Challenges facing the nuclear non-proliferation treaty

Abstract

The nuclear non-proliferation regime, centred around the 1968 treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons, presents us with a paradox. It is arguably the world’s most successful and important global security regime, and its most vulnerable. This chapter provides some important historical and analytical background to the regime, and outlines its major benefits and achievements. It then considers areas - such as vertical proliferation, and new nuclear states - where it has been unsuccessful, and considers the profound contemporary and future stresses it is under. There is considerable internal division about its purpose and the pace of disarmament, challenges of nuclear security and energy safety that escape its boundaries, and concerns that it is ill-equipped either for a future of deep disarmament or proliferation breakout. Against this background, the chapter maps out emerging reform proposals and considers those most compelling and promising.