Public Opinion and Nuclear Use: Evidence from Factorial Experiments

Abstract

Does the public oppose nuclear use? Survey experimental research varying either the advantages or the disadvantages of nuclear use has produced a wide range of results. Yet no study has examined how the military advantages and strategic and moral disadvantages of nuclear weapons interact. We explore this interaction and uncover a pattern that unifies the literature’s seemingly disparate results: the persuasive power of nuclear weapons’ military advantages is conditional on their disadvantages. We demonstrate this by independently randomizing both the advantages and disadvantages of nuclear use in (1) a 2×2 factorial version of an influential design and (2) a novel adaptation of conjoint experiments that focuses on the most plausible comparisons between nuclear and conventional strikes. Our results support a new explanation for why the public can appear rigidly opposed to nuclear strikes in some circumstances and highly permissive in others.