Rethinking dual-use in quantum technology

Abstract

Quantum technologies serve civilian and military purposes at once, a fact usually captured by the contested term “dual-use”. Introducing a topical collection on dual-use quantum technologies, this editorial provides a proposed guidance on the term’s applicability in view of an emerging quantum economy. Quantum technology was dual-use from its origins, in foundational experiments funded and in some cases performed by defence and intelligence agencies; but that history is largely Anglo-American, which is part of why the connection between quantum research and defence is accepted so differently, and so much more recently, in continental Europe. As a concept, “dual-use” describes a status rather than settling any moral question, a point that three of the collected papers reach independently using different lenses. The collection’s ten contributions are a reflection of a wide and diverse sector; they span technology development, strategy, governance, and the ethics of dual-use research.