ABSTRACT

The title of this chapter may sound odd. After all, since the end of the Cold War some 20 years ago, many have talked about a “peace dividend,” whereby military spending would be diverted to more productive uses, such as investments in housing, education, and other social programs. Indeed, in the few years that followed the end of the Cold War, the United States and several other major NATO-member countries such as Great Britain, Germany, and France slashed their military budgets and saw the size of their economies expand massively. Globally, there were signs of progress as well. In 1990, 1.8 billion people, representing 41.7 percent of the world population, lived on less than PPP $1.25 a day; in 2005, the corresponding numbers were 1.4 billion and 25.2 percent. 1 Over the same period of time, the proportion of countries ranked as “free” or “partly free” by Freedom House has increased, with a resulting decline in the proportion of countries considered “not free” 2 the number of armed conflicts around the world has also declined dramatically.