[en] In prospecting the role of nuclear energy in a future society, it is necessary to foresee the social attitudes towards energy, economy and environment, and to analyze their interactions with the exploitation of nuclear energy itself. As those issues, this article looks upon the change of the socio-economic environment, the concerns about nuclear power and eco-environment, and the sustainability and limits of the energy resources, etc. With this perception, the so-called SWOT analysis is employed to identify the internal strengths (S) and/or weaknesses (W) of nuclear energy compared with other energy competitors on the basis of the evaluation of the external factors which are likely to play the roles of opportunities (O) for and/or threats (T) against the technological change in nuclear energy. (authors)