615 CONFRONTI Nuclear Energy in the Twentieth Century: New International Approaches a cura di Elisabetta Bini e Igor Londero. Intervengono Leopoldo Nuti, Barbara Curli, Giovanni Battimelli e Giovanni Paoloni, Lawrence S. Wittner, Dick van Lente, Jayita Sarkar Nuclear energy represents one of the most controversial issues in contemporary his- tory and politics, and raises either vehe- ment opposition or unconditional support. On the one hand, the use of nuclear tech- nology in the bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki during the Second World War shaped postwar discussions about the use of nuclear power, while at the same time influencing the balance of power between the two superpowers and relations inside the Atlantic bloc and with Third World countries. On the other hand, the same technology that raised fears of a poten- tial nuclear conflict – and therefore of a Third World War and of a total annihila- tion of mankind – also became the object of widespread beliefs in the possibility of producing an unlimited, clean and effi- cient source of energy. This apparent con- tradiction between the hopes and fears of nuclear power was declined differently in different national contexts, but character- ized most countries in the post-World War II period. For many, including Italy, the «nuclear euforia» of the 1950s and 1960s was strongly linked to the lack of energy resources. For others, such as Third World countries, access to nuclear power became a way of overcoming the technological gap with the developed world, and establish- ing their place in the international arena. In all cases, debates about nuclear policies intersected in complex ways with wider discussions about modernization and in- ternational relations 1 . Over the last twenty years, scholars have devoted an increased attention to the study Elisabetta Bini e Igor Londero Nuclear Energy in History 1 B. Heuser, Nuclear Mentalities? Strategies and Beliefs in Britain, France and the FRG, New York, Palgrave Macmillan, 1998; S.R. Weart, The Rise of Nuclear Fear, Cambridge, Harvard University Press, 2012. Contemporanea / a. XVIII, n. 4, ottobre-dicembre 2015