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

I also use the level of child nutrition derived from national samples and anthropometry surveys within LDCs circa 1975 and 1990 (UNDP 1994). Child nutrition is the percentage of children under five who are of healthy weight. This is the opposite of child undernutrition typically considered the percentage of children whose weight for age is less than minus two standard deviations from the median of a reference population in a given country (World Bank 1997). This measure is important because, like food adequacy, it moves food security beyond simple measures of availability as it calls attention to problems of distribution and nutritional deficiencies that may result. Child nutrition measures not only capture food security threats on the most vulnerable segment of the population, children, but it also indicates larger problems regarding food access among other vulnerable groups (Kelly 1992).

MILITARIZATION VARIABLES

Militarization is the process of increasing the power and economic resources of the military, with the critical question being whether militarizing states improve their food security. I measure social militarization as the first difference change in Andreski's (1968) military participation ratio (MPR), or the number of armed forces personnel divided by size of the population between 16 and 65 (U.S. Arms Control and Disarmament Agency 1975, 1985, 1994 and the World Bank 1994). Because larger militaries are likely to recruit from a broader cross-section of the population and to have greater social integration in terms of the location of bases and operations, I hypothesize that this growth creates social cohesion and improves food security and development (see Andreski 1968; Bullock & Firebaugh 1990).

Next, I use two measures to account for economic militarization. First, I use the change in military expenditures in constant U.S. dollars normed over real gross national product (ACDA 1975, 1985, 1994; Summers & Heston 1991). This measure is similar to Benoit's (1973) measure of "military burden" on the economy as a whole and will be useful in determining whether military spending could potentially crowd out social spending. Second, I use the increase in arms imports between 1970 and 1985 based on value of weapons received in constant U.S. dollars normed over real GNP (Brzoska & Ohlson 1987). This measure will be a useful extension of tests for the military burden argument, determining whether arms imports come at the expense of human well-being (Brzoska & Ohlson 1987; Brzoska & Pearson 1994; Pearson 1994) among other important factors (Pearson 1989). Thus, I hypothesize that the economic militarization will contribute to food security decline.

Finally, I examine military dependency to capture political militarization2. I use Boswell and Dixon's (1990) formula and arms import data from Brzoska and Ohlson (1987) to construct this measure. Military dependency is the ratio of arms imports from the largest supplier divided by total imports and weighted by total arms imports over total military spending (Boswell & Dixon 1990). Unlike Boswell and Dixon, who construct this as western military dependency, I use it as ties to any power. This measure is not just important for its links to international politics and security. Because it taps into the extent to which a country's militarization is tied up with international actors, it serves as an important check to external factors that may help or hinder food security. For example, state-centered and modernization theorists claim that security ties are beneficial not only for improving international security but also with providing access to economic and food assistance (Cathie 1989).