Utilization of nuclear power - a sustainable error of history?

The history of atomic energy has been producing major surprises for at least half a century. A wave of atomic enthusiasm - which grew to a veritable atomic euphoria - was triggered by the famous atoms-for-peace speech by US president Eisenhower in 1953. Despite their inherent technocratic pacifism, Eisenhower's atoms led to critical conflicts within those societies that subscribed to the nuclear development scheme. A critical revision of these conflicts reveals a dramatic falling apart of the historic horizon of expectations and the historic development path. Notwithstanding, both the apologists of nuclear energy use and their antagonists have erred in many ways without truly losing their capacity to act. They misjudged the planning security, the safety of the installations, and the stability of the price relations on the energy and capital equipment markets. Moreover, both sides erred in their predictions concerning the political conditions and the social consequences of nuclear power plants. This observation is not historically insightful in the sense of learning from one's mistakes. It is insightful rather for the relationship between experience, expectation and decision on the one hand and socio-technical change on the other hand. (orig.)