The field of Chernobyl studies may appear to have been saturated some years ago, but this new book by Olga Kuchinskaya, Assistant Professor at the University of Pittsburgh Department of Communication, provides an important addition to the literature on the consequences of the 1986 accident. Using archival and ethnographic sources, newspapers, interviews, and secondary literature in various languages, she provides new insights into why the impact of Chernobyl in Belarus has been downplayed.

Divided into six concise chapters, the author seeks to analyze how we have derived our knowledge of the medical effects of Chernobyl and the social mechanisms that ostensibly ensure that such knowledge is accurate and sufficient. She perceives the “invisibility” as affected by power relations, and whether those investigating the radiation consequences are intent on revealing or obfuscating them. She asks what information was available to the victims, and to what resources they had access.

The author notes that the early days after Chernobyl were fraught with problems for Belarus, which lacked laws to protect the population from radiation fallout, as well as relevant scientific institutions, which were based mostly in Moscow or in Ukraine. The “Soviet safe living concept,” devised by Leonid Ilin, Vice-President of the Academy of Medical Sciences of the USSR, limited itself to a maximum dosage of radiation exposure of 35 rems over a lifetime, meaning that once the initial 30-km zone of radiation had been evacuated, no further measures were applied to the populations of Belarus, Russia, and Ukraine.

Although Belarusian scientists eventually devised their own more cautious concept based on soil contamination in 1990, the government soon superseded it with a new version that “protected” only populations receiving an annual effective radiation dose of over 1 Milli-Sievert per annum, thereby excluding the population of over 70% of the contaminated area of Belarus. Economic concerns further exacerbated the problem, as in 1992 almost one-fifth of the Belarusian budget was devoted to Chernobyl concerns.

In Chapter 5, entitled “No Clear Evidence,” the author critiques the role of the UN agencies dealing with Chernobyl: the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), the World Health Organization (WHO), and the UN Development Program (UNDP). In 2005, the UN agencies concluded in a report that fewer than 50 deaths were directly attributable to the disaster and conceded only that thyroid gland cancer was an observable consequence. She contrasts IAEA findings with local studies linked to chronic exposure to low-level radiation, including leukemia among clean-up workers and the general population, as well as many other illnesses in affected areas, findings completely absent from the UN reports.

Kuchinskaya includes comment from the late Evgeni Konoplya, one of the founders of the Belarusian Institute of Radiobiology, that scientists who study Chernobyl consequences in Belarus and Ukraine have a far better understanding of the effects “even than western scientists” do (133). She cites the American scientist John Gofman who noted that those participating in radiation protection committees are often appointed by heads of state nuclear programs or governments. Obviously, the role of the IAEA is to promote nuclear power.

The author points out that after Alexander Lukashenko came to power in 1994, all areas of Chernobyl research were subordinated to the State Committee on Chernobyl, and the majority of research institutes relocated to the south-eastern city of Gomel', close to the affected area, but peripheral to central authority. Moreover, the government has opted to re-cultivate contaminated farmlands and has a vested interest in minimizing the health consequences of Chernobyl with a decision to build a Belarusian power plant in 2011.

Moreover, the leading investigators in Belarus among the scientific community have now passed away and the government has forced the closure of a number of NGOs working on Chernobyl effects, including the “Children of Chernobyl,” which organized regular conferences (though not annual as the author states, 162) and published the delivered papers.

The book emphasizes how radiation risks in Belarus became less visible to the public and concludes (164) that it is essential to focus on the “social mechanisms of knowledge production” and their relationship to power relations. Simply put, the victim is the local population, which lacks access to knowledge and accurate information.

The Politics of Invisibility is timely and much needed. It is well written and carefully argued, and an important antidote to the official reports of UN agencies, particularly those of the IAEA, whose attitudes have often been condescending and ritualistic but who have maintained a near monopoly over western media reporting on Chernobyl’s impact on the health of the affected populations.