ABSTRACT
Over the last two decades the international community has devoted considerable energy to controlling the supply of small arms and light weapons (SALW) — from the point of manufacture to export and import, and ultimately into the hands of the end-user(s). During the same period a growing body of research has been produced to understand and measure the demand for, and effects of, SALW proliferation, availability, and misuse. It is in fact this preoccupation with the human costs of SALW — the daily tragedy of deaths, injuries, and insecurity — that animates much international action on arms control and disarmament inside the United Nations (UN) and outside of it. This chapter considers the evolution of this effects research from the late 1990s to the present and its interactions with global policy processes.
