Critically examine the relationship between war and underdevelopment

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              Critically examine the relationship between war and underdevelopment.

Abstract

Wars throughout the world today inflict enormous human, social and economic costs on both combatants and non-combatants alike, and weaken the processes of development in afflicted regions. Yet in spite of extensive acknowledgment of these straightforward facts, surprisingly little economic analysis has examined the various economic impacts of war and what could be done to alleviate these effects. This essay seeks to work towards counterbalancing this gap in the economic literature. To do this the essay provides an outline of the routes wherein war inflicts human, development and economic costs, before presenting a typology of wars together with a review of the literature indicating the relationship between war and underdevelopment.


Introduction

War – and particularly civil war – is generally understood to be one of the primary causes of economic underdevelopment and human suffering (Keen, 2006). Yet despite this general understanding, economic analyses of developing countries at war remain comparatively rare. This paper begins to look at this under-examined area.

Throughout every year of the four decades of the Cold War – while the global forces of communism and capitalism brought the superpowers towards nuclear stalemate – nations throughout the ‘Third World’ were involved in armed conflict of some kind. Between the 1950s and the 1990s, some fifteen million deaths were brought about by wars in developing countries. Such wars included global conflicts, government violence against citizens and civil war.  (Hughes & Pupavac, 2005)

With the end of the Cold War, regions throughout the world formerly afflicted with conflict linked to the East-West alignment turned dramatically towards peace. Yet while conflicts linked to the Cold War rivalry lessened from the 1980s onwards, new wars emerged, different from the anti-colonial resistance and national emancipation movements that had marked the conflicts seen in developing countries during the Cold War. (Allen, 2000).

These wars were situated almost entirely in developing countries. From 1989 to 1995, there were between 31 and 54 globally documented struggles occurring each year, and an average of 15 major wars happening at any one time. (Roberts & Hite, 2007)

Of these conflicts, a number were older ideological struggles that continued in a unique manner, like the one in Afghanistan; others were long–lasting separatist struggles, such as those in Sri Lanka and Eritrea. Meanwhile, the Central American conflicts came to an end in a troubled deadlock; though some continuation was seen in Mexico. Territorial and ethnic conflicts exploded in Eastern Europe, predominantly in the former Yugoslavia and the marginal Russian territories. Lastly, a disturbing number of African countries (such as Sierra Leone, Somalia, the Congo and Rwanda) turned out to be involved in armed disagreement, contributing to the long-running civil wars in Angola and Ethiopia, while diminishing any confidence emerging from the settlements in Mozambique, Uganda and South Africa. (Duffield, 2002)

        That war is expensive in terms of human lives and economic and social development is, to some extent, a truism; a fact of which people are reminded every day by the radio, the television and the press. War is widely condemned at the highest levels, with international gatherings frequently emphasising the responsibility of those involved in conflicts (and others throughout the world) to protect non–combatants. (Duffield, 2005)

Yet despite this understanding, the exact machinery through which war devastates the lives and economic and social development of combatants and non-combatants, and whether or not such effects could be counterbalanced or stopped, is not accurately understood. (Keen, 2006).

The relationship between war and underdevelopment

There exist a variety of published works by historians on the economic costs and benefits (such as technological and organizational development) of military action in industrial nations.  Yet modern development economists have not provided similar documentation of the economic impact of wars in developing nations. For example, war and its end results were not discussed by the UNDP in the first Human Development Report of 1990 as a reason for an absence of human development. (Duffield, 2005)

This is in spite of the fact that the disturbances caused by war were a primary characteristic of at least half the most damaging factors hindering human development. Seven years later, the 1997 Human Development Report offered a dedicated evaluation of the causes of poverty, yet it again failed to present any in–depth deliberation on countries at war. Similarly, the World Bank’s ‘Poverty Reduction Strategy’ offers little that directly addresses the particular needs of countries at war. (Roberts & Hite, 2007)

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Against this it is emblematic that eight of the ten countries with the lowest Human Development Index – Eritrea, Niger, Rwanda, Mozambique, Sierra Leone, Ethiopia, Mali and Guinea – have endured severe civil wars in recent years. Fully half of the fifty countries categorised by the UN as ‘least developed’ have endured major armed conflicts in the last two decades. Eight out of the ten nations with the highest infant death rates and the lowest per capita incomes have recently endured conflict of some kind. (Stewart & Fitzgerald, 2005)

In essence, very little research has investigated how different economic policies ...

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