Former CISAC Fellows Awarded the Doreen and Jim McElvany Nonproliferation Grand Prize

At the Center for International Security and Cooperation (CISAC), two former fellows, Sidra Hamidi (‘18 - ‘19) and Chantel Murphy (‘18 - ‘19), gained recognition for their co-authored article “A tale of two fuel cycles: defining enrichment and reprocessing in the nonproliferation regime,” winning the Doreen and Jim McElvany Nonproliferation Grand Prize.

The award, administered by the Nonproliferation Review Journal and the James Martin Center for Nonproliferation Studies (CNS), acknowledges exceptional scholarly research, innovative ideas, and policy proposals published in the Nonproliferation Review. The center and journal aim to spur new thinking about nonproliferation and disarmament.

With the collaboration beginning at CISAC, the article explores the George W. Bush administration’s policies toward the nuclear programs of Iran and South Korea. In examining the Bush administration’s policies toward two states with advanced nuclear fuel cycles, Hamidi and Murphy’s article also explores the various US and international definitions of uranium enrichment and spent-fuel reprocessing. Its analysis draws on the concept of “technopolitics,” the study of the mutually reinforcing processes by which political priorities shape technological systems while technology also limits and creates new kinds of politics.

Find the full announcement here.