Defence spending and economic growth in South Africa: A supply and demand model*

This paper provides a contribution to the growing corpus of knowledge and understanding of the interaction between economic growth and defence spending in South Africa by specifying a Keynesian simultaneous equation model and estimating the system for the period 1961 to 1997. The model contains a growth equation, a savings equation, a trade balance equation and a military burden equation and when estimated by single equation and systems estimation methods is relatively well specified. There is evidence of an overall negative effect of military spending on the economy over this period, though the significance of individual coefficients is low. There is certainly no evidence of any positive impact, suggesting that cuts in military spending do present an opportunity for improved macroeconomic performance.     

The Long-run Causal Relationship Between Military Expenditure and Economic Growth in China: Revisited

This paper re-examines the long-run causal relationship between military expenditure and economic growth in China over the period 1952–2010. An empirical econometric analysis based on a Barro-style growth model is conducted. By employing the Bartlett corrected trace test, which provides better approximations of the finite sample distribution to determine the rank of cointegration, the results support the existence of a single long-run equilibrium relationship between the variables. Furthermore, it is confirmed that the cumulated shocks of military expenditure primarily originate from different components of shocks that relate to economic development rather than the other way round.     

The Impact of Military Spending on Economic Growth: The Case of North Cyprus

The present study aims at investigating the causal relationship between defence expenditures and economic growth in the case of North Cyprus using the Autoregressive Distributed Lag (ARDL) bounds testing approach to cointegration and Granger causality tests for the period from 1977 to 2007. The results suggest that the variables in question are in a long-run equilibrium relationship and that there exists a strong, positive unidirectional causality running from defence expenditures to economic growth.     

MILITARY SPENDING AND ECONOMIC GROWTH IN SOUTH ASIA: COMMENT AND RECONSIDERATION

In a recent paper in this journal, Wijewerra and Webb study the connection between military spending and gross domestic product (GDP) in a group of five South Asian countries, finding a small but statistically significant positive relationship between military spending and GDP. This paper reviews their approach and proposes an alternative which tries to deal with the problems of omitted variables and variable construction. It finds, in contrast, that a higher share of military spending in GDP is associated with lower growth of GDP per capita.     

DOES DEFENCE SPENDING STIMULATE ECONOMIC GROWTH IN INDIA? A REVISIT

This study reinvestigates the effect of defence spending on economic growth using Zivot and Andrews and Lee and Strazicich, structural unit root tests and the autoregressive distributed lag bounds testing approach to cointegration in augmented version of Keynesian model for India. Study confirmed long run relationship among variables studied show that economic growth is positively affected by defence spending (also negative impact after a threshold point), investment and trade openness while negatively by interest rate. Granger causality analysis revealed bidirectional causal relationship between defence spending and economic growth as probed by variance decomposition approach.     

ON ETHNIC CONFLICT AND THE ORIGINS OF TRANSNATIONAL TERRORISM

Using the ITERATE dataset, we explore the origins of transnational terrorist activity, from 1982 through 1997, in 118 countries. We model terrorism, not as a function of a nation’s ethnic, religious or linguistic fractionalization, but as an independent measure of perceived ethnic tensions. When we control for institutional quality, evidence that political rights and civil liberties mitigate the terrorism‐producing effects of ethnic tensions exists only since 1990. Economic freedoms, on the other hand, robustly reduce the number of terrorist attacks originating in ethnically tense societies.     

A Note on the Effect of Terrorism on Economic Sentiment

This study documents that unforeseen events like terrorist attacks can be linked to the formation of Economic Sentiment after controlling for sentiment’s economic drivers. By utilizing dynamic panel techniques, the Economic Sentiment Indicator, as well as one of its constituents Consumer Sentiment, for a pan-European panel of 27 countries appear to be negatively influenced by terrorism activity. Moreover, these negative effects are significant only in the post-9/11 era.     

基于社会主义核心价值体系建设的文化哲学思考

每一种文化都有其独特的价值体系,文化的各个层面都受到价值体系的内在制约,价值体系在文化中处于核心地位.当前我们以社会主义核心价值体系引领思想文化建设,体现了我们党在全面推进中国特色社会主义伟大事业进程中高度的文化自觉.社会主义核心价值体系建设增强了民族认同,提升了文化软实力,凸显了文化传承与创新,促进了文化整合.     

From control to parasitism

This article sets out to investigate the current paradoxical roles of border control agencies in order to contribute to the theoretical debate on border porosity and related security issues in West Africa. The colonial demarcation of African borders accounts for their porous nature initially, as borderland populations challenged the unjust scission of their cultural, economic, geographical and geopolitical spaces. However, new forms of porosity also evolved over time, masterminded by new actors. Drawing on the Ghana–Togo border case, and through interviews, observation and documentary analysis, this article argues that border control agencies are partly responsible for the current border porosity and attendant security problems as their jurisdiction has shifted to a multi-layered border parasitism. The article is not, however, an attack on border law enforcement agencies; rather it attempts to explore their roles in shielding the region, already exposed to terrorism and piracy, from further security threats.     

Political Military Competition and Size and Composition of Government

This paper uses a formal model to analyze the effects of political military competition among states on the size and composition of state. Great economies of scale in warfare, even distribution of military capability among contestants and greater value of contested resources generate higher level of military capacity and growth of government. If there is decreasing return to scale in state revenue generating function and provision of public intermediate inputs, then there will be an increasing size of civilian public sector relative to that of military. The paper finally studies how waves of military revolutions affected international political military competition and the size and composition of government in history.