, computers began to be used to process economic data. Consumer demand was calculated by computers from data gathered by surveys. But the time delay in the system meant that items were no longer in demand by the time they had been produced. When Leonid Brezhnev and Alexei Kosygin took over in the mid-1960s, the economy of the Soviet Union was stagnating. By 1978, the country was in full economic crisis. Production had degenerated to a "pointless, elaborate ritual" and endeavours to improve the plan had been abandoned. The narrator says, "What had begun as a grand moral attempt to build a rational society ended by creating a bizarre, bewildering existence for millions of Soviet people."


Contributors

* Vitali Semyonovich Lelchuk, USSR Academy of Sciences * Alexei A. Gastev * Nikolai Vassilievich Chernobrovov, electrical engineer, 1920s * Alexei Leontevich Shatilin, "Hero of the Soviet Union" * Lev Emmanuilovich Razgon, former Bolshevik * Michael J. Grisak, Gary steelworker, 1930s * Rosa Dmitrievna Inkina, construction worker, Magnitogorsk * Evgenii A. Ivanov, Senior Manager, USSR Gosplan * Valerii Nikolaevich Blinov, managing director, Moscow Toothbrush and Plastic Comb Factory * Aleksei Sergeevich Vassiliev, Deputy Managing Director in Charge of Quality, Moscow Toothbrush and Plastic Comb Factory * Leonid Pavlovich Katovskii, taxi driver * Sergei Mikhailovich Ulanov, Head of Organization and Methodology of Price Creation, USSR State Committee on Prices * A. S. Fedorenko, Director, Central Economic-Mathematical Institute of the USSR Academy of Sciences * Abel G. Aganbegyan, economist * Dr Alexander Nikolaevich Voronov, Director, All Union Scientific Research Institute for the Study of the Population's Demand for Consumer Goods and the Conjuncture of the Market * Dr Vyacheslav Konstantinovich Nefedov, economist * Dr Natalya Antonovna Cherkasova, economist


Part 2. 'To The Brink of Eternity'

This episode, originally broadcast on 18 June 1992, outlines how the United States government and its departments attempted to use
systems analysis Systems analysis is "the process of studying a procedure or business to identify its goal and purposes and create systems and procedures that will efficiently achieve them". Another view sees systems analysis as a problem-solving technique that ...
and
game theory Game theory is the study of mathematical models of strategic interactions. It has applications in many fields of social science, and is used extensively in economics, logic, systems science and computer science. Initially, game theory addressed ...
to develop strategies to control the nuclear threat and
nuclear arms race The nuclear arms race was an arms race competition for supremacy in nuclear warfare between the United States, the Soviet Union, and their respective allies during the Cold War. During this same period, in addition to the American and Soviet nuc ...
during the
Cold War The Cold War was a period of global Geopolitics, geopolitical rivalry between the United States (US) and the Soviet Union (USSR) and their respective allies, the capitalist Western Bloc and communist Eastern Bloc, which lasted from 1947 unt ...
, and, more specifically, to manage the "loss of control" crises encountered during events such as the
Space Race The Space Race (, ) was a 20th-century competition between the Cold War rivals, the United States and the Soviet Union, to achieve superior spaceflight capability. It had its origins in the ballistic missile-based nuclear arms race between t ...
, the
Cuban Missile Crisis The Cuban Missile Crisis, also known as the October Crisis () in Cuba, or the Caribbean Crisis (), was a 13-day confrontation between the governments of the United States and the Soviet Union, when American deployments of Nuclear weapons d ...
, and the Vietnam War. The focus is on the men on whom '' Dr Strangelove'' was allegedly based:
Herman Kahn Herman Kahn (February 15, 1922 – July 7, 1983) was an American physicist and a founding member of the Hudson Institute, regarded as one of the preeminent futurists of the latter part of the twentieth century. He originally came to prominence ...
, Albert Wohlstetter and
John von Neumann John von Neumann ( ; ; December 28, 1903 – February 8, 1957) was a Hungarian and American mathematician, physicist, computer scientist and engineer. Von Neumann had perhaps the widest coverage of any mathematician of his time, in ...
. These were mathematical analysts employed by the American
RAND Corporation The RAND Corporation, doing business as RAND, is an American nonprofit global policy think tank, research institute, and public sector consulting firm. RAND engages in research and development (R&D) in several fields and industries. Since the ...
to examine issues of America's national security in the nuclear age. They believed the world could be controlled by the scientific manipulation of fear. One problem, however, was the seemingly unpredictable and irrational nature of politicians, societies, and individuals, which rendered elements of the theory difficult to apply, as well as the challenge of finding accurate, impartial, and unmodified data on which to base concise predictions. In the end, their visions were obscured and became the stuff of science fiction fantasy. Similar material is also covered in the ''"F**k You Buddy"'' part of Curtis's later work, '' The Trap'', but ''To The Brink of Eternity'' has the focus entirely on the nuclear and military aspects of Cold War strategy, such as planning for and against
pre-emptive war A preemptive war is a war that is commenced in an attempt to repel or defeat a perceived imminent offensive or invasion, or to gain a strategic advantage in an impending (allegedly unavoidable) war ''shortly before'' that attack materializes. I ...
. John Nash is not mentioned, and the psychological and economical aspects of game theory are not included. As of April 2024, this is the only episode of the series unavailable for public viewing on Adam Curtis' YouTube channel in the United States.


Contributors

* Samuel T. Cohen, inventor of the neutron bomb *
Simon Ramo Simon "Si" Ramo (May 7, 1913 – June 27, 2016) was an American engineer, businessman, and author. He led development of microwave and missile technology and is sometimes known as the father of the intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM). He ...
, guided missile engineer, 1950s * James A. Thomson, President of RAND Corporation * William Gorham, RAND Corporation 1953–1962; Assistant to Secretary of Department of Health, Education and Welfare 1965–68 * Albert Wohlstetter, RAND Corporation, 1950s * Amelia Musgrove, bar owner, White Sands *
Thomas Schelling Thomas Crombie Schelling (April 14, 1921 – December 13, 2016) was an American economist and professor of foreign policy, national security, nuclear strategy, and arms control at the School of Public Policy at the University of Maryland, Coll ...
, RAND Corporation 1960–64; Consultant to Department of Defense 1966–70 * Debbie Kahn, daughter of Herman Kahn * Gail Neale,
Hudson Institute Hudson Institute is an American Conservatism in the United States, conservative think tank based in Washington, D.C. It was founded in 1961 in Croton-on-Hudson, New York, by futurist Herman Kahn and his colleagues at the RAND Corporation. Kahn ...
, 1960s * George Ball, Under-Secretary of State in Kennedy administration 1961–66 * William Kaufmann, RAND Corporation; Consultant to Secretary of Defense 1961–80 * William Ehrhart, US Marine Corps 1968 * Col. David Hackworth, US Army (retired) *
Herbert York Herbert Frank York (24 November 1921 – 19 May 2009) was an American nuclear physicist of Mohawk origin. He held numerous research and administrative positions at various United States government and educational institutes. Biography Her ...
, former Director of Defense Research and Engineering, Department of Defense *
Jerry Pournelle Jerry Eugene Pournelle (; August 7, 1933 – September 8, 2017) was an American scientist in the area of operations research and ergonomics, human factors research, a science fiction writer, essayist, journalist, and one of the first bloggers. ...
, chairman, Citizens' Advisory Council on National Space Policy, 1980 *
Larry Niven Laurence van Cott Niven (; born April 30, 1938) is an American science fiction writer. His 1970 novel ''Ringworld'' won the Hugo Award for Best Novel, Hugo, Locus Award, Locus, Ditmar Award, Ditmar, and Nebula Award for Best Novel, Nebula award ...
, science fiction writer and member of CACNSP * Dr Hugh DeWitt, physicist, Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory


Part 3. 'The League of Gentlemen'

This part, originally broadcast on 22 June 1992, focuses on how both the Conservative and Labour governments of the 1960s attempted to use economists to engineer economic growth to specific targets, as well as programme post-war economic management in the United Kingdom, and attempts to prevent relative economic decline and the perception of the 1960s Wilson governments that
devaluation In macroeconomics and modern monetary policy, a devaluation is an official lowering of the value of a country's currency within a fixed exchange-rate system, in which a monetary authority formally sets a lower exchange rate of the national curre ...
would jeopardise against national self-esteem. By the mid-1970s,
stagflation Stagflation is the combination of high inflation, stagnant economic growth, and elevated unemployment. The term ''stagflation'', a portmanteau of "stagnation" and "inflation," was popularized, and probably coined, by British politician Iain Mac ...
emerged to confound the
Keynesian Keynesian economics ( ; sometimes Keynesianism, named after British economist John Maynard Keynes) are the various macroeconomic theories and models of how aggregate demand (total spending in the economy) strongly influences economic output an ...
theories used by policy makers. Meanwhile, a group of economists had managed to convince
Margaret Thatcher Margaret Hilda Thatcher, Baroness Thatcher (; 13 October 19258 April 2013), was a British stateswoman who served as Prime Minister of the United Kingdom from 1979 to 1990 and Leader of the Conservative Party (UK), Leader of th ...
,
Keith Joseph Keith Sinjohn Joseph, Baron Joseph, (17 January 1918 – 10 December 1994), known as Sir Keith Joseph, 2nd Baronet, for most of his political life, was a British politician. A member of the Conservative Party, he served as a minister under f ...
and other British politicians that they had foolproof technical means to make Britain 'great' again. The stagflation of the 1970s catapulted the then obscure economic theory of
Monetarism Monetarism is a school of thought in monetary economics that emphasizes the role of policy-makers in controlling the amount of money in circulation. It gained prominence in the 1970s, but was mostly abandoned as a direct guidance to monetar ...
to the forefront of political thought. By the late 1970s
Milton Friedman Milton Friedman (; July 31, 1912 – November 16, 2006) was an American economist and statistician who received the 1976 Nobel Memorial Prize in Economic Sciences for his research on consumption analysis, monetary history and theory and ...
had been awarded the Nobel Prize in Economics and even some Labour politicians were claiming that government attempts to grow the economy by injecting capital was doing more harm than good by driving up
inflation In economics, inflation is an increase in the average price of goods and services in terms of money. This increase is measured using a price index, typically a consumer price index (CPI). When the general price level rises, each unit of curre ...
. In 1979, Margaret Thatcher came to power and began to implement these new economic theories to drive down inflation by cutting government spending and raising interest rates, thus tightening the
money supply In macroeconomics, money supply (or money stock) refers to the total volume of money held by the public at a particular point in time. There are several ways to define "money", but standard measures usually include currency in circulation (i ...
. However, this failed to end inflation straight away, and caused widespread job loss and industrial decline. By the early 1980s, unemployment had risen to 2.5 million, British industrial output had declined by 1/6, and large-scale riots had begun to break out in Britain. The Conservative Government decided to abandon the Monetarist project and lowered interest rates in an attempt to create jobs. In fact, by the mid-1980s Mrs Thatcher claimed in a television interview that she had "never subscribed" to the theories of Milton Friedman. The episode ends with many of the economists involved in the ill-fated attempts to manage the economy arriving at the same conclusion their predecessors had 30 years before: they could only prevent an economic disaster, not engineer growth. Other economists point out that other countries' successes had more to do with focusing on improving their education systems and industrial bases rather than large-scale attempts to engineer the entire nation's economy. Another economist and adviser to Margaret Thatcher,
Alan Budd Sir Alan Peter Budd (16 November 1937 – 13 January 2023) was a British economist, who was a founding member of the Bank of England's Monetary Policy Committee (MPC) in 1997. Budd left the MPC in May 1999, and between August 1999 and 2008 wa ...
, worries that the whole Monetarist project might simply have been an attempt to reduce the economic and political power of the working class by raising unemployment and lowering wages, or as he puts it, "creating a
reserve army of labour Reserve army of labour is a concept in Karl Marx's critique of political economy. It refers to the unemployed and underemployed in capitalist society. It is synonymous with "industrial reserve army" or "relative surplus population", except tha ...
."


Contributors

* Michael Posner, Economic Adviser to the
Treasury A treasury is either *A government department related to finance and taxation, a finance ministry; in a business context, corporate treasury. *A place or location where treasure, such as currency or precious items are kept. These can be ...
1967–69 * Sir Donald MacDougall, Economic Director, N.E.D.C. 1962–64; Director-General, Department of Economic Affairs 1964–68 * Reza Moghadam,
London School of Economics The London School of Economics and Political Science (LSE), established in 1895, is a public research university in London, England, and a member institution of the University of London. The school specialises in the social sciences. Founded ...
* Prof. Charles Goodhart, Economic Adviser to the Department of Economic Affairs 1965–67; Chief Economic Adviser on Monetary Policy,
Bank of England The Bank of England is the central bank of the United Kingdom and the model on which most modern central banks have been based. Established in 1694 to act as the Kingdom of England, English Government's banker and debt manager, and still one ...
1980–85 * Rt Hon.
Tony Benn Anthony Neil Wedgwood Benn (3 April 1925 – 14 March 2014), known between 1960 and 1963 as Viscount Stansgate, was a British Labour Party (UK), Labour Party politician and political activist who served as a Cabinet of the United Kingdom, Cabine ...
MP, member of Labour cabinet 1964–70 * Brian Reading, Department of Economic Affairs 1964–66 * Prof.
Alan Budd Sir Alan Peter Budd (16 November 1937 – 13 January 2023) was a British economist, who was a founding member of the Bank of England's Monetary Policy Committee (MPC) in 1997. Budd left the MPC in May 1999, and between August 1999 and 2008 wa ...
, Economic Adviser to the Treasury 1970–74 * Prof.
Milton Friedman Milton Friedman (; July 31, 1912 – November 16, 2006) was an American economist and statistician who received the 1976 Nobel Memorial Prize in Economic Sciences for his research on consumption analysis, monetary history and theory and ...
, Monetarist economist * Sam Brittan, the
Financial Times The ''Financial Times'' (''FT'') is a British daily newspaper printed in broadsheet and also published digitally that focuses on business and economic Current affairs (news format), current affairs. Based in London, the paper is owned by a Jap ...
* Lord Harris of Highcross, President of
Institute of Economic Affairs The Institute of Economic Affairs (IEA) is a British right-wing free market think tank, which is registered as a charity. Associated with the New Right, the IEA describes itself as an "educational research institute", and says that it seeks to ...
* Lord Joseph, member of Conservative cabinet 1970–74; Secretary of State for Industry 1979–81 * Sir Alfred Sherman * Gordon Pepper, City stockbroker 1962–90 * Roy Adkin, insolvency practitioner, West Midlands * Sir John Hoskyns, Chief Policy Advisor to Mrs Thatcher 1979–82 * Brian Winterflood, executive director, County NatWest Securities 1986–88 * Ernie Plumb, Chief Inspector,
City of London The City of London, also known as ''the City'', is a Ceremonial counties of England, ceremonial county and Districts of England, local government district with City status in the United Kingdom, city status in England. It is the Old town, his ...
Police Force (retired) * Richard Turton, Partner, Insolvency Department, Touche Ross


Part 4. 'Goodbye Mrs Ant'

This part, originally broadcast on 2 July 1992, focuses on attitudes to nature and tells the story of the
insecticide Insecticides are pesticides used to kill insects. They include ovicides and larvicides used against insect eggs and larvae, respectively. The major use of insecticides is in agriculture, but they are also used in home and garden settings, i ...
DDT, which was first seen as a saviour to humankind in the 1940s, only to be claimed as a part of the destruction of the entire
ecosystem An ecosystem (or ecological system) is a system formed by Organism, organisms in interaction with their Biophysical environment, environment. The Biotic material, biotic and abiotic components are linked together through nutrient cycles and en ...
in the late 1960s. It also outlines how the sciences of
entomology Entomology (from Ancient Greek ἔντομον (''éntomon''), meaning "insect", and -logy from λόγος (''lógos''), meaning "study") is the branch of zoology that focuses on insects. Those who study entomology are known as entomologists. In ...
and
ecology Ecology () is the natural science of the relationships among living organisms and their Natural environment, environment. Ecology considers organisms at the individual, population, community (ecology), community, ecosystem, and biosphere lev ...
were transformed by political and economic pressures. The episode appears to be named after the 1959 film ''Goodbye, Mrs. Ant''. Clips from the 1958 horror movie '' Earth vs. the Spider'' and the 1941 grasshopper cartoon '' Hoppity Goes to Town'' are also used. Insects were a huge problem in the United States, and they often ruined entire crops. Emerging in the 1940s, DDT and other insecticides seemed to offer the solution. As more insecticides were invented, the science of entomology changed focus from insect classification, to primarily testing new insecticides and exterminating insects rather than cataloguing them. But as early as 1946–48, entomologists began to notice that insecticides were having a negative impact on other animals, particularly birds. Chemical companies portrayed the human battle against insects as a struggle for existence, and their promotional films in the 1950s invoke
Charles Darwin Charles Robert Darwin ( ; 12 February 1809 – 19 April 1882) was an English Natural history#Before 1900, naturalist, geologist, and biologist, widely known for his contributions to evolutionary biology. His proposition that all speci ...
. Darwin's biographer James Moore notes how the battlefield and life and death aspects of Darwin's theories were emphasised to suit the
Cold War The Cold War was a period of global Geopolitics, geopolitical rivalry between the United States (US) and the Soviet Union (USSR) and their respective allies, the capitalist Western Bloc and communist Eastern Bloc, which lasted from 1947 unt ...
years. Scientists believed they were seizing power from
evolution Evolution is the change in the heritable Phenotypic trait, characteristics of biological populations over successive generations. It occurs when evolutionary processes such as natural selection and genetic drift act on genetic variation, re ...
and redirecting it by controlling the environment. In 1962, biologist
Rachel Carson Rachel Louise Carson (May 27, 1907 – April 14, 1964) was an American marine biologist, writer, and conservation movement, conservationist whose sea trilogy (1941–1955) and book ''Silent Spring'' (1962) are credited with advancing mari ...
released the book ''
Silent Spring ''Silent Spring'' is an environmental science book by Rachel Carson. Published on September 27, 1962, the book documented the environmental harm caused by the indiscriminate use of DDT, a pesticide used by soldiers during World War II. Carson acc ...
'', which was the first serious attack on pesticides and outlined their harmful side effects. It caused a public outcry, but had no immediate effect on the use of pesticides. Entomologist Gordon Edwards retells how he made speeches that were critical of Carson's book. He eats some DDT on camera to show how he demonstrated its apparent safety during these talks. The spraying of DDT in the growing suburbs on America brought the side effects to the attention of the wealthy and articulate middle classes. Victor Yannacone, a suburbanite and lawyer, helped found the
Environmental Defense Fund Environmental Defense Fund or EDF (formerly known as Environmental Defense) is a United States–based nonprofit environmental advocacy group. The group is known for its work on issues including global warming, ecosystem restoration, oceans, an ...
with the aim to legally challenge the use of pesticides. They argued that the chemicals were becoming more poisonous as they spread, as evidenced by the disappearance of the
peregrine falcon The peregrine falcon (''Falco peregrinus''), also known simply as the peregrine, is a Cosmopolitan distribution, cosmopolitan bird of prey (raptor) in the family (biology), family Falconidae renowned for its speed. A large, Corvus (genus), cro ...
. In 1968, they got a hearing on DDT in
Madison, Wisconsin Madison is the List of capitals in the United States, capital city of the U.S. state of Wisconsin. It is the List of municipalities in Wisconsin by population, second-most populous city in the state, with a population of 269,840 at the 2020 Uni ...
. It became headline news, with both sides claiming that everything America stood for was at stake. Biologist Thomas Jukes is shown singing a pro-DDT parody on "
America the Beautiful "America the Beautiful" is an American patriotic song. Its lyrics were written by Katharine Lee Bates and its music was composed by church organist and choirmaster Samuel A. Ward at Grace Church (Newark), Grace Episcopal Church in Newark, New ...
" he sent to ''Time'' magazine at the time of the trial. Hugh Iltis describes how, in 1969, a scientist testified at the hearing about how DDT appears in breast milk and accumulates in the fat tissue of babies. This got massive media attention. Where once chemicals were seen as good, now they were bad. In the late 1960s,
ecology Ecology () is the natural science of the relationships among living organisms and their Natural environment, environment. Ecology considers organisms at the individual, population, community (ecology), community, ecosystem, and biosphere lev ...
was a marginal science. But Yannacone used ecology as a scientific basis to challenge the DDT defenders' idea of evolution. Similar to how the science of entomology had been changed in the 1950s, ecology was transformed by the social and political pressures of the early 1970s. Ecologists became the guardians of the human relationship to nature. James Moore describes how people try to get Darwin on the side of their view of nature. In ''
The Origin of Species ''On the Origin of Species'' (or, more completely, ''On the Origin of Species by Means of Natural Selection, or the Preservation of Favoured Races in the Struggle for Life'')The book's full original title was ''On the Origin of Species by M ...
'' nature is seen as being at war, but also likened to a web of complex relations. Here, Darwin gave people a basis for urging humans not to take control of nature but to cooperate with it. In popular imagination, a scientific theory has a single fixed meaning, but in reality it becomes cultural property, and is usable by different interested parties. Twenty years later, the story of DDT continues with a press conference announcing the halting of construction in a skyscraper due to a nesting peregrine falcon being found there. Ornithologist David Berger criticises the event for helping to foster the myth of the sensitivity of nature. Joan HalifaxNote: she is named as "Joan Fairfax" in the documentary, subtitled with "The Ojai Foundation", but her real name appears to be Joan Halifax. talks about ecology as a gift to human beings and all species, a moral lesson that gave rise not to
utopia A utopia ( ) typically describes an imagined community or society that possesses highly desirable or near-perfect qualities for its members. It was coined by Sir Thomas More for his 1516 book ''Utopia (book), Utopia'', which describes a fictiona ...
, but
ecotopia ''Ecotopia: The Notebooks and Reports of William Weston'' is a utopian novel by Ernest Callenbach, published in 1975. The society described in the book is one of the first ecological utopias and was influential on the counterculture and the gree ...
. Politics professor
Langdon Winner Langdon Winner (born August 7, 1944) is Thomas Phelan Chair of Humanities and Social Sciences in the Department of Science and Technology Studies at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, Troy, New York. Langdon Winner was born in San Luis Obispo, C ...
theorises that social ideals are being read back to us as if they were lessons derived from science itself. The scientific notions of the 1950s, the ideas of endless possibilities for exploitations of nature, are now seen as ill-conceived. And the ideas of ecology today may in 30 or 40 years seem similarly ill-conceived. The episode ends with a quote from Darwin about seeking divine providence in nature. "I feel most deeply that the whole subject is too profound for the human intellect. A dog might as well speculate on the mind of Newton. Let each man hope and believe what he can."


Contributors

* Prof. Robert Metcalf, entomologist, National Defense Research Committee 1943–46 * Harry Renken, farmer * Wilbert Joyce, farmer * Shirley Briggs, biologist, US Fish and Wildlife Service 1945–48 * Lillard Heddon, crop sprayer 1945–83 * Dr Eugene Kenega, research entomologist,
Dow Chemical The Dow Chemical Company is an American multinational corporation headquartered in Midland, Michigan, United States. The company was among the three largest chemical producers in the world in 2021. It is the operating subsidiary of Dow Inc., ...
1940–82 * Dr Thomas Jukes, research chemist, American Cyanamid Company 1945–63 * James Moore, biographer of Charles Darwin * J. Gordon Edwards, entomologist * Lorri Otto, resident of
Milwaukee Milwaukee is the List of cities in Wisconsin, most populous city in the U.S. state of Wisconsin. Located on the western shore of Lake Michigan, it is the List of United States cities by population, 31st-most populous city in the United States ...
suburb * Carol Yannacone * Victor Yannacone * Daniel Berger, ornithologist,
University of Wisconsin A university () is an institution of tertiary education and research which awards academic degrees in several academic disciplines. ''University'' is derived from the Latin phrase , which roughly means "community of teachers and scholars". Uni ...
1965–68 * Dr Hugh Iltis, ecologist, University of Wisconsin 1968 *
Langdon Winner Langdon Winner (born August 7, 1944) is Thomas Phelan Chair of Humanities and Social Sciences in the Department of Science and Technology Studies at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, Troy, New York. Langdon Winner was born in San Luis Obispo, C ...
, historian of science * Joan Halifax, The Ojai Foundation


Part 5. 'Black Power'

The penultimate episode, originally broadcast on 9 July 1992, looks at how
Kwame Nkrumah Francis Kwame Nkrumah (, 21 September 1909 – 27 April 1972) was a Ghanaian politician, political theorist, and revolutionary. He served as Prime Minister of the Gold Coast (British colony), Gold Coast from 1952 until 1957, when it gained ...
, the leader of the Gold Coast (which became
Ghana Ghana, officially the Republic of Ghana, is a country in West Africa. It is situated along the Gulf of Guinea and the Atlantic Ocean to the south, and shares borders with Côte d’Ivoire to the west, Burkina Faso to the north, and Togo to t ...
on independence from the United Kingdom in 1957) from 1952 to 1966, set Africa ablaze with his vision of a new industrial and scientific age. At the heart of his dream was to be the huge Volta River dam, generating enough power to transform
West Africa West Africa, also known as Western Africa, is the westernmost region of Africa. The United Nations geoscheme for Africa#Western Africa, United Nations defines Western Africa as the 16 countries of Benin, Burkina Faso, Cape Verde, The Gambia, Gha ...
into an industrialised
utopia A utopia ( ) typically describes an imagined community or society that possesses highly desirable or near-perfect qualities for its members. It was coined by Sir Thomas More for his 1516 book ''Utopia (book), Utopia'', which describes a fictiona ...
and focal point of post-colonial
Pan-Africanism Pan-Africanism is a nationalist movement that aims to encourage and strengthen bonds of solidarity between all Indigenous peoples of Africa, indigenous peoples and diasporas of African ancestry. Based on a common goal dating back to the Atla ...
. At first, it was hoped the U.K. would help to finance the project, but after the
Suez Crisis The Suez Crisis, also known as the Second Arab–Israeli War, the Tripartite Aggression in the Arab world and the Sinai War in Israel, was a British–French–Israeli invasion of Egypt in 1956. Israel invaded on 29 October, having done so w ...
of 1956, interest was lost. Later, after meeting U.S. Presidents
Dwight D. Eisenhower Dwight David "Ike" Eisenhower (born David Dwight Eisenhower; October 14, 1890 – March 28, 1969) was the 34th president of the United States, serving from 1953 to 1961. During World War II, he was Supreme Commander of the Allied Expeditionar ...
and
John F. Kennedy John Fitzgerald Kennedy (May 29, 1917 – November 22, 1963), also known as JFK, was the 35th president of the United States, serving from 1961 until his assassination in 1963. He was the first Roman Catholic and youngest person elected p ...
, American backing for the project materialised. A scheme was finally drawn up offering
Kaiser Aluminum Kaiser Aluminum Corporation is an American aluminum producer. It is a spinoff from Kaiser Aluminum and Chemicals Corporation, which came to be when common stock was offered in Permanente Metals Corporation and Permanente Metals Corporation's na ...
favourable conditions (including the smelting of aluminium imported from outside Ghana) and the dam was opened to great fanfare in January 1966. Weeks later, in February 1966, while Nkrumah was on a state visit to
North Vietnam North Vietnam, officially the Democratic Republic of Vietnam (DRV; ; VNDCCH), was a country in Southeast Asia from 1945 to 1976, with sovereignty fully recognized in 1954 Geneva Conference, 1954. A member of the communist Eastern Bloc, it o ...
and
China China, officially the People's Republic of China (PRC), is a country in East Asia. With population of China, a population exceeding 1.4 billion, it is the list of countries by population (United Nations), second-most populous country after ...
, his government was overthrown in a military coup (possibly
CIA The Central Intelligence Agency (CIA; ) is a civilian foreign intelligence service of the federal government of the United States tasked with advancing national security through collecting and analyzing intelligence from around the world and ...
backed), and evidence of massive corruption and debt was revealed. As of 1992, for many Ghanaians the promised benefits of the project were still unrealised.


Contributors

* Al Haji Futa, Ghanaian negotiating team * Kojo Botsio, Minister of Education 1951–57 * Sqn Ldr Clen Sowu, Assistant Exhibition Officer 1956; Rawlings Government 1982–85 * Kwesi Lamptey, Opposition MP 1951–57 * James Moxon, Public Relations Spokesman, Volta River Project * Komla Gbedemah, Minister of Finance 1957–61 * Ron Sullivan, lawyer for Kaiser Aluminum on Volta Project 1959–79 * Lloyd Cutler, lawyer for Kaiser Aluminum on Volta Project * J. Burke Knapp, Senior Vice President,
World Bank The World Bank is an international financial institution that provides loans and Grant (money), grants to the governments of Least developed countries, low- and Developing country, middle-income countries for the purposes of economic development ...
1956–78 * Prof. Akilagpa Sawyerr, Vice Chancellor,
University of Ghana The University of Ghana is a public university located in Accra, Ghana. It is the oldest public university in the country. The university was founded in 1948 as the University College of the Gold Coast in the British colony of the Gold Coast ...
1985–92 * Bill Mahoney, US Ambassador to Ghana 1962–65 * George Ball, Under-Secretary of State in Kennedy administration 1961–66 * Dr. Jonathan Frimpong-Ansah, Deputy Governor, Ghana Central Bank 1965–68 * Louis Casely-Hayford, dam engineer 1966 * John Stockwell, CIA officer in West Africa during coup * Divine Tetteh, school teacher, resettlement village * J. G. A. Renner, Minister for Lands and Natural Resources 1982–86


Part 6. 'A Is for Atom'

This final episode, originally broadcast on 16 July 1992, is named after a 1953
General Electric General Electric Company (GE) was an American Multinational corporation, multinational Conglomerate (company), conglomerate founded in 1892, incorporated in the New York (state), state of New York and headquartered in Boston. Over the year ...
promotional film called '' A Is for Atom''. The episode gives an insight into the history of nuclear power. In the 1950s, scientists and politicians thought they could create a different world with a limitless source of nuclear energy. But things started to go wrong. Scientists in America and the Soviet Union were duped into building dozens of potentially dangerous nuclear power plants. For business reasons, General Electric and Westinghouse decided that the types sold would be versions based on the reactors used in nuclear submarines, but sold with dubious claims made about their cost effectiveness and safety. However, in 1964, at the Atomic Energy Commission it was found that while small reactors were safe, the bigger core sizes as used in power plants were potentially susceptible to
nuclear meltdown A nuclear meltdown (core meltdown, core melt accident, meltdown or partial core melt) is a severe nuclear reactor accident that results in core damage from overheating. The term ''nuclear meltdown'' is not officially defined by the Internatio ...
—an accident where the reactor core could melt through the bottom of the reactor containment vessel. A study showed this could potentially happen, and if it did, it could damage the reactor. These concerns were largely kept from the public. The episode goes into some detail over attempts to find solutions to the meltdown issue. In the Soviet Union, reactors were considered too expensive, until
Brezhnev Leonid Ilyich Brezhnev (19 December 190610 November 1982) was a Soviet politician who served as the General Secretary of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union from 1964 until his death in 1982 as well as the fourth chairman of the Presidium ...
came to power. Under his leadership, Anatoly Petrovich Alexandrov designed cheap reactors that were produced at high speed, with very few safety features, sometimes not even containment vessels. This was publicly criticized by experts, but the experts were sidelined. In Britain, by 1974, delays to its native advanced gas cooled reactor power plant caused Britain to adopt the American PWR design of reactors. However, in America it was being discovered that safety systems that had to work to avoid meltdown could not be guaranteed to work reliably in the complex circumstances in a nuclear reactor. Tests run on the emergency core-cooling systems to deal with pipe breaks, performed on the Atomic Energy Commission's test models in
Idaho Idaho ( ) is a landlocked U.S. state, state in the Pacific Northwest and Mountain states, Mountain West subregions of the Western United States. It borders Montana and Wyoming to the east, Nevada and Utah to the south, and Washington (state), ...
in 1971, repeatedly failed; often the water was forced out of the core under pressure. It was discovered that the theoretical calculations had no correspondence with reality. Nevertheless, they had not necessarily proved that they wouldn't work on a real reactor, so they decided to carry on with mandated safety systems, that the best evidence suggested, may well not function in the event of an accident. Engineers and scientists and regulators that tried to publicise the potential issues found that their concerns were not published, and these issues remained largely unknown to the public, and nuclear power had a high degree of confidence with the public. Then came the disasters of Three Mile Island in 1979 and
Chernobyl Chernobyl, officially called Chornobyl, is a partially abandoned city in Vyshhorod Raion, Kyiv Oblast, Ukraine. It is located within the Chernobyl Exclusion Zone, to the north of Kyiv and to the southwest of Gomel in neighbouring Belarus. ...
in 1986, which changed public views on the safety of this new technology. It revealed that the industry had been hiding the problems and unpredictable nature of these types of reactors, and that they had imposed risks on the public, without consultation. It ends with the points that the forms of the reactors were chosen only for business reasons. There are very broad range of scientific and engineering options which were not explored. Therefore, perhaps nuclear power should be led by public decisions and redeveloped, but from a more morality-centred point of view.


Contributors

* Dr. Chauncey Starr, physicist,
Manhattan Project The Manhattan Project was a research and development program undertaken during World War II to produce the first nuclear weapons. It was led by the United States in collaboration with the United Kingdom and Canada. From 1942 to 1946, the ...
1943–46 * Prof. Yurii I. Koryakin, Head of Research, USSR Institute of Power Research * Vladimir I. Merkin, designer of first Soviet civilian reactor * Sir Kelvin Spencer, Chief Scientist, Ministry of Power 1954–59 * Alvin Weinberg, Director,
Oak Ridge National Laboratory Oak Ridge National Laboratory (ORNL) is a federally funded research and development centers, federally funded research and development center in Oak Ridge, Tennessee, United States. Founded in 1943, the laboratory is sponsored by the United Sta ...
1955–71 * Dr. Glenn Seaborg, chairman, Atomic Energy Commission 1961–71 * Dr. David Okrent, chairman, Advisory Committee on Reactor Safeguards 1966 * Christopher Hinton (interviewed 1974) * Robert Pollard, reactor engineer, Atomic Energy Commission 1969–76 * Dr. Victor Gilinsky, Nuclear Regulatory Commissioner 1975–84 * Yuriy Shcherbak, Ukrainian journalist and MP * Joseph Morone, nuclear historian


Notes and references


External links

*
Blog by Adam Curis about A IS FOR ATOM in the light of the Japanese nuclear accident
{{DEFAULTSORT:Pandora's Box (Television Documentary Series) 1992 British television series debuts 1992 British television series endings 1990s British documentary television series 1990s British television miniseries BBC television documentaries about history during the 20th Century British documentary television series about science British English-language television shows Films directed by Adam Curtis Nuclear safety and security