Guns, butter, and development: Security and military famine extensions of the modernization versus dependency debate

Journal of Political and Military Sociology, Winter 2001 by Scanlan, Stephen J

It is likely that if any positive effects on human development occur they will be reaped primarily by the military and other elites. An inequitable distribution of social goods is present, by which the military in its privileged position of power and status is able to control access to items such as food. Research from this angle emphasizes there is more to development than just increases in growth rates or assumptions that a trickle-down effect will benefit the entire population and more equitably distribute social resources.

With regard to food security, dependency perspectives claim that exploitation in the global economy creates inequality between nations and therefore hunger. Some (Friedmann 1994; McMichael 1997, 2000) argue that an international food order creates an unequal exchange relationship between the LDCs and developed countries, a relationship in which the former are dependent on food imports from the latter in exchange for the provision of cheap labor and the exports of cash crops. In this regard, formerly self-sufficient economies lose their subsistence way of life to the market-oriented characteristic of the global capitalist order. The international political economy of food, particularly the increase in international agri-business conglomerates, is thus no different than other global markets such as manufactured goods or technology because a situation of dependent development results that leaves LDCs in a weak competitive position (Barkin, Blatt, & DeWalt 1990).

Human Security, Military Famines, and Hunger. Discussion about modernization and dependency theories can essentially be reduced to debates about food security. However, it is essential to consider new questions that extend modernization and dependency theories. Questions pertaining to the changing nature of security and military famines in LDCs should become more central so as to capture the changing dynamics of development in the waning years of the Cold War and establish a clearer framework for examining these questions in present and future contexts.

During the Cold War, "international security" concerned military readiness and the ability to engage an enemy. Measures such as arms transfers and military dependency that I discuss below are important factors related to this dynamic. In the post Cold War era, however, the nature of security has been transformed into the broader notion of "human security" that concerns economic development and meeting the basic needs of the global citizenry. The UNDP (1994:22) claims that "the concept of security has for too long been interpreted narrowly: as security of territory from external aggression, or as protection of national interests in foreign policy or as global security from the threat of nuclear holocaust. It has been related more to nation-states than to people."

Today the largest threats to security are at the sub-national level and the quality of life that individuals have. As the UNDP further notes (1994:22), for most people "security symbolized protection from the threat of disease, hunger, unemployment, crime, social conflict, political repression and environmental hazards . . . A feeling of insecurity arises more from worries about daily life than from the dread of a cataclysmic world event." Human security has become the key to the development considerations, forming the core of human rights ideals and the commitment of LDCs to improving the lives of their citizens (UNDP 2000). Although the time period of interest examined in this analysis is during the waning years of the Cold War when security as traditionally considered was en vogue, human security concerns were not absent but overshadowed by and yet linked to the Cold