Military expenditure,economic growth and structural instability: a case study of South Africa

This paper contributes to the growing literature on the milex-growth nexus, by providing a case study of South Africa and considering the possibility of structural breaks by applying newly developed econometric methods. Using full sample bootstrap Granger non-causality tests, no Granger causal link is found between military expenditure and GDP for 1951–2010, but parameter instability tests show the estimated VARs to be unstable. Using a bootstrap rolling window estimation procedure, however, finds evidence of bidirectional Granger causality in various subsamples. This implies standard Granger non-causality tests, which neither account for structural breaks nor time variation may be invalid.     

Stopping Suicide Attacks: Optimal Strategies and Unintended Consequences

We study the behavior of defense spending in Switzerland over 1975–2001. Our main interest is in determining how neutrality in international affairs (non‐membership in military alliances) affects defense spending. We find that neutrality is associated with a perception of lower levels of external threat; hence it confers economic benefits in the form of a smaller defense burden. However, neutrality does not fully insulate a country from variations in the level of external threat in the global system as perceived by members of military alliances. Swiss defense spending has tracked very closely the spending trends – but at a lower average level – of the United States and other NATO countries. To the extent that post‐Cold War threats, such as international terrorism, materialize primarily in the context of existing security alliances, Swiss military spending patterns observed in 1975–2001 are likely to remain the same in the future.     

Causal Linkages Between Domestic Terrorism and Economic Growth

We use the Hsiao–Granger method to test for terrorism–growth causality for seven Western European countries. In bivariate settings, the impact of economic performance on domestic terrorism is very strong. In trivariate settings, the impact of performance on terrorism diminishes. In general, we find that economic performance leads terrorist violence in robust ways only for three out of seven countries. Terrorism is almost never found to causally influence growth in bivariate and trivariate specifications. Our findings indicate that the role of economic performance in determining terrorist violence appears to have been important for some countries, whereas all attacked economies have been successful in adjusting to the threat of terrorism.     

THE HARD CASES

Many countries received Soviet-origin highly enriched uranium (HEU) for civilian nuclear research purposes. Because of inadequate nuclear security at a number of the research sites, U.S. policy has sought to remove or otherwise safely dispose of their HEU stocks as quickly as possible. Although the pace of HEU disposition has accelerated significantly in recent years, several sites have posed formidable technical, economic, and political challenges. This article identifies the major obstacles to HEU removal at two key installations—Kharkiv in Ukraine, and Sosny in Belarus—and recommends a strategy for overcoming these impediments. Key components for a successful disposition strategy include: treating these cases with the urgency they deserve, expanding potential compensation packages, explicitly addressing the institutional and political issues involved, engaging high-level political leaders, working with third parties, and promoting these efforts as part of a nondiscriminatory initiative to phase out HEU in the civilian nuclear sector globally.     

UNDER THE RADAR?

Missile Contagion: Cruise Missile Proliferation and the Threat to International Security, by Dennis M. Gormley. Praeger Security International, 2008. 272 pages, $54.95.     

Japan's plutonium policy: Consequences for nonproliferation

ABSTRACT

What do we mean by nuclear proliferation? What does it mean to proliferate? This article investigates both the literal and figurative meaning of the term “proliferation.” It argues that many of the definitions and conceptualizations of nuclear proliferation often used by scholars are either limited in their utility or logically inconsistent. It then reconceptualizes and redefines the term, incorporating an understanding of both its etymological origins and the geopolitical context in which the phenomenon occurs. It concludes by exploring the potential impact that the politicization of the phenomenon may have on the identification of occurrences of proliferation, from both an academic and a policy-making perspective.     

Book review

Steven L. Burg and Paul S. Shoup, The War in Bosnia‐Herzegovina: Ethnic Conflict and International Intervention.New York: M.E. Sharpe, 1999. Pp.xviii + 499, maps, tables, notes, biobliog., index. NP. ISBN 1–56324–308–3.     

Inequality‐based reliability estimates for complex systems

Full‐system testing for large‐scale systems is often infeasible or very costly. Thus, when estimating system reliability, it is desirable to use a method that uses subsystem tests, which are often less expensive and more feasible. This article presents a method for bounding full‐system reliabilities based on subsystem tests and, if available, full‐system tests. The method does not require that subsystems be independent. It accounts for dependencies through the use of certain probability inequalities. The inequalities provide the basis for valid reliability calculations while not requiring independent subsystems or full‐system tests. The inequalities allow for test information on pairwise subsystem failure modes to be incorporated, thereby improving the bound on system reliability. We illustrate some of the properties of the estimates via an example application. © 2013 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. Naval Research Logistics, 2013