PHA-Exchange> Military spending and development

[Claudio]

>From Richard Jolly, ids, uk. (Insights 50)

The increase in military spending has been squeezing the resources available for development. Globally, total military spending has returned to Cold War levels nd underlis gross misallocation of resources....with under-spending on the broader challenges of human security and huaman development.

Since 1998, global military spending has increaed by 6% in real terms to almost 800 bill USD in 2002 (1 trill USD in 2003). 

The dominance of the military in political decision-making is on the rise both in the North and in the South.

The US spent around 6% of its GDP on the military in 2003.
Since September 11, 2001,  the US Congress has  allocated some 50 bill USD  from the national budget for military operations in Afganistan and 100 bill USD for operations in Iraq.  (All of Sub-Saharan Africa countries together have an annual GDP of  around 310 bill USD!!).

In poorer countries, increases in military spennding as a % of GDP are associated with slowdowns in economic growth.
The 1999  South Africa military purchases (7 bill USD) could have purchased  combination therapy for all 5 mill AIDS sufferers for 2 yrs; the 2004 India purchase of an aircraft carrier from Russia (1.5 bill USD) could have provided  basic survival income for one year  for over 1 mill families.

Human security should shift attention to the security of communities and individuals, away from the security of territory or nations --thus broadening the concept of security to 'social security'.  For this, we have to define a core of threats to human security in order to make priorities operational and balance expenditures to a sane level.

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