Nice Essay

Nuclear energy, also called atomic energy, is the powerful energy released by changes in the nucleus (core) of atoms. The heat and light of the sun result from nuclear energy. Scientists and engineers have found many uses for this energy, including the production of electric energy and the explosion of nuclear weapons. Scientists knew nothing about nuclear energy until the early 1900’s, though they knew that all matter consists of atoms. Scientists then further learned that a nucleus makes up most of the mass of every atom and that this nucleus is held together by an extremely strong force. A huge amount of energy is concentrated in the nucleus because of this force. The next step was to make nuclei let go of much of that energy. Scientists first released nuclear energy on a large scale at the University of Chicago in 1942, three years after World War II began. This achievement led to the development of the atomic bomb. The first atomic bomb was exploded in the desert near Alamogordo, New Mexico, on July 16, 1945. In August, United States planes dropped bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki, Japan. The bombs largely destroyed both cities and helped end World War II. Since 1945, peaceful uses of nuclear energy have been developed. The energy released by nuclei creates large amounts of heat. This heat can be used to make steam, and the steam can be used to generate electric energy. Engineers have built devices called nuclear reactors to produce and control nuclear energy. A nuclear reactor operates somewhat like a furnace. But instead of using such fuels as coal or oil, almost all reactors use uranium. And instead of burning in the reactor, the uranium fiss power production is by far the most important peaceful use of nuclear energy. Nuclear energy also powers some submarines and other ships. In addition, the fission that produces nuclear energy is valuable because it releases particles and rays called nuclear radiation that have uses in medicine, industry, and science. However, nuclear radiation can be extremely dangerous. Exposure to too much radiation can result in a condition called radiation sickness. Almost all the world’s electric energy is produced by hydroelectric and thermal power plants. Hydroelectric plants use the force of rushing water from a dam or waterfall to generate electricity. Thermal plants use the force of steam from boiling water. The great majority of thermal plants burn fossil fuels–coal, oil, and natural gas–to produce heat to boil water. The remaining thermal plants fission uranium. Few countries have enough water power to generate large amounts of hydroelectricity. Most countries depend mainly on fossil fuels. But fossil fuels are a non-renewable resource. Therefore, many experts predict that nuclear power will become increasingly important. Worldwide distribution of nuclear energy. In the mid-1990’s, about 425 nuclear power reactors operated in about 30 countries. Nuclear power plants produced less than 20 percent of the world’s electric energy. The United States had about 110 nuclear reactors and was the world’s largest producer of nuclear energy. Reactors produced about 20 percent of the country’s electricity. Canada had 22 reactors, which produced about 15 percent of Canada’s electricity. Other countries, notably France and Japan, have a large nuclear power generating capacity. Advantages and disadvantages of nuclear energy. Nuclear power plants have two main advantages over fossil-fuel plants. (1) Once built, a nuclear plant can be less expensive to operate than a fossil-fuel plant, mainly because a nuclear plant uses a much smaller volume of fuel. (2) Uranium, unlike fossil fuels, releases no chemical or solid pollutants into the air during use. However, nuclear power plants have three major disadvantages. These drawbacks have slowed the development of nuclear energy in the United States. (1) Nuclear plants cost more to build than fossil-fuel plants. (2) Because of the need to assure that hazardous amounts of radioactive materials are not released, nuclear plants must meet certain government regulations that fossil-fuel plants do not have to meet. For example, a nuclear plant must satisfy the government that it can quickly and automatically deal with any kind of emergency. (3) Used nuclear fuel produces dangerous radiation long after it has been removed from the reactor. The full development of nuclear energy. Many experts believe that the benefits of nuclear energy outweigh any problems involved in its production. According to these experts, oil may be so scarce by the mid-2000’s that it will be too expensive to drill. Canada, Germany, Russia, the United States, and some other countries have enough coal to meet their energy requirements for hundreds of years at present rates of use. However, coal releases large amounts of sulfur and other pollutants into the air when it is burned. If nuclear energy were fully developed, it could completely replace oil and coal as a source of electric power. But a number of problems must be solved before nuclear energy can be fully developed. For example, almost all today’s power reactors use a scarce type of uranium known as U-235. If U-235 continues to be used at its present rate, the world’s supply of it will become so small that it will be too expensive to mine and process by about 2050. Therefore, for nuclear energy to replace other energy sources, it must be based on fuel that is much more plentiful than U-235. NUCLEAR ENERGY/The science of nuclear energy The process by which a nucleus releases energy is called a nuclear reaction. To understand the various types of nuclear reactions, a person must know something about the nature of matter. The composition of matter All the matter that makes up all solids, liquids, and gases is composed of chemical elements. The chemical elements, in turn, are composed of atoms. A chemical element consists of a substance that cannot be broken down chemically into simpler substances. There are 112 known chemical elements. Ninety-one of them are found on or in the earth. The other 21 elements are artificially created. Scientists rank the elements according to mass, a measure of the quantity of matter in an object. An object’s mass is proportional to its weight. Hydrogen is the lightest natural element, and uranium is the heaviest. Most of the artificially created elements are heavier than uranium. Atoms and nuclei. An atom consists of a positively charged nucleus and one or more electrons, which are negatively charged. The nucleus makes up almost all of an atom’s mass. The electrons, which are almost massless, revolve about the nucleus. Electrons determine the various chemical combinations that an atom enters into with other kinds of atoms . However, electrons do not play an active part in nuclear reactions. The nuclei of every chemical element except hydrogen consist of particles called protons and neutrons. An ordinary nucleus of hydrogen, the lightest element, has one proton and no neutrons. The heaviest elements, such as uranium and thorium, have the largest number of protons and neutrons. Protons carry a positive charge. Neutrons have no net charge. Extremely strong forces, called nuclear forces, hold the protons and neutrons together in the nucleus. The nuclear forces of each type of nucleus determine the amount of energy that would be required to release its neutrons and protons. Isotopes. Most chemical elements have more than one form. These different forms are called the isotopes of an element. The atoms that make up each of the different forms have different masses and are also called isotopes. Scientists identify an isotope by its mass number–that is, the total number of protons and neutrons in each of its nuclei. All the isotopes of a given element have the same number of protons in every nucleus. Every hydrogen nucleus, for example, has just 1 proton. Every uranium nucleus has 92 protons. However, each isotope of an element has a different number of neutrons in its nuclei and so has a different mass number. For example, the most plentiful isotope of uranium has 146 neutrons. Its mass number is therefore 238 (the sum of 92 and 146). Scientists call this isotope uranium 238 or U-238. The uranium isotope that almost all nuclear reactors use as fuel has 143 neutrons, and so its mass number is 235. This isotope is called uranium 235 or U-235. No two elements have the same number of protons in their atoms. However, if an atom gains or loses one or more protons, it becomes an atom of a different element. However, if an atom gains or loses one or more neutrons, it becomes another isotope of the same element. Nuclear reactions A nuclear reaction changes the structure of a nucleus. The nucleus gains or loses one or more neutrons or protons. It thus changes into the nucleus of a different isotope or element. If the nucleus changes into the nucleus of a different element, the change is called a transmutation . Three types of nuclear reactions release useful amounts of energy. These reactions are (1) radioactive decay, (2) nuclear fission, and (3) nuclear fusion. During each reaction, the matter involved loses mass. The mass is lost because it changes into energy. Radioactive decay, or radioactivity, is the process by which a nucleus changes into the nucleus of another isotope or element. The process releases energy chiefly in the form of particles and rays called nuclear radiation. Uranium, thorium, and several other elements decay naturally and so contribute to the natural, or background, radiation that is always present on the earth. Nuclear reactors produce radioactive isotopes artificially. Nuclear radiation accounts for about 10 percent of the energy produced in a reactor. Nuclear radiation consists largely of alpha and beta particles and gamma rays. An alpha particle, which is made up of two protons and two neutrons, is identical with a helium nucleus. A beta particle is identical with an electron. It results from the breakdown of a neutron in a radioactive nucleus. The breakdown also produces a proton, which remains in the nucleus. Gamma rays are electromagnetic waves similar to X rays. Scientists measure the rate of radioactive decay in units of time called half-lives. A half-life equals the time required for half the atoms of a particular radioactive element or isotope to decay. Half-lives range from a fraction of a second to billions of years. Nuclear fission is the splitting of heavy nuclei to release energy. All commercial nuclear reactors produce energy in this way. To produce fission, a reactor requires a bombarding particle, such as a neutron, and a target material, such as U-235. Nuclear fission occurs when the bombarding particle splits a nucleus in the target material into two parts called fission fragments. Each fragment consists of a nucleus with about half the neutrons and protons of the original nucleus. The energy is released in many forms. But most of the energy released by fission eventually takes the form of heat. The bombarding particle must first be captured by a nucleus for fission to occur. Reactors use neutrons as bombarding particles because they are the only atomic particles that are both easily captured and able to cause fission. Neutrons can also pass through most kinds of matter, including uranium. The target material. Commercial power reactors use uranium as their target material, or fuel. A uranium nucleus is the easiest of all natural nuclei to split because it has a large number of protons. Protons naturally repel one another, and so a nucleus with many protons has a tendency to “fly apart” and can be split with little difficulty. Uranium also makes a good nuclear reactor fuel because it can sustain a continuous series of fission reactions. As a result, uranium can produce a steady supply of energy. To create a series of reactions, each fissioned nucleus must give off neutrons. Each of these neutrons can split still another uranium nucleus, thus releasing still more neutrons. As this process is repeated over and over, it becomes a self-sustaining chain reaction. Chain reactions can produce an enormous amount of energy. Only nuclei that have many more neutrons than protons, such as uranium nuclei, can produce a nuclear chain reaction. The scarce uranium isotope U-235 is the only natural material that nuclear reactors can use to produce a chain reaction. Nuclei of the much more abundant U-238 isotope usually absorb neutrons without fissioning. An absorbed neutron simply becomes part of the U-238 nucleus. Neutrons released in fission travel too rapidly to be absorbed by U-235 nuclei in numbers large enough to sustain a chain reaction. Reactors can use U-235 as a fuel because they utilize other materials called moderators to slow the neutrons down. Some reactors use water as a moderator, while others use graphite. The slowed neutrons travel at a velocity of about 2.2 kilometers per second and are known as thermal neutrons. Reactors that use moderators are called thermal reactors. Most of today’s reactors are thermal reactors. Thermal neutrons are highly effective in causing fission in U-235. Therefore, the uranium in a thermal reactor can have a low percentage of U-235 content. Depending on their design, today’s power reactors use a U-235 content ranging from 0.71 percent–the percentage in natural uranium–to about 4 percent. Special purpose reactors may use fuel with a higher percentage of U-235. Scientists have also developed fast reactors, in which high-velocity neutrons cause the fissions. These reactors use plutonium or uranium 233 fuel. Fast breeder reactors produce more fuel material than they consume. A fast breeder reactor that converts U-238 to plutonium can greatly extend the use of uranium as an energy resource. In addition, a fast reactor can be designed to consume certain radioactive elements that have long-lives and are present in used fuel. Such a reactor would reduce the amount of certain radioactive wastes that must be disposed of. The section Research on new types of reactors in this article discusses fast reactors in more detail. Nuclear fusion occurs when two lightweight nuclei fuse (combine) and form a nucleus of a heavier element. The products of the fusion have less mass than the original nuclei had. The lost mass has therefore been changed into energy. Fusion reactions that produce large amounts of energy can be created by means of extremely intense heat. Such reactions are called thermonuclear reactions. Thermonuclear reactions produce the energy of both the sun and the hydrogen bomb. A thermonuclear reaction can occur in only a form of matter called plasma. Plasma is a gaslike substance made up of free electrons and free nuclei (nuclei that have no electrons revolving about them). Normally, nuclei repel one another because of the positive charges of their protons. However, if a plasma containing lightweight atomic nuclei is heated many millions of degrees, the nuclei begin moving so fast that they overcome the force of repulsion and fuse. Problems of controlling fusion. Scientists have not yet succeeded in harnessing the energy of fusion to produce electric energy. In their fusion experiments, scientists generally work with plasmas that are made from isotopes of hydrogen. Hydrogen has three isotopes. A mixture of deuterium and tritium is an excellent thermonuclear fuel because ordinary seawater contains plentiful stocks of deuterium and lithium. One barrel of seawater contains enough of these substances to produce as much energy as the burning of about one-fifth of a barrel of oil. To produce a controlled thermonuclear reaction, a plasma of one or more hydrogen isotopes must be heated many millions of degrees. But scientists have yet to develop a container that can hold plasma this hot. The plasma expands quickly. In addition, the walls of the container must be kept at low temperatures to prevent them from melting. But if the plasma touches the walls, it becomes too cool to produce fusion. The plasma must therefore be kept away from the walls of the container long enough for its nuclei to fuse and produce usable amounts of energy. Fusion devices. Most experimental fusion reactors are designed to contain hot plasma in “magnetic bottles” twisted into various shapes. The walls of the bottles are made of copper or some other metal and are surrounded by electromagnets. An electric current is passed through the electromagnets, creating a magnetic field on the inside of the walls. The magnetism pushes the plasma away from the walls. All the fusion devices thus far developed, however, use much more energy than they create. The section Research on new types of reactors discusses experimental fusion reactors in greater detail. NUCLEAR ENERGY/How nuclear energy is produced All large commercial nuclear power plants produce energy by fissioning U-235. But U-235 makes up about 0.71 percent of the uranium found in nature. About 99.28 percent of all natural uranium is U-238. The two types occur together in uranium ores, such as carnotite and pitchblende. Separating the U-235 from the U-238 in these ores is difficult and costly. For this reason, the fuel used in reactors consists largely of U-238. But the fuel has enough U-235 to produce a chain reaction. Nuclear fuel requires special processing before and after it is used. The processing begins with the mining of uranium ore and ends with the disposal of fuel wastes. This section deals chiefly with the methods used in the U.S. nuclear power industry. These methods resemble those used in other countries. Power plant design. Most nuclear power plants cover 200 to 300 acres (80 to 120 hectares). The majority are built near a large river or lake because nuclear plants require enormous quantities of water for cooling purposes. A nuclear plant consists of several main buildings, one of which houses the reactor and its related parts. Another main building houses the plant’s turbines and electric generators. Every plant also has facilities for storing unused and used fuel. Many plants are largely automated. Each of these plants has a main control room, which may be in a separate building or in one of the main buildings. The reactor building, or containment building, has a thick concrete floor and thick walls of steel or of concrete lined with steel. The concrete and steel guard against the escape of radioactive material from an accidental leak in the nuclear reactor. Power reactors that are used in nuclear power plants in the United States consist of three main parts: (1) a reactor, or pressure, vessel; (2) a core; and (3) a set of control rods. In addition, reactor operations depend upon two substances–moderators and coolants. The reactor, or pressure, vessel is a tanklike structure that encloses the other main parts of the reactor. The vessel has steel walls that are typically up to least 6 inches (15 centimeters) thick and capable of containing the high pressure exerted in a reactor. The core contains the nuclear fuel, in which the fission chain reaction occurs. The core sits in the lower half of the reactor vessel. A great many fuel assemblies stand upright in the core between an upper and lower support plate. Each fuel assembly contains a bundle of fuel rods. A fuel rod consists of pellets of fuel inside a metal tube. The pellet material is usually a powder called uranium dioxide. The tubing material is typically zircalloy, a mixture of the metal zirconium and one or more other metals. Neutrons can pass from the fuel through the tube walls, but most other nuclear particles cannot. The control rods are long metal rods that are used to regulate fission in the fuel. The control rods contain such neutron-absorbing materials as boron or cadmium. A mechanism outside the reactor vessel is attached to the rods. This mechanism inserts the rods into the core and withdraws them when necessary. When inserted fully into the core, the control rods absorb many neutrons and so prevent a fission chain reaction from occurring. To begin operation of the reactor, the control rods are partially withdrawn until a chain reaction occurs at a constant rate. To increase power in the reactor, the rods are withdrawn slightly more. Thus, fewer neutrons are absorbed, and more are available to cause fission. To stop the chain reaction, the rods are inserted all the way into the core to absorb most of the neutrons. The moderator is a substance that slows down neutrons as they pass through it. Slow neutrons are needed for fission. The moderator fills the space between the fuel rods in the fuel assemblies. It slows down neutrons as they pass from one fuel rod to another. The coolant is a liquid or gas that carries off the heat created by the fission chain reaction. The coolant circulates throughout the core. It carries the heat from the reactor to an energy conversion system. Thus, the coolant keeps the fuel and cladding from getting too hot, and it transfers energy to a place where electricity can be generated. All commercial power reactors in the United States are light water reactors. In these devices, light (ordinary) water serves as the moderator and the coolant. Canadian reactors are heavy water reactors. They use heavy water as the moderator and the coolant. Heavy water contains deuterium in place of ordinary hydrogen. For more information on reactors, see the section Research on new types of reactors in this article. Fuel preparation. After uranium ore has been mined, it goes through a long milling and refining process to separate the uranium from other elements in the ore. Light water absorbs more neutrons than do other types of moderators. The uranium used in light water reactors must therefore be enriched–that is, the percentage of U-235 must be increased. Neutrons then have a better chance of striking a U-235 nucleus. In the United States, uranium that has been separated from the ore is sent to an enrichment plant. Enrichment plants increase the proportion of U-235 in the uranium, depending on the intended use of the uranium. Most light water reactors use fuel with about 2 to 4 percent U-235. Each tube measures about 1/2 inch (13 millimeters) in diameter and 10 to 14 feet (3 to 5 meters) long. After a tube has been filled with uranium dioxide pellets, its ends are welded shut. These fuel rods are then fastened together into bundles of 30 to 300 each. Each bundle, or fuel assembly, weighs 300 to 1,500 pounds (140 to 680 kilograms). Commercial power reactors need 50 to 150 short tons (45 to 136 metric tons) of uranium dioxide. The amount depends on the size of the reactor Chain reactions. A reactor requires a certain minimum amount of fuel to keep up a chain reaction. This amount, called the critical mass, varies according to the design and size of the reactor. Reactors are designed to hold more than a critical mass of fuel to allow for fuel use during operation. The position of the control rods determines the effective mass of the fuel, the amount of fuel taking part in the chain reaction. If the effective mass is decreased below the critical mass, the chain reaction will die out and reactor power will decrease. If the effective mass is increased above the critical mass, the chain reaction will become more rapid and reactor power will increase. In an emergency, if the chain reaction became too rapid, the reactor could overheat. However, the control rods are available to slow down the chain reaction if it becomes too rapid. To prepare a reactor for operation, the fuel assemblies are loaded into the core with the control rods completely inserted. In a light water reactor, the water used as a moderator to slow down the neutrons fills the spaces between the fuel assemblies. The control rods are then slowly withdrawn, and a chain reaction begins. The farther the rods are withdrawn, the greater the rate of the reaction because fewer neutrons are absorbed. More neutrons thus are available to cause fission. When the desired power is reached, the control rods are positioned so that the effective mass is equal to the critical mass. The water in the core carries off the heat created by the chain reaction. To stop the reaction, the rods are again inserted all the way into the core to absorb most neutrons. Steam production. The light water reactors used by almost all U.S. nuclear plants are of two main types. One type, the pressurized water reactor, produces steam outside the reactor vessel. The other type, the boiling water reactor, makes steam inside the vessel. Most nuclear plants in the United States use pressurized water reactors. These reactors heat the moderator water in the core under extremely high pressure. The pressure allows the water to heat past its normal boiling point of 212 °F (100 °C) without actually boiling. The chain reaction heats the water to about 600 °F (316 °C). Pipes carry this extremely hot, though not boiling, water to steam generators outside the reactor. The steam generators transfer heat from the pressurized water to a separate supply of water that boils and so produces steam. In a boiling water reactor, the chain reaction boils the moderator-water in the core. Steam is therefore produced inside the reactor vessel. Pipes carry the steam from the reactor to the plant’s turbines. In producing electric energy, a nuclear plant’s steam turbines and electric generators work like those in a fossil-fuel plant. The steam produced by a reactor spins the blades of the plant’s turbines, which drive the generators. Many plants have combination turbines and generators called turbo generators. After steam has passed through a plant’s turbines, it is piped to a condenser. The condenser changes the steam back into water. A reactor can thus use the same water over and over. But a condenser requires a constant supply of fresh water to cool the steam. Most plants pump this water from a nearby river or lake. The water, which becomes warm as it passes through the condenser, is then pumped back into the river or lake. This warm wastewater may heat the water in the river or lake enough to endanger plants and animals that live there. For this reason, the discharge of the wastewater is sometimes called thermal pollution. To help solve the problem of thermal pollution, most new nuclear plants have cooling towers. Hot water from the steam condensers is moved through the towers in such a way that the heat passes into the atmosphere. The cooled water is returned to the steam condenser for reuse. Hazards and safeguards. An ordinary power reactor cannot explode like an atomic bomb. Only a greatly supercritical mass of plutonium 239 or of highly enriched uranium 235 can explode in this way. A supercritical mass contains more than the amount of plutonium or uranium required to sustain a chain reaction. The chief hazards of nuclear power production result from the great quantities of radioactive material that a reactor produces. These materials give off radiation in the form of alpha and beta particles and gamma rays. The reactor vessel is surrounded by thick concrete blocks called a shield, which normally prevents almost all radiation from escaping. Federal regulations limit the amount of radiation allowed from U.S. nuclear plants. Every plant has instruments that continually measure the radioactivity in and around the plant. They automatically set off an alarm if the radioactivity rises above a predetermined level. If necessary, the reactor is shut down. A plant’s routine safety measures greatly reduce the possibility of a serious accident. Nevertheless, every plant has emergency safety systems. Possible emergencies range from a break in a reactor water pipe to a leak of radiation from the reactor vessel. Any such emergency automatically activates a system that instantly shuts down the reactor, a process called scramming. The usual method of scramming is to insert the control rods rapidly into the core. A leak or break in a reactor water pipe could have dangerous consequences if it results in a loss of coolant. Even after a reactor has been shut down, the radioactive materials remaining in the reactor core can become so hot without sufficient coolant that the core melts. This condition, called a meltdown, could result in the release of dangerous amounts of radiation. In most cases, the large containment structure that houses a reactor would prevent radioactive material from escaping into the atmosphere. To prevent such an accident from occurring, all reactors are equipped with an emergency core cooling system, which automatically floods the core with water in case of a loss of coolant. Wastes and waste disposal. The fissioning of U-235 produces more neutrons than are needed to continue a chain reaction. Some of them combine with U-238 nuclei, which far outnumber U-235 nuclei in the reactor fuel. When U-238 captures a neutron, it is changed into U-239. The U-239 then decays into neptunium 239 (Np-239), which decays into plutonium 239 (Pu-239). This same process forms Pu-239 in a breeder reactor. Slow neutrons can fission Pu-239, as well as U-235. Some of the newly formed Pu-239 is thus fissioned during the fissioning of U-235. Even in small amounts, plutonium can cause cancer or genetic damage in human beings. Larger amounts can cause radiation sickness and death. Safe disposal of these wastes is one of the most difficult problems involved in nuclear power. Most nuclear plants need to replace their fuel assemblies only about once a year. The radioactive wastes generate heat, and so used fuel assemblies must be cooled after removal from a reactor. Nuclear plants cool the assemblies by storing them underwater in specially designed storage pools. In the United States, the federal government is working on guidelines for the safe and permanent disposal of nuclear wastes. The current U.S. plan calls for isolating long-lived radioactive waste from the environment in underground storage sites. A law passed by Congress in 1982 required the federal government to build two sites for nuclear wastes from commercial power plants. In 1987, the law was changed to require a single site. A storage site for nuclear waste must lie in a highly stable area that is free of earthquakes, faulting, and other geologic activity. The site must be dry so that the waste containers cannot be corroded and water supplies cannot be contaminated. The site also must be constructed so that future generations do not dig into it and release radioactivity. The government is studying the suitability of a location in Nevada. In the meantime, commercial nuclear power plants in the United States continue to store used fuel assemblies and other wastes in pools of water on the plant grounds. Other countries, including Japan, Russia, and the United Kingdom, are pursuing a reprocessing plan. Under this plan, nuclear plants would ship their used fuel assemblies to the reprocessing plants for removal of Pu-239 and unused U-235. These radioactive isotopes would then be recycled into fuel for nuclear reactors. However, this method would leave radioactive isotopes in the chemical solutions used for reprocessing. These solutions would have to be changed into a solid form that could be safely stored. In every country that has a nuclear energy industry, the government plays a role in the industry. But the government’s role varies greatly among countries. This section deals mainly with the U.S. and Canadian nuclear energy industries. Organization of the industry. Private utility companies own most of the nuclear power plants in the United States. The rest are publicly owned. Private companies also manufacture reactors, mine uranium, and handle most other aspects of U.S. nuclear power production. Canada’s nuclear power plants are all publicly owned. Atomic Energy of Canada Limited (AECL), a government corporation, has overall responsibility for the country’s nuclear research and development program. AECL also designs the CANDU (CANada Deuterium oxide-Uranium) heavy water reactors used by all Canadian nuclear plants. Private companies make the various reactor parts and mine and process the country’s uranium. Canada has no uranium enrichment plants because CANDU reactors operate with unenriched uranium fuel. The industry and the economy. The main economic advantage of nuclear power plants is that this fuel is less expensive than fossil fuels. But nuclear plants cost somewhat more to build than do fossil-fuel plants. Under normal economic conditions, a nuclear plant’s savings in fuel eventually make up for its higher construction expenses. At first, these expenses add to the cost of producing electricity. But after some years, a plant will have paid off its construction costs. It can then produce electricity more cheaply than a fossil-fuel plant can. But two main problems–sharply higher costs and equipment failures–have somewhat lessened this long-run economic advantage of nuclear power plants. Many nuclear plants in the United States have had to shut down for months at a time because of equipment failures. Such losses of operating time further add to the cost of producing electricity. The industry and the environment. Unlike fossil-fuel plants, nuclear plants do not release solid or chemical pollutants into the atmosphere. A nuclear plant releases small amounts of radioactive gas into the air. In addition, the cooling water used in pressurized water plants picks up a small amount of radioactive tritium in the steam condenser. The tritium remains in this water when it is returned to a river or lake. But these small amounts of radiation released into the environment are not believed to be harmful. Thermal pollution remains a problem at some nuclear plants. But cooling towers help correct this problem. In a small number of nuclear accidents, hazardous amounts of radiation have been released into the atmosphere. Accidental releases of radioactive substances have occurred in Russia, the United States, and the United Kingdom; and an especially serious accident occurred in 1986 at the Chernobyl nuclear power plant in Ukraine (then part of the Soviet Union). The subsection Hazards and safeguards that appears earlier in this article discusses the main methods of guarding against accidents. Critics of nuclear power also fear another danger to the environment. As power production increases, the creation of high-level radioactive wastes also increases. The United States has no permanent storage place for such wastes. The problem of storing radioactive wastes is discussed in the subsection Wastes and waste disposal. Government regulation. The Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC), an agency of the federal government, regulates nonmilitary nuclear power production in the United States. One of the NRC’s main duties is to ensure that nuclear power plants operate safely, and it makes and enforces a variety of safety standards. Every nuclear reactor and power plant must be inspected and licensed by the NRC before it may begin operations. The NRC also supervises the manufacture and distribution of nuclear fuels, and controls the disposal of radioactive wastes from commercial production. The Atomic Energy Control Board, a Canadian government agency, regulates Canada’s nuclear energy industry. The board’s duties resemble those of the Nuclear Regulatory Commission. Careers in nuclear energy cover a wide range of occupations and require widely varying amounts of training. A high percentage of the jobs require a college degree or extensive technical education. Many of these jobs are in large research laboratories, which work to improve nuclear processes and to lessen their hazards. Other careers requiring advanced training are in such areas as uranium mining and processing, reactor manufacturing and inspection, power plant operation, and government regulation. In 1972, scientists discovered that a natural chain reaction had released nuclear energy nearly 2 billion years ago in a uranium deposit in west-central Africa. Two billion years ago, there had been so little radioactive decay that the ore contained enough U-235 for a chain reaction. An accumulation of ground water acted as a moderator to begin the reaction. As heat from the reaction changed the water into steam, less and less water was available to serve as a moderator and the reaction died out. Except for such rare natural occurrences, nuclear energy was not released on a large scale on the earth until 1942. That year, scientists produced the first artificially created chain reaction. Scientific discoveries that took place within the last 100 years led to the large-scale release of nuclear energy. Early developments Before the late 1800’s, scientists did not suspect that atoms could release nuclear energy. Then in 1896, the French physicist Antoine Henri Becquerel found that uranium constantly gives off energy in the form of invisible rays. He thus became the discoverer of radioactivity. Other scientists soon began experiments to learn more about this mysterious phenomenon. The beginning of nuclear physics. In 1898, the great British physicist Ernest Rutherford identified two kinds of radioactive “rays,” which he called alpha rays and beta rays. He and other researchers later showed that these rays are actually high-energy particles, which became known as alpha and beta particles. Experiments with these particles then led Rutherford to discover the atom’s nucleus. This achievement, which Rutherford announced in 1911, marked the beginning of a new science–nuclear physics. About 1914, scientists began doing experiments to see what happens when nuclear particles collide. The experimenters used alpha particles from naturally radioactive materials to bombard the nuclei of light atoms. Light nuclei do not repel positively charged particles, such as alpha particles, as strongly as heavy nuclei do. Rutherford used this method to produce the first artificial transmutations in a series of experiments from 1917 to 1919. He bombarded nitrogen atoms with alpha particles. In rare collisions, a nitrogen 14 nucleus absorbed an alpha particle (a helium 4 nucleus). At the same time, the alpha particle pushed a proton out of the nitrogen nucleus. The nucleus thereby became an oxygen 17 nucleus. Artificial fission. To produce nuclear reactions in heavy nuclei, scientists needed a particle that heavy nuclei would not repel. In 1932, the British physicist James Chadwick discovered such a particle–the neutron. In 1938, two German radiochemists, Otto Hahn and Fritz Strassmann, reported they had produced the element barium by bombarding uranium with neutrons. At first, scientists could not explain how uranium had produced barium, which is much lighter than uranium. All previous transmutations had resulted in an element about as heavy as the original one. Then in 1939, the Austrian physicist Lise Meitner and her nephew Otto Frisch showed that Hahn and Strassman had in fact produced the first known artificial fission reaction. A uranium nucleus had split into two nearly equal fragments, one of which consisted of a barium nucleus. Two neutrons were also emitted. The other fragment consisted of a nucleus of krypton, a somewhat lighter element than barium. These two nuclei, together with the emitted neutrons, are lighter than a uranium nucleus and a neutron. The reaction had therefore produced more energy than it consumed. Scientists soon realized that if many uranium nuclei could be made to fission, a tremendous amount of energy would be released. The amount of energy could be calculated from a theory developed by the great German-born physicist Albert Einstein in 1905. The theory shows that matter can change into energy and that matter and energy are related by the equation E equals m times c-squared. This equation states that the energy (E) into which a given amount of matter can change equals the mass (m) of that matter multiplied by the speed of light squared (c-squared). The speed of light squared is obtained by multiplying the speed of light by itself. Using this equation, scientists determined that the fissioning of 1 pound (0.45 kilogram) of uranium would release as much energy as 8,000 short tons (7,300 metric tons) of TNT. Uranium could therefore be used to make a powerful bomb. The beginning of the nuclear age The development of nuclear weapons. World War II broke out in Europe in September 1939. The month before, Einstein had written to U.S. President Franklin D. Roosevelt urging him to commit the United States to developing an atomic bomb. Einstein had fled to the United States from Germany to escape Nazi persecution. He warned Roosevelt that German scientists might already be working on a nuclear bomb. Roosevelt acted on Einstein’s urging, and early in 1940 scientists received the first funds for uranium research in the United States. The United States entered World War II in 1941. The government then ordered an all-out effort to build an atomic bomb and in 1942 established the top-secret Manhattan Project to achieve this goal. A group of scientists at the University of Chicago had charge of producing plutonium for the Manhattan Project. The group included such noted physicists as Enrico Fermi, Leo Szilard, and Eugene Wigner, all of whom had been born in Europe and had settled in the United States. Fermi headed the group. Under the scientists’ direction, workers built an atomic pile, or reactor, beneath the stands of the university athletic field. The pile consisted of 50 short tons (45 metric tons) of natural uranium oxide and uranium embedded in 500 short tons (450 metric tons) of graphite. The graphite served as a moderator. The pile was designed to demonstrate a controlled nuclear chain reaction in the uranium. Cadmium rods controlled the reaction. On Dec. 2, 1942, this reactor produced the first artificial chain reaction. The success of the University of Chicago project led the U.S. government to build a plutonium-producing plant in Hanford, Wash. The government also built a uranium enrichment plant in Oak Ridge, Tenn. Plutonium and greatly enriched uranium from these plants were used in the two atomic bombs that the United States dropped on Japan in August 1945. After World War II, scientists began work on developing a hydrogen bomb. The United States exploded the first hydrogen bomb in 1952 and so achieved the world’s first large-scale thermonuclear reaction But the AEC became responsible for regulating the nuclear energy industry. It also kept control in such areas as uranium enrichment and waste disposal. The United States made the world’s first full-scale use of controlled nuclear energy in 1954. That year, the U.S. Navy launched the first nuclear-powered vessel, the submarine Nautilus. The world’s first full-scale nuclear power plant began operations in 1956 at Calder Hall in northwestern England. In 1957, the first large-scale nuclear plant in the United States opened in Shippingport, Pa. It supplied electricity to the Pittsburgh area until 1982, when the plant was closed. Canada opened its first full-scale plant in 1962 at Rolphton, Ont. The successful start of the nuclear power industry convinced world leaders of the need for international cooperation in the field. In 1957, the United Nations (UN) established the International Atomic Energy Agency to promote the peaceful uses of nuclear energy. Also in 1957, Belgium, France, Italy, Luxembourg, the Netherlands, and West Germany formed the European Atomic Energy Community (Euratom). The organization encourages the development of nuclear power among its member countries. Denmark, the United Kingdom, and Ireland joined Euratom in 1973. The spread of nuclear capability During the 1960’s and early 1970’s, a number of countries acquired reactors and used them to start nuclear power development. Progress was also made during this period toward limiting nuclear weapons tests and stopping the spread of nuclear weapons. In 1970, for example, a nuclear nonproliferation treaty went into effect. The treaty prohibits the nuclear powers that have agreed to abide by the document from giving nuclear weapons to nations that do not already have them. The nonproliferation treaty also prohibits nations without nuclear weapons from acquiring them. But the nonproliferation treaty does not prohibit nations from selling or buying nuclear reactors. A reactor can be used not only for peaceful purposes but also to produce plutonium for nuclear weapons. India used a research reactor for this purpose and in 1974 exploded its first atomic bomb. Canada had supplied the reactor to India with the understanding it would be used for peaceful purposes only. Canada has signed the nonproliferation treaty, but India has not. Critics of India’s action question the wisdom of supplying reactors to countries that do not already have them. Meanwhile, the United States had been greatly increasing its nuclear power capacity. But opposition to nuclear power development also increased in the United States during the late 1960’s and early 1970’s. Critics began to question nearly every aspect of nuclear power production, from the cost of uranium enrichment to the problems of waste disposal. Many critics of the United States nuclear program charged that the government overlooked various safety risks at nuclear plants to promote nuclear power development. Partly as a result of such criticism, Congress disbanded the Atomic Energy Commission (AEC) in 1974 and divided its functions between two newly formed agencies. The Energy Research and Development Administration (ERDA) took over the AEC’s development programs. The Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) took over its regulatory duties. The NRC, it was believed, could better regulate the industry if it was not also responsible for the industry’s growth and development. In 1977, Congress abolished ERDA and transferred its responsibilities to the newly created Department of Energy. Safety concerns There have been a number of accidents at nuclear power plants. Most of them have not been serious. However, in 1957, a fire at the Windscale plutonium production plant in northern England resulted in the release of a large quantity of radioactivity. The British government banned the sale of milk from cows in that part of England for more than a month after the fire. In the United States, concerns about the safety of nuclear reactors increased after a serious accident in 1979 at the Three Mile Island nuclear power plant near Harrisburg, Pennsylvania. Mechanical and human failures resulted in a breakdown of the reactor’s cooling system and the destruction of the reactor core. Scientists and technicians prevented a failure of the reactor vessel that might have released large amounts of radioactive isotopes into the reactor containment building. Cleanup of the plant was completed in the early 1990’s. The worst nuclear accident in history occurred in 1986 at the Chernobyl nuclear power plant near Kiev in Ukraine, which was then part of the Soviet Union. An explosion and fire ripped apart the reactor and released large amounts of radioactive isotopes into the atmosphere. Unlike most Western reactors, the Chernobyl reactors lacked an enclosure to prevent radioactive isotopes from escaping. Soviet officials reported that 31 people died from radiation sickness or burns and more than 200 others were seriously injured. The radioactive substances spread over parts of what are now Ukraine, Russia, and Belarus, and were carried by wind into northern and central Europe. Experts expected a significant increase in the number of cancer deaths among those near the reactor. But they predicted that the health effects outside the Chernobyl area would be slight. As a result of the accidents at Three Mile Island and Chernobyl, opposition to nuclear power increased in many countries during the late 1980’s. In the United States, the NRC tightened its control of nuclear plants. Experts have expressed particular concern over the safety of older Soviet-designed reactors now operating in Russia, Ukraine, and several countries of the former Soviet bloc. Western scientists and engineers are helping to remedy some of the most urgent safety problems in these reactors. As the nuclear power industry has continued to develop, many improvements in plant equipment and operation have increased safety. Nonetheless, some experts insist that the next generation of reactors should take greater advantage of design features that rely less–or not at all–on mechanical equipment such as pumps and valves to remove heat if an accident occurs. Some of these reactors are known as passively safe reactors.

It was early spring in the year 2048 and my bithday was coming up this August 26. I would be turning 70 years and retirring. I am not looking forward to it as much as I thought. My whole life I dreamed of moving to Florida and living on the beach when I retired. I planned on traveling a lot seeing the great sites the country has to offer. All of these plans have changed instead my yougest son is putting an addition on his house so that I could move in. I am very thankful for what he is doing, but I really don’t want to go. I want my privacy and I’m sure he wants his too. There is no other choice I worked as long as I could but I’m just getting to old. We all agree that I am not going into a nursing especially me. If the government would have told us that they couldn’t solve the Social Security crisis almost 30 years ago I would have prepared better. But instead they promised they could save it and the program would still be aruond when I retired. They obviously lied and now I have nothing. Moments later I hear music its my alarm clock. It was only a dream its April 1996 and I’m 18. The article about the Social Security in the paper had me thinking and I must have a bad dream.

The Presidential election will be coming up this November ‘96 and the question that many of Americans have on their mind is what are you going to about the Social Security crisis? This question has our nation divided between generations. The elder people of our nation (ages 50 and up) feel confident that Social Security will be there for them and that it should be left alone. On the other hand the Baby Boomers (ages 31-49) and Generation X (ages 18-30) lack this confidence fearing that they will never receive Social Security, and the money they put in would be a waste. Many politicians are afraid to touch this issue because the elder still make a large number of the voting block. Speaking as a member of Generation X it is our duty to vote for change in Social Security to ensure we will have something to look forward to when we retire. We can not wait any longer to defeat this crisis.

The Social Security crisis is the threat of the Social Security system going bankrupt. Well its more than just a threat its the reality. The common belief is that Social Security is a saving fund where the government takes a certain percentage out of our weekly pay. Then that money is put into a savings fund where it is held until we retire. When we retire the money is returned to us in monthly checks plus the interest. This is where we are wrong. Social Security is a pay-as-you-go system where the current workforce pays for the present retirees, and then when they retire they will depend on the younger workforce to pay for them and so on and so on. Which is fine when you always have more workers then retirees. This is the problem the government will face when the Baby Boomers retire in the year 2010. In 1950 there were 7.2 workers for each retiree. Today there are 3.2 workers for every retiree, an by the year 2020 there will only be 2.4 or less for each retiree. By the year 2010-2015 Social Security is projected by the government to pay out more money than it could take in. Since the current Social Security took in a surplus of $60 billion last year with a projected total to be around $5 trillion they will have enough money to last another 10 years or so. All in all experts expect that Social Security will have spent every penny it has by the year 2030.

In actuality the bankruptcy will probably happen about ten years sooner. See there is a catch to their surplus that not to many people know about. The surplus is put in to government bonds so that government can use that money to support other programs and to pay of other debts. Also when the government figures out the national debt they subtract that surplus to make the national debt look smaller. The problem will come when Social Security needs that surplus to support its program and the government has to pay of these bonds. The United States will go further into debt having to severely raise taxes and drastically cut government programs. Or they won’t pay the their debt and the American retirees will be out trillions of dollars.

There are also two other contradicting factors that boggle the minds of almost all Americans. First as we all know the life expectancy of people is getting larger. In 1940 a man at the age of 65 could expect to live another 13 years; today they could expect to live another 17 years. The government figures by the year 2000 many people will have collected half as long as they have worked. The twisted part of the whole thing is that citizens are beginning retire and collect benefits earlier then ever. More than half of all retirees begin collecting benefits before they are 65. The average at which people began collecting went from 68.7 in 1950 to 63.7 in 1991.

The Government has tried to institute new polices and reform old ones, but they are falling short over the long run. In 1993 the President pushed a tax that stated 85% of Social Security became taxable income to people with substantial amount of other retirement savings such as pensions and personal savings. What they are telling is if you are one the smart people in America that pre-planned your retirement with other savings and not just Social Security they can put heavy tax on your Social Security checks. Now you would have to pay twice once whiled you worked and again when you retire. Its has if you are being punished for doing the right thing.

Another tactic many government official are trying to push is raising the payroll tax 2%. The current tax is 12.4%, 6.2% from the employee and 6.2% from the employer. This would aid us temporarily, but would do nothing to stop the long term problem. ‘To maintain the systems solvency, taxes would have to be increased, or benefits cut, between one-half and 1 percent every 10 years’ (Bosworth 36). If you do the math you will realize by the time Generation X retires the payroll tax needed to keep Social Security going will have almost doubled. The higher tax rates will start some sort of recession with people getting far less out of their pay checks to live on. Anyway who wants pay more taxes. They would also like to cut many of the benefits that Social Security offers, but why should we pay more and receive less.

The U.S. government has dug itself into a whole waiting to the last minute to save Social Security. When by simple demographics years ago would have showed the same problem. They have to get it out of their heads that Social Security is such a great system that can be saved. Well it was great a the time, but as we know times change. The only way to save Social Security is to completely overhaul it. With the best way to overhaul is by the introduction of partially privatizing Social Security.

It help bring Chile social security system out of bankruptcy. In 1981 Chile privatized it social security by requiring their workers to put 10% of their pretax wages in private pension funds. The funds are carefully regulated, and workers can switch among trust fund managers for better returns or lower costs. They also receive periodic statements. Upon their retirement they receive their money to buy annuity. What ever is left can be passed onto their heirs. If there isn’t enough to provide a descent living the government steps in guaranteeing a minimum. Now Chile enjoys a high savings rate well over 20% of their gross domestic product compared to the US’s 3.2%.

The plan has been pushed here heavily in the states by Senator Robert Kerry of Nebraska (D). The plan would not allow people to drop out of Social Security completely like some other more radical plans, but to divert a percentage of their payroll tax into accounts that work like Individual Retirement Accounts (IRA’s). The Senators plan proposes that 2% of the 12.4% tax would be taken out and placed in private accounts set up by the government. The money would be one’s own personal account with compound interest (Congressional Digest 246). The Institute for Research on Economics of Taxation (IRET) adds, ‘that they would not be able to touch that money until they retiree or become disabled. The money is theirs the government would not be allowed to touch it. If that person should die the money would be added to their estate’ (Congressional Digest 248).

The Cato Institute (a nonprofit public policy research foundation founded in 1977 whose publication, conferences, and seminars are designed to illuminate private sector, voluntary solutions to social and economic problems) also adds, ‘that those presently in the workforce would have the option of remaining in the current Social Security system or switching to the new private system. Those entering the workforce after the implementation of the new private system would be required to participate in the new system. Thus the current system would be eventually phased out’ (Congressional Digest 244). The plan also has guidelines to problems and questions that people have or arrive.

First off people begin to question the safety of the government handling their own personal money. It a viable question considering our national debt and the way they spend tax money, but the there is a viable answer. If you let people drop totally out of Social Security and have their own pension plan there would be know way for the government to keep track and ensure that people are saving. Then when these people begin to retire and we find out that many of them never saved any money and will have no monthly retirement checks we will have a poverty struck elder class that the government would have to bail out. In conclusion to ensure that everyone has money set aside for retirement the government has to control the money.

Another common critique is how much is 2% going to save? It wills save a lot more than the average person thinks. Currently Social Security takes a dollar from the worker and gives it directly to the retiree with no growth or interest. The IRET states, ‘With compounding interest at a 7% real return, a dollar saved at age 20 would be worth $16 at age 60 and $32 at the age of 70′ Congressional Digest). That’s more then the current system could ever own up to.

Many critics also wanted to know what would the new system do about people who earned low wages and wouldn’t have a substantial amount of money set aside to pay for retirement. The Cato institute proposes a minimum savings amount, acting as safety net. It would be a number to a similar to the minimum wage where if the individual doesn’t meet the amount specified to earn a livable monthly payment the government would supplement the difference to bring the monthly income up to the correct level. The money would come out of the other 10.4% that people still pay into. They also report considering the rate of return even someone making minimum wage their entire life would still have enough to meet the monthly requirement (Congressional Digest 244). Concluding that the safety net would only support a scarce few. This would also keep our nations poverty level up.

A questions many Americans have is where do we begin? You begin with all age groups including people in their forties and fifties. For these people who are getting close to retirement and wouldn’t have a substantial amount saved up the government would take the benefits earned from year to date and put them into a bond. The bound would be put along with the 2% they begin saving. The money would earn interest together so when these people retire they will be shore to receive the money they deserve and then some (Investment Company Institute Congressional Digest 252).

The only problem the plan doesn’t solve is the problem that can’t be solved. This is how do you support the people already collecting their Social Security. Social Security will have to use their surplus, but as stated the government has already used this money. In order for people to get the money they deserve the government will have to cut their loses and pay back their bonds. It will severely hurt the budget, but what choose is there. No plan would have been able to solve this dilemma it would have happened anyway.

What more can you say? The time to change the Social Security system has come. The program considered by many to the prominent leg of the three legged retirement stool, along with pensions and personal savings, is growing week. ‘…the result for retirees almost certainly will mean that the one leg of three legged retirement stool is going to get wobblier’ (Wechsler 25). The government is going to have to act now to prepare for the future because if they wait any longer the leg mine as well just fall off. The government is there for the people and I’m sure they don’t want the suffering of Generation X retirees on their conscious. I don’t want this to happen. I would like to work hard in my life looking forward to luxury of retirement at the end, and as a citizen of this country I should be given that right. If the system goes bankrupt that luxury just maybe taken away.

The only way to ensure that Social Security will be around for the young people of this country is to instate the partially privatization plan. Years ago it was considered to radical of an idea, but now it seems that there really no other choice. It’s the only plan that shows some hard facts to support it goals unlike many of the other plans by Congress or President. You have read the argument and you now the facts I don’t know how anyone could think otherwise. It took Chile out of bankruptcy it will do the same for us to. What do have to lose.

It was early spring in the year 2048 and my bithday was coming up this August 26. I would be turning 70 years and retirring. I am not looking forward to it as much as I thought. My whole life I dreamed of moving to Florida and living on the beach when I retired. I planned on traveling a lot seeing the great sites the country has to offer. All of these plans have changed instead my yougest son is putting an addition on his house so that I could move in. I am very thankful for what he is doing, but I really don’t want to go. I want my privacy and I’m sure he wants his too. There is no other choice I worked as long as I could but I’m just getting to old. We all agree that I am not going into a nursing especially me. If the government would have told us that they couldn’t solve the Social Security crisis almost 30 years ago I would have prepared better. But instead they promised they could save it and the program would still be aruond when I retired. They obviously lied and now I have nothing. Moments later I hear music its my alarm clock. It was only a dream its April 1996 and I’m 18. The article about the Social Security in the paper had me thinking and I must have a bad dream.

The Presidential election will be coming up this November ‘96 and the question that many of Americans have on their mind is what are you going to about the Social Security crisis? This question has our nation divided between generations. The elder people of our nation (ages 50 and up) feel confident that Social Security will be there for them and that it should be left alone. On the other hand the Baby Boomers (ages 31-49) and Generation X (ages 18-30) lack this confidence fearing that they will never receive Social Security, and the money they put in would be a waste. Many politicians are afraid to touch this issue because the elder still make a large number of the voting block. Speaking as a member of Generation X it is our duty to vote for change in Social Security to ensure we will have something to look forward to when we retire. We can not wait any longer to defeat this crisis.

The Social Security crisis is the threat of the Social Security system going bankrupt. Well its more than just a threat its the reality. The common belief is that Social Security is a saving fund where the government takes a certain percentage out of our weekly pay. Then that money is put into a savings fund where it is held until we retire. When we retire the money is returned to us in monthly checks plus the interest. This is where we are wrong. Social Security is a pay-as-you-go system where the current workforce pays for the present retirees, and then when they retire they will depend on the younger workforce to pay for them and so on and so on. Which is fine when you always have more workers then retirees. This is the problem the government will face when the Baby Boomers retire in the year 2010. In 1950 there were 7.2 workers for each retiree. Today there are 3.2 workers for every retiree, an by the year 2020 there will only be 2.4 or less for each retiree. By the year 2010-2015 Social Security is projected by the government to pay out more money than it could take in. Since the current Social Security took in a surplus of $60 billion last year with a projected total to be around $5 trillion they will have enough money to last another 10 years or so. All in all experts expect that Social Security will have spent every penny it has by the year 2030.

In actuality the bankruptcy will probably happen about ten years sooner. See there is a catch to their surplus that not to many people know about. The surplus is put in to government bonds so that government can use that money to support other programs and to pay of other debts. Also when the government figures out the national debt they subtract that surplus to make the national debt look smaller. The problem will come when Social Security needs that surplus to support its program and the government has to pay of these bonds. The United States will go further into debt having to severely raise taxes and drastically cut government programs. Or they won’t pay the their debt and the American retirees will be out trillions of dollars.

There are also two other contradicting factors that boggle the minds of almost all Americans. First as we all know the life expectancy of people is getting larger. In 1940 a man at the age of 65 could expect to live another 13 years; today they could expect to live another 17 years. The government figures by the year 2000 many people will have collected half as long as they have worked. The twisted part of the whole thing is that citizens are beginning retire and collect benefits earlier then ever. More than half of all retirees begin collecting benefits before they are 65. The average at which people began collecting went from 68.7 in 1950 to 63.7 in 1991.

The Government has tried to institute new polices and reform old ones, but they are falling short over the long run. In 1993 the President pushed a tax that stated 85% of Social Security became taxable income to people with substantial amount of other retirement savings such as pensions and personal savings. What they are telling is if you are one the smart people in America that pre-planned your retirement with other savings and not just Social Security they can put heavy tax on your Social Security checks. Now you would have to pay twice once whiled you worked and again when you retire. Its has if you are being punished for doing the right thing.

Another tactic many government official are trying to push is raising the payroll tax 2%. The current tax is 12.4%, 6.2% from the employee and 6.2% from the employer. This would aid us temporarily, but would do nothing to stop the long term problem. ‘To maintain the systems solvency, taxes would have to be increased, or benefits cut, between one-half and 1 percent every 10 years’ (Bosworth 36). If you do the math you will realize by the time Generation X retires the payroll tax needed to keep Social Security going will have almost doubled. The higher tax rates will start some sort of recession with people getting far less out of their pay checks to live on. Anyway who wants pay more taxes. They would also like to cut many of the benefits that Social Security offers, but why should we pay more and receive less.

The U.S. government has dug itself into a whole waiting to the last minute to save Social Security. When by simple demographics years ago would have showed the same problem. They have to get it out of their heads that Social Security is such a great system that can be saved. Well it was great a the time, but as we know times change. The only way to save Social Security is to completely overhaul it. With the best way to overhaul is by the introduction of partially privatizing Social Security.

It help bring Chile social security system out of bankruptcy. In 1981 Chile privatized it social security by requiring their workers to put 10% of their pretax wages in private pension funds. The funds are carefully regulated, and workers can switch among trust fund managers for better returns or lower costs. They also receive periodic statements. Upon their retirement they receive their money to buy annuity. What ever is left can be passed onto their heirs. If there isn’t enough to provide a descent living the government steps in guaranteeing a minimum. Now Chile enjoys a high savings rate well over 20% of their gross domestic product compared to the US’s 3.2%.

The plan has been pushed here heavily in the states by Senator Robert Kerry of Nebraska (D). The plan would not allow people to drop out of Social Security completely like some other more radical plans, but to divert a percentage of their payroll tax into accounts that work like Individual Retirement Accounts (IRA’s). The Senators plan proposes that 2% of the 12.4% tax would be taken out and placed in private accounts set up by the government. The money would be one’s own personal account with compound interest (Congressional Digest 246). The Institute for Research on Economics of Taxation (IRET) adds, ‘that they would not be able to touch that money until they retiree or become disabled. The money is theirs the government would not be allowed to touch it. If that person should die the money would be added to their estate’ (Congressional Digest 248).

The Cato Institute (a nonprofit public policy research foundation founded in 1977 whose publication, conferences, and seminars are designed to illuminate private sector, voluntary solutions to social and economic problems) also adds, ‘that those presently in the workforce would have the option of remaining in the current Social Security system or switching to the new private system. Those entering the workforce after the implementation of the new private system would be required to participate in the new system. Thus the current system would be eventually phased out’ (Congressional Digest 244). The plan also has guidelines to problems and questions that people have or arrive.

First off people begin to question the safety of the government handling their own personal money. It a viable question considering our national debt and the way they spend tax money, but the there is a viable answer. If you let people drop totally out of Social Security and have their own pension plan there would be know way for the government to keep track and ensure that people are saving. Then when these people begin to retire and we find out that many of them never saved any money and will have no monthly retirement checks we will have a poverty struck elder class that the government would have to bail out. In conclusion to ensure that everyone has money set aside for retirement the government has to control the money.

Another common critique is how much is 2% going to save? It wills save a lot more than the average person thinks. Currently Social Security takes a dollar from the worker and gives it directly to the retiree with no growth or interest. The IRET states, ‘With compounding interest at a 7% real return, a dollar saved at age 20 would be worth $16 at age 60 and $32 at the age of 70′ Congressional Digest). That’s more then the current system could ever own up to.

Many critics also wanted to know what would the new system do about people who earned low wages and wouldn’t have a substantial amount of money set aside to pay for retirement. The Cato institute proposes a minimum savings amount, acting as safety net. It would be a number to a similar to the minimum wage where if the individual doesn’t meet the amount specified to earn a livable monthly payment the government would supplement the difference to bring the monthly income up to the correct level. The money would come out of the other 10.4% that people still pay into. They also report considering the rate of return even someone making minimum wage their entire life would still have enough to meet the monthly requirement (Congressional Digest 244). Concluding that the safety net would only support a scarce few. This would also keep our nations poverty level up.

A questions many Americans have is where do we begin? You begin with all age groups including people in their forties and fifties. For these people who are getting close to retirement and wouldn’t have a substantial amount saved up the government would take the benefits earned from year to date and put them into a bond. The bound would be put along with the 2% they begin saving. The money would earn interest together so when these people retire they will be shore to receive the money they deserve and then some (Investment Company Institute Congressional Digest 252).

The only problem the plan doesn’t solve is the problem that can’t be solved. This is how do you support the people already collecting their Social Security. Social Security will have to use their surplus, but as stated the government has already used this money. In order for people to get the money they deserve the government will have to cut their loses and pay back their bonds. It will severely hurt the budget, but what choose is there. No plan would have been able to solve this dilemma it would have happened anyway.

What more can you say? The time to change the Social Security system has come. The program considered by many to the prominent leg of the three legged retirement stool, along with pensions and personal savings, is growing week. ‘…the result for retirees almost certainly will mean that the one leg of three legged retirement stool is going to get wobblier’ (Wechsler 25). The government is going to have to act now to prepare for the future because if they wait any longer the leg mine as well just fall off. The government is there for the people and I’m sure they don’t want the suffering of Generation X retirees on their conscious. I don’t want this to happen. I would like to work hard in my life looking forward to luxury of retirement at the end, and as a citizen of this country I should be given that right. If the system goes bankrupt that luxury just maybe taken away.

The only way to ensure that Social Security will be around for the young people of this country is to instate the partially privatization plan. Years ago it was considered to radical of an idea, but now it seems that there really no other choice. It’s the only plan that shows some hard facts to support it goals unlike many of the other plans by Congress or President. You have read the argument and you now the facts I don’t know how anyone could think otherwise. It took Chile out of bankruptcy it will do the same for us to. What do have to lose.

The Presidential election will be coming up this November and the question that many of Americans have on their mind is what are you going to about the Social Security crisis? This question has our nation divided between generations. The elder people of our nation (ages 50 and up) fell confident that Social Security will be there for them and that it should be left alone. On the other hand the Baby Boomers (ages 31-49) and Generation X (ages 18-30) lack this confidence fearing that they will never receive Social Security, and the money they put in would be a waste. Many politicians are afraid to touch this issue because the elder still make a large number of the voting block. Speaking as a member it is our duty to vote for change in Social Security to ensure we will have something to look forward to when we retire. We can not wait any longer to defeat this crisis.

For those who don’t know the Social Security crisis is the threat that Social Security may go bankrupt. Well its more than just a threat its the reality. The common belief is that Social Security is a saving fund where the government takes a certain percentage out of our weekly pay. Then that money is put into a savings fund where it is held until you retire. When they retire money is returned to them in monthly checks plus the interest. This is where they are wrong. Social Security is a pay-as-you-go system where the current

workforce pays for the present retirees, and then when they retire they will depend on the workforce and so on and so on. Which is fine when you always have more workers then retirees. This is the problem the government will face when the Baby Boomers retire in the year 2010. In 1950 there were 7.2 workers for each retiree. Today there are 3.2 workers for every retiree, an by the year 2020 there will only be 2.4 or less for each retiree. By the year 2010-2015 Social Security is projected by the government to pay out more money than it could take in. Since the current Social Security took in a surplus of $60 billion last year with a projected total to be around $5 trillion they will have enough money to last another 10 years or so. All in all experts expect that Social Security will have spent every penny it has by the year 2030

Introduction

In spite of the confusing nature of NGOs, the theorists who study them seem to be inclined to assess this exacting form of political practice in terms of democratic theory. They try to establish how much NGOs contribute to participatory democracy. There seem to be a more or less equal numbers of enthusiasts and sceptics. In the mid-nineties some were quite excited. But since then the contradictions which are unmistakably clear in the practice of NGOs have led most authors to adopt a position that is midway between the extremes. A number of practical studies have now been carried out on the work of NGOs, their success and failure, the results of their actions and their political significance. Some authors approach NGOs from an entirely different angle. They go past these issues or even turn the questions around, so that the key question becomes: What does the NGO phenomenon mean for our understanding of the state, government and democracy? The key concepts are those of the state, democracy and civil society. But before we approach this subject more closely it would be wise to look at some recent studies in this field.

The equivocal nature of NGOs

In the beginning many people waited with great expectation to see what would become of NGOs. They thought that NGOs would form a new stage in the development of social movements. And they expected NGOs to follow the labour movement and the new social movements as a form of citizen participation. NGOs were also expected to represent the interests of consumers and the environment at the global level. All these expectations were realistic to some extent, e.g. in so far as some NGOs and their members came from within new social movements. But, when looked at objectively and in social terms, this is true of very few NGOs. The new social movements covered a wide spectrum of political and, above all, social issues: environment, energy policy, transport, peace, gender relations. Socialist, anti-capitalist and anti-imperialist goals were associated with the first great wave of protest in the late sixties and early seventies. But these goals were relegated to the sidelines in the second wave of protest in the late seventies and early eighties. The global environment and support for liberation movements in the countries of the South were significant issues for only a small proportion of activists, political organisations, publishers, journals and alternative enterprises engaged in fair trade.

NGOs have developed in a similar way to green parties. In the case of the latter, political activists have turned professional by engaging in party politics and going into parliament. In a small sector of the social movements, especially in the environmental field, movement activists have turned professional by founding NGOs. These two political strands became tied together towards the end of the eighties and at the beginning of the nineties as a result of the debate about sustainable development and by the UN Conference on Environment and Development in Rio de Janeiro in 1992. In these two fields (environment and international solidarity), unlike in others, NGOs succeeded in gaining recognition from intergovernmental organisations and national governments. Individual organs of state and some foundations gave direct financial support to NGOs and/or supported them indirectly by means of tax exemptions and cooption in political discussion processes. The active involvement of NGOs and the recognition of them by the state won them respect and public support, so that they could depend on a substantial level of donations from the public. A few well-organised NGOs have broad-based networks and often operate internationally. These include only a few older organisations such as Amnesty International and rather more organisations like Greenpeace. The images and expectations that people have of NGOs are based on these organisations.

Only a very small proportion of the NGOs that now exist around the globe can take part in international conferences and try to influence the decision-making process. They represent particular interests and groups of people without having been elected and mandated by them. The participation of a particular NGO in conferences is most often made possible by close contact with governments, a particular state or individual politicians, i.e. personal acquaintance or membership of a particular network. The” sovereign people” often do not know that they are being represented. This gives rise to the well known paradox of representation: that the representative is appointed first and then defines those whom he/she represents. It may well be the case that NGOs act in the best interests of the people whom they represent, but it may also be the case that they usurp their position and make people’s decisions for them. People who are affected by decisions have to accept that decisions will be made” in their name”. People who are supposedly represented by NGOs cannot effectively object to the activities of those NGOs - even when they know that the NGOs are representing interests that have nothing to do with the people affected by a particular decision. This is because the representative concerned can always claim to be speaking on behalf of some other individuals, groups or interests. In this way, it is possible for whole tracts of land to be turned into nature museums against the will of the population, whilst elsewhere the process of urbanisation goes on uninhibited. NGOs might force people to adopt a particular idea of sustainable consumption. Alternatively, they might claim to follow a policy of sustainability whilst at the same time being involved in the marketing of particular resources and discrediting people who object as particularistic. In addition, in the end it is this paradox of representation that enables the state to assert its own legitimacy over and above that of NGOs as the real representative of the interests of the people. This is even easier for the state when it points out that all interest groups are able to take part in the political process.

Finally, we can point to yet another aspect of the problem that can be observed during international negotiations. Northern NGOs tend to come into conflict with each other over negotiating strategies. If they make radical demands, they run the risk of being ignored by political or economic decision-makers. If they are too cooperative, this may create the impression that they are too weak, lack power in negotiations or have spoilt their chances, because many activists feel that they are no longer represented. Research has confirmed the hypothesis that in the limited field in which NGOs have the ear of international institutions, intergovernmental bodies and governments or are contracted to undertake particular projects; these NGOs may be used in various ways to supplement the activities of the state. NGOs possess specialised, scientific or local knowledge. They belong to broad networks and have many contacts. They are trusted and respected by people at the grassroots. They often have more scope for effective action than corrupt state bureaucracies. And they can perform work relatively cheaply, which would be far more costly if undertaken by state institutions or which state institutions are barely in a position to undertake because they lack the relevant powers.

(Demirovic 2000).

There is a significant difference between the NGOs in the countries of the South and those in the North. NGOs based in Japan, the USA or Europe have access to information, money, technology and political contacts. They share the same cultural and political background as the official decision-makers (Wahl 1997). This gives rise to an imbalance that has many disadvantages. Amongst NGOs in the North, there are often paternalistic attitudes towards the South. NGO representatives from the South find themselves in a dependent role, with the fatal consequence that they are either constantly complaining about the lack of solidarity from the North and therefore make themselves unpopular or they allow themselves to be co-opted and lose touch with their own political and social grassroots. In the latter case, they become divorced from their local context and simply act as mediators between local groups and NGOs in the South and the donor institutions in the countries of the North. Working for an NGO becomes a well-paid job, which no longer bears much relationship to the original reason for becoming active or to the real situation of the country concerned. Moreover, such jobs have to be made permanent in the interests of the members of the NGO. NGOs appear alongside state institutions and take on the tasks of the state. They have to compete for financial resources and for contracts for project implementation. The NGOs of the North, in order to safeguard their own standing as advocates, avoid being too critical of their own societies, although this is where they should be bringing about fundamental change in order to solve the key problems of the South. In order to justify their continued existence, they have to maintain the image of the South as being in need of support.

The picture of NGOs, which is portrayed in the media and some academic literature, is characterised by a very selective treatment of issues, organisations and projects. Several factors enable Greenpeace to gain attention: Dramatic actions, negotiating skill and expertise, international presence and forward-looking technological developments (e.g. CFC-free refrigerators) have all helped Greenpeace to win widespread public confidence. On the other hand, there are tens of thousands of NGOs spread throughout many regions of the world which are concerned with a wide variety of issues and vary considerably as regards political orientation, but they are almost totally ignored. Given the great diversity of NGOs, one might ask whether there is any sense in trying to analyse this phenomenon in general terms. It seems to me that this is only possible, if NGOs are regarded as a particular kind of political body - like political parties (Jäger 1983, Hirsch 1999), i.e. as a social entity that is formed in a particular conflict of social actors and then in turn strongly influences or even determines their behaviour.

The subject matter that we have addressed here from the point of view of democracy theory can also be addressed with similar results from the point of view of state theory. As far as many grassroots groups or groups within a movement are concerned, it does not make any difference to them whether or not they are regarded as NGOs. In the seventies many of them would have been regarded as being part of social movements. When they take on the form of an NGO, they have a different significance within society and are no longer movement organisations (Klein 1997). They are recognised by the state and are given official status. They are given tax privileges. They can apply for grants or win contracts. They have formal access to the government, parliamentary bodies, national and international organisations and decision-making bodies and can develop informal contacts with individuals in the state administration and in political parties or foundations which have an influence on the political process.

It is this development in particular which leads us to regard NGOs as democratic actors in a pluralist neo-corporatist context. This goes against the conventional narrow definition of democracy as the political process whereby the electorate chooses between competing parties on the basis of their programmes and candidates. From this point of view, neo-corporatist tripartite negotiations between government, trade unions and companies are a challenge to the government’s decision-making powers and can therefore be regarded as a weakening of democracy. Similarly, social movements may be dismissed as a form of mob rule or as an irrational expression of the special interests of a small minority. If we take this analysis to its logical conclusion, NGOs are not to be regarded as democratic actors, because they are suspected of weakening the authority of the state and the state’s monopoly of power both in terms of making decisions which are collectively binding and in terms of physical force.

It is not least the pressure of social movements and their demands for greater democratic participation which have led to a change in the official and constitutional definition of democracy and in the understanding of democracy from the point of view of political scientists and journalists. As a consequence, not only associations such as trade unions but also social movements and NGOs are valued as actors in the democratic process. A distinction is made between four forms of advocacy and participation in decision-making:

a) Administrative: interaction between representatives of the state administration and interest groups in the drafting of legislation, the implementation of government policy, the awarding of public contracts and the monitoring of social problems;

b) Territorial: the prerogative of political parties;

c) Functional: carried out by associations of workers, employers, craftspeople, doctors, farmers, teachers, etc.;

d) Experts, citizens’ initiatives, lobbyists: These form a large new category of actors in the field of advocacy which is regarded as a part of civil society. In this whole realm between the private sphere and the state a multitude of organisations and associations promote interests which are not their own private interests but rather have to do with public affairs. Actions are intended to have an impact in public life. Fairness and abstention from violence are key aspects of the normative self-understanding of the many diverse, competing actors within civil society. They are characterised by the use of public argument, whereas the administrative and functional forms of advocacy are characterised mainly by negotiation (Klein 1997). Where negotiations are concerned, the actors have a certain amount of power: They can threaten to boycott negotiations or to leave the negotiating table and thus render the actions of the state less effective. Where the use of argument and persuasion is required, the actors have to accept the consequences of being bound by their own arguments, if their arguments are to carry weight (Saretzki 1995). Habermas distinguishes between influence and power. The actors within civil society can win public support for their arguments and bully the political system which consists of bureaucracy, parliament and government. But they have no direct power to determine the decisions which are made (Habermas 1992).

This observation, that civil society does not wield any power but can exert influence through public argument, implies a questionable value judgement. It is implied that - because their actions are backed by logical argument - organisations of civil society, in our case NGOs, are internally democratic and do not pursue the vested interests of a particular group - unlike trade unions, which promote the interests of particular groups and are judged to be hierarchical and bureaucratic. As we have already shown, neither of these assumptions is true. NGOs are not necessarily democratically organised and do indeed often pursue the special interests of particular groups. This supposed contrast between NGOs and trade unions is also unsatisfactory from a normative point of view. When NGOs engage in advocacy on behalf of rainforest or indigenous peoples, this is not in any way morally superior to the demands of trade unions for jobs for the millions of unemployed, the payment of sickness benefit, educational opportunities or training subsidies. The question is also raised as to whether the interests of particular groups do not actually have a relatively high normative value. The widespread rhetoric of public welfare can be used, on the other hand, to justify massive job losses on the basis of a policy of sustainable employment or to reject refugees as simply “economic” refugees. A normative preference for argument rather than negotiation logically leads to a policy of giving preference to NGOs over and above trade unions and other associations. People tend to forget that trade unions have NGO status on the international stage. And NGOs are often active where trade unions have been seriously weakened by government policy or the power of large companies.

NGOs can be regarded as a phenomenon which indicates that associations and political parties are in crisis. The function of associations and political parties as decision-making or representative bodies is in any case minimal as a result of low levels of participation in elections. And in the leading capitalist states they have fallen into disrepute (Hirsch 1999). Finally, NGOs can operate where the state apparatus is in crisis and the functions of the state are taken over by society. In this case, NGOs are not intermediary bodies, because there is no state or government to relate to. The judicial model of the relationship between the state and NGOs is problematic because it is constructed on the assumption that civil society is always focused on the national government as the centre of political decision-making (Demirovic 2000). In reality, the networking and coordination of NGOs at the international level cannot be overlooked. Given a neo-pluralist concept of civil society, this is interpreted as the mobilisation of international public opinion and as a contribution to the democratisation of global society. But this does not fit the concept of NGOs as advocates and intermediaries between private interests and the state. This contradiction can only be overcome by regarding international civil society simply as an extension of this form of advocacy into every nation state throughout the world (Habermas 1992). It is significant that many NGOs participate in international and transnational political processes, political processes which themselves become arenas of conflict, not least because of the participation of NGOs. NGOs have therefore played an innovative role in the development of a new form of political action.

There are at least three lines of argument which indicate that the model of civil society as a form of intermediary is too simple. Firstly, the implicit assumption that civil society is oriented towards the nation state as a stable focus for political activity is unrealistic. It implies that the opinions of a great many individuals, when they are expressed in public debate, are all directed towards the top of the socio-political pyramid. There are, however, debates on a horizontal level around particular subjects, organisations, policies or broader issues. And the processes of civil society do not only operate from the bottom upwards as if it were only a forum in which social movements represent group interests and organise protest. Civil society also provides a forum in which state actors can maintain the status quo or rather manage the way in which the status quo is allowed to change. There is a general disregard of the fact that civil society - taken as a whole - is a unity of opposites which includes two kinds of actors: those which exert the power of the state and those which are opposed to state hegemony and which advocate alternatives to the conventional capitalist model of the regulation and reproduction of society.

Secondly, no account is taken of the internal logic of civil society. It is reduced to a purely political phenomenon. The cultural - and in a formal sense private - aspects of civil society are disregarded. Music societies, art galleries, learned societies, churches, pubs, cafés, clubs, street names, publishers, intellectuals: These are all part of civil society. Civil society is the space in which social and political consensus is built. Political activities are of secondary importance in the midst of such a wide variety of cultural activities.

Thirdly, the state is neither a unitary entity nor the top of a pyramid. A centralist judicial model of political power which sees the state as a hierarchy does not fit the facts. And it clearly has no validity when one takes into account the transformation of the state which is taking place through denationalisation, privatisation, internationalisation of the state, and adaptation of the machinery of government for the purpose of global governance instead of government of the nation state (Jessop 1999; Hirsch 1999). The state is, as we shall see, a force field of strategic forces, in which NGOs are present as one kind of actor. NGOs not only extend the field to include additional interests. They also contribute to the transformation of the state. It is therefore not possible to separate state and society. NGOs turn the state into part of society in such a way that they internalise - or reproduce within themselves - the separation of civil society and the state. The problem with many theories of civil society is that - on the basis of certain normative assumptions - they advocate a formal separation of judicial state power from civil society, so that they become blind to the crisis of the state and the tendency of politics to become a socio-cultural phenomenon.

NGOs and the Globalisation of the state

According to the concept - developed by Poulantzas - of the capitalist state as a social structure, the bourgeois state does not stand over and above society. We have to change our concept of government by the state accordingly. In the first place the state influences structures, establishes the equality of all persons before the law as citizens and unites the people as a nation which it then represents. As the state transforms class conflict into a multitude of conflicts between particular social interests, it condenses these conflicts within its own apparatus. This process of condensation in turn constitutes the state. The conflicts amongst the ruling classes and between the ruling classes and subordinate classes take on a political form and are fought out within the state apparatus. All the parties to a conflict, whether it is between the employer and the employees within a firm or between a company and the local population, have an interest in pursuing the conflict within the state apparatus. The employers favour this, because they are otherwise too weak on their own. The workers prefer it, because any success that they might have in a conflict with their employer is immediately threatened by competition from other workers or by the strength of other companies somewhere else. The state becomes the terrain on which groups within society sort out their differences. So long as the separation of the state and the economy is reproduced in such conflicts, the ruling classes will always have the upper hand, because the state is the structure within which they coordinate and combine their common interests.

In order to extrapolate Poulantzas’ ideas to shed light on NGOs, we have to take his thought further in two directions. Firstly, we have to make clear from the start that the concept of the state as a material condensation of the relationship of power within society is not to be restricted to the nation state. In the seventies Poulantzas already argued, quite rightly, against the view that the internationalisation of capital would inevitably lead to a supranationalisation of the state. This view is still widespread today, though, because of globalisation. Poulantzas criticizes in particular the apparent assumption that there is an in-built contradiction between economic structures and processes (the internationalisation of production, the dynamic nature of

the capitalist system of production) and an out-dated overall framework (the nation state) (Poulantzas 1975, p. 71). Poulantzas’ key argument is based on the assertion that the capitalist system of production does not control society from outside but rather reproduces itself within the social structures of society. These social structures form the space in which processes that are not concurrent sort themselves out and lead to a particular constellation of social forces and class struggles (Poulantzas 1975, p. 45). This reproduction of the capitalist system of production in and through social structures has historically taken on the form of an imperialist hierarchy in which individual centres have imposed their rule using their own various means of oppression and exploitation. Poulantzas perceived the actual existence of this imperialist hierarchy or chain of command at the beginning of the seventies in two dividing lines: firstly, a line between the metropolitan centres and the oppressed societies, and secondly, a line between the metropolitan centres themselves. According to Poulantzas’ interpretation, the economic relationship between the USA and Europe is reproduced in the form of dependency within European societies. This leads to the emergence of a new form of capital, the inner bourgeoisie, which is distinguished from the national bourgeoisie by the fact that it represents the interests of multinational companies. But, unlike the comprador bourgeoisie, it does not simply act as the executive arm of company headquarters, but rather adapts itself to the local (i.e. national) situation as regards production and wealth creation and therefore comes into conflict with head office. Since the metropolitan states reproduce the interests of ruling capital, it is clear that they are dependent.

In spite of the linking up of systems of production, the state still primarily takes on the form of the nation state, according to Poulantzas, because the class conflicts of national society are condensed within it (Cox 1998). The conclusion - so far as democracy theory is concerned - is obvious. The subordinate classes and groups are really only able to influence political decision-making processes and to force compromises within the framework of the nation state. The institutions which make democratic control and voluntary assent to binding agreements possible and which have only been established as a result of hard-won compromises, exist only within the nation state (Hirsch 1999, Jessop 1999). When political decision-making shifts into a supranational arena, one of the conclusions which we can draw is that we should fight for a return of policy-making to the national arena.

Nevertheless, the view that the bourgeois state can only exist in the form of the nation state does not seem to hold water. Over the course of history the bourgeois state has at times taken on the form of a multinational or colonial empire. Strictly speaking, it was not until the period of decolonisation after the Second World War that nation states became the norm, i.e. at a time when state management of the economy, democracy and territory all followed the same boundaries and American power and influence, especially over European countries and Japan, encouraged the development of a centralised, autonomous welfare state. We should tackle this question systematically using Poulantzas’ concepts, because this enables us to observe the development of an internationalised state as a constellation of social forces, in which NGOs play a significant part. If we define the state as a strategic force field and the material condensation of the relation of social forces, this does not mean that this material condensation can only take on a national form, already pre-defined. If that were the case, then the state would not also be reproduced as a form of government. But the state would nevertheless have power as a form of government, because it had been predetermined structurally that social forces and power can only become condensed in this particular form. The reason for this seems to be Poulantzas’ supposition that the state is always characterised by being constituted by a nation. But it is Poulantzas’ own dynamic and relational concept of the state which suggests that the state should be regarded as a strategic force field, as an extensive network of reproductive mechanisms, through which social power flows. From this point of view, the national dimensions of the state are important, but only as strategic elements of the state which may increase or decrease in importance depending on the economic situation and the constellation of political forces. In other words, there are many indications that, whilst nation states are far from becoming insignificant, let alone redundant, they are being reconstituted. This is happening in parallel with global, transnational profit maximisation and accumulation of capital. Linked with this is the formation of a transnational sub-class of the bourgeoisie and transnational categories of labour (both highly qualified and unqualified, both legal and illegal migrants) (Hirsch 1999). Existing balances of power become unstable as a result.

Nation states not only reproduce dependent relationships within themselves; they also become a part of the internationalised state - along with individual institutions and political processes. The internationalised state does not take the form of an independent autonomous institution. It is a reproductive system which is supported both by parts of the nation state and by international organisations, such as the UN and its agencies, NATO, OECD, WTO, the World Bank, the IMF and the EU, etc. The apparatus of the nation state and individual parts of it are linked up at various levels with supra-state institutions to form a network. And together with these supra-state institutions the apparatus of the nation state reproduces itself as state at a higher level. The way in which relations of power are materially condensed now differs, of course, from that during the era of the Keynesian welfare state.

In the seventies Poulantzas was able to observe that a political crisis and the crisis of the welfare state caused political decision-making processes to be transferred out of parliament and government into the administrative apparatus. This then became the organisational focus and the seat of political power and was politicised in the process. This led to a permeation of the administrative apparatus by diverse interests. Various factions secured a position within the apparatus. And numerous competing networks spread out over it. The shift of political power into informal channels and arcane political processes within the administration causes the masses to be excluded from the democratic process. Poulantzas calls this process “authoritarian statism”. It is not an extraordinary kind of state - as in the case of fascism or military dictatorship, but can instead be characterised as the “new ‘democratic’ form of the bourgeois republic” in the phase of transition from fordism to post-fordism (Poulantzas 1975, p.191). Poulantzas nevertheless remains too closely bound in his thinking to the model of a closed political administration and does not take account of the web of administration that is spreading itself out across the globe. “The growing horizontal differentiation of international institutions and hence of the national ministries, sections and units concerned indicates that civil servants are involved right across the board in dealing with international problems. Contact with colleagues in other states and with international organisations in order to share information and opinions has become an accepted part of the daily routine.” (Wessels 2000, p. 427.) Associations and NGOs are also involved in this business of cooperative management through an international network operating at several levels. This management process is not simply restricted to large international conferences. It also includes a multitude of daily interactions and routines of an administrative nature. With their knowledge and the political pressure which they exert, associations and NGOs contribute to the “increasing complexity of inter-state problem solving processes” (Wessels 2000, pp. 371.) But this cannot be described as a process of corporatist negotiation, because the NGOs do not speak on behalf of members who can be mobilised. And it is similarly impossible to make unambiguous agreements which are generally applicable and binding on governments and state administrations as well as corporate actors. On the whole it is just a question of information exchange and consultation. But even this is sufficient to alter the relationship between state and society, because the international organisations and administrative bodies become politicised as a result of maintaining contacts with journalists, political parties, interest groups and representatives of NGOs. The mechanisms of governance - consultation, agreement, participation - develop along the lines of a loose geometric system which links local, regional, national and supranational decision-makers with each other and with social groups according to how much power they have and the matters with which they are concerned.

In this situation NGOs exert a democratising influence in two ways: Firstly, they ensure the transparency of political processes, constellations of power, stalling tactics, ignorance and incompetence; Secondly, they work to improve decision-making processes. NGOs contribute step by step to the transformation of the political landscape and to the development of international networks of state administrations. In my view, neither democracy nor our concepts of democracy should be limited to national, regional and local levels, because this fails to take sufficient account of new patterns of reproduction of state power within a network of reconstituted administrative bodies. Some enthusiastic supporters of globalisation believe that we will eventually find ourselves living as world citizens in a global democracy. But this is not going to happen. What is already happening is that the strategy of the powerful states, which is to shift political processes into the arcane world of international organisations, administrative bodies and networks, is causing NGOs to be forced into the role of social interest groups. Whilst submitting to this process, NGOs can sometimes exert a democratising influence without necessarily being democratically constituted themselves. It is the new pattern of hegemony itself which creates these new possibilities for action by NGOs (Cox 1998, p. 80).

Poulantzas’ analysis follows Althusser’s break-down to a large extent. Althusser concerns himself with the many aspects of social life which he sees organised within the various parts of an ideological state apparatus. These organs of the ideological state, each with their own particular methods of subjugation, facilitate the allocation of individuals to various social structures and thus determine what functions they perform. But there is a key problem with this form of government. In political theory, following Weber, it is somewhat one-sidedly referred to as the problem of legitimacy. This term is inadequate, because”legitimacy” is associated with justice and morality and consequently with rational justification of the state. In addition, according to Weber the state exists as a bureaucratic institution. Round about the time when Weber was writing Gramsci invented the concept of civil society in order to draw attention to a more fundamental phenomenon. Within civil society a consensus is built which forms the basis for justification of rule by the state. People put their faith in legal regulations and moral standards which match their everyday beliefs, ideas and activities. This consensus is a one-sided imposition because it is created by the ruling classes imposing their way of life and their way of organising work on a great many other social groups. They demonstrate their ability to organise the production process and to manage the life of society and thus win trust and recognition for their good leadership. This form of hegemony succeeds in creating a commonly held worldview, in which the social contradictions are understood and dealt with as differences in interests. The way people look at things is transformed: Instead of multifarious opposing forces there is a more or less harmonious world which is only interpreted in different ways. It is within civil society that this transformation of social contradictions into unity with diversity takes place. Civil society, according to Gramsci, is an extension of the state which provides the leadership of the state with a firm and lasting basis in cultural traditions and customs. These traditions and customs are a form of rationalisation and a way of overcoming day-to-day economic ups and downs and short term interests on the level of moral and political goals. The state is reproduced in civil society as a coercive apparatus. Gramsci also refers to this as “political society” (società politica). (Gramsci 1971)

In Gramsci’s view civil society is made up of parties or factions, each of which tries to develop a collective purpose. Parties in this broad sense are organisations which determine the broad direction of politics, train the people who are to realise the goals and develop the image of these people. They also train the mass of the population and reconcile a multitude of particular interests through internal discussion. In Gramsci’s view, parties are “schools of state life” (Gramsci 1971, p. 921). As organisations within civil society parties are part of the extended state, which permeates a multifaceted society from schools and education to street names, publishing and newspapers, reorganises society into parties, forms collectives and thus reproduces the state. Seen from this point of view, NGOs - like the social movements of earlier years - are a result of the reform of the development of interest groups and collectives. They not only represent particular interests; they also contribute to their formation; they train people in a new political role; and they create a new relationship between the state in the narrow sense (government, parliament, administration) and the population.

Hegemony and civil society cannot be adequately defined simply in the context of the nation state and relations between states. In the course of the development of capitalism since the middle of the 19th century several forms of world order, each of them actually a form of hegemony, can be identified (Cox 1998, pp. 80). And globalisation is not based on direct subjugation and exploitation by a powerful state. It is much more a question of spheres of influence as forms of hegemony which are based on common interests.

In recent years a process has taken place in which hegemony has been established and parties (in the broad sense) have been created. Characteristic of this process is the existence of powerful international institutions, committees and think tanks which - although they don’t think of themselves as belonging to civil society - seek to promote the development of a civil society in which NGOs are to have a privileged role. It is not just a question as to whether or not there are NGOs which are politically active in international institutions. It is of considerable political significance that the activities of NGOs have been encouraged, taken up and developed by representatives of parties, governments and international institutions. This is intended to promote a strategy of reorganisation, a new pattern of reproduction of the national state apparatus and its integration into the international state. NGOs are seen as catalysts and building blocks in this process and are used accordingly.

In the first place, people are being trained within NGOs for a new political role in civil society as globalised intellectuals (Habermas 1992). With their particular skills and abilities these people can contribute to the development of a consensus in which the astronaut’s view, i.e. the spaceship earth model, supersedes all other views (Demirovic 2000).

And secondly, NGOs contribute to the construction of the internationalised state by helping to build up the internationalised imperialist state network. They also go beyond simply acting as consultants by supplying international decision-making processes with proper permanent channels for the forming of opinions. This is happening primarily in the politically”soft” areas of development, environment and human rights and to a lesser extent in the fields of security and economics. This is a warning to us to be careful in our observations, but it does not disprove our argument, because in these “soft” areas, as in the case of intellectual property rights, strategically important decisions are often being made in relation to new ways of accumulating wealth (Habermas 1992). And the process of extension and reproduction of the international state is by no means complete. Both these factors, the recruitment of intellectuals by NGOs and the development of new processes for the forming of opinions, are an indication of the dynamic nature of the self-transformation of the state, a process which is promoted by initiatives of civil society and taken up by political society. So far as NGOs are concerned, this means that there is a growth of political hegemony even within their sphere of action. Whilst some NGOs become privileged actors which have the ear of companies, international institutions and governments, others can try to build up public opinion and help to build social movements. The development of a new kind of NGO has therefore given rise to a new conflict within civil society in relation to the question of hegemony.

Bibliography

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