Organizational Culture and Professional Identities in the Soviet Nuclear Power Industry

This essay describes the evolution and interaction of powerful constituencies within the Soviet nuclear energy community since the late 1950s. It elucidates the historical origins of the alleged distinction between nuclear specialists (atomshchiki) and power engineers (energetiki) and explores why there was not more disagreement with and resistance to state authorities. The emerging civilian nuclear industry faced the dual legacy of the atomic bomb project and the state electrification program, a legacy that informed attempts to regulate a complex, dual-use technology, as well as the values and routines of specialists involved with the design and operation of nuclear power reactors. The essay argues that rather than cynicism, a deep commitment to scientific rationality and an often personal conviction of the necessity of nuclear energy permeated this heterogeneous community of experts. The secrecy imposed on their work only reinforced these experts' loyalty to a state that embodied their own technocratic visions.