“Guns vs Butter” or “Guns Yield Butter”: Government Ideology and Military Spending

Military spending is a very significant and highly scrutinized aspect of government policy, because it epitomizes the complex interaction of issues regarding national defense, economic interests, and political ideology. Decisions to allocate resources in favor of defense over competing needs in other sectors such as social welfare, education, or infrastructure are not made based on perceived threats but are so significantly conditioned by the ideology of the ruling party. This article provides a summarized analysis of the impact of government ideology on military spending by referring to various academic research with a great variety of empirical data.

Ideological Influence on Military Spending

A government’s ideology does certainly matter to what extent resource allocation is affected by military spending, but the size or shape of this influence does largely depend on the general and wider economic and geopolitical environment.

Left-Wing Governments: Social Welfare Over Defense

Governmental policies of left leaning persuasion necessarily emphasize social security, job security and even economic equality, rather than military expenditure. Such disposition is most always indicative of, or inclined towards, “butter” as opposed to “guns,” a perspective taken up by Whitten and Williams (2010) in their study. The researchers pointed to the fact that parties of the left will view military expenditures more from their potential benefits, for example, in terms of employment generation. For such governments, military expenditure may work as a kick-starter for the economy if it ever fell into depression. But left-wing governments are bound to highlight social welfare spending, a consideration which leads to the decline in military spending. This becomes all the more important in election years. This fact has been pointed out by the study of Bove, Efthyvoulou, and Navas (2012) when accounting for the political cycles impact on public spending. Thus, leftist governments “tend to cut military spending and increase social spending in election years, hostage to their ideological orientation to increase social spending”.

Right-Wing Governments: Security and Defense as Priorities

In contrast, right-wing governments have a greater focus on national security, and thus they more frequently increase military spending. Most often, this motive emanates from the belief that a strong defense is necessitated in the name of national sovereignty and for projecting power into the world. Right-wing governments also show a softer ear toward the goals of the military-industrial complex through policy supporting heavy defense budgets.

In the work of Kauder and Potrafke (2011), military spending in Germany between 1951 and 2011 is considered to explain the tendency that right-wing governments have with respect to defense budgets. Their estimations found that rightist-oriented government regimes in Germany, motivated by the threats of the Cold War, extensively heightened military spending in the early 1960s. This ideological effect did wane over the years due to a political consensus across different parties, particularly in response to shared security challenges emanating from sources of threats worldwide.

Domestic Political Institutions and Their Impact on Military Spending

The configuration of political institutions, more specifically whether the institutions are democratic or authoritarian, powerfully and path-dependently shapes choices about military spending.

Accountability and Scrutiny

In democracies, government accountability to the people is rather high, and military spending receives far more detailed scrutiny. Public opinion, election cycles, and the general political environment go a long way in determining defense spending. Albalate, Bel, and Elias (2010) remark that in democracies, decisions concerning military spending must pass through complex negotiations with a host of players, which may include the government, opposition, civil society, and the military organization itself.

In many ways, the influence exerted by electoral cycles on military spending is particularly influential. Bove, Efthyvoulou, and Navas (2012) observe that in democratic settings, left-oriented governments often cut military spending to accommodate social programs within election years. This change in shift reflects the tendency of voters toward short-term social gains rather than long-term defense budgets, at least when strong hostile threats are not present.

Military Spending as a Tool of Power Consolidation

In different types of authoritarianism, military spending is a requirement for security and acts to shore up those in power from their citizens. The military has a dual role in these regimes: it protects the state from external aggression while, at the same time, securing the longevity of the regime through control over the people.

It is safe, then, to say that authoritarian governments engage in very high levels of military spending: a fact that such military spending is crucial for the sustenance of their rule. A study by Bove and Brauner (2023) furthered on the ground of both national security and stability of the regime itself. This dynamic results in perpetually elevated military expenditures, irrespective of prevailing economic circumstances, since the regime’s existence is perceived to hinge upon the military’s fortitude and allegiance.

Economic Conditions and Their Asymmetric Impact on Military Spending

The economic context heavily shapes military spending, combining with government ideology to produce variable outcomes.

The Asymmetry Between Economic Growth and Decline

The economic conditions plays into affect asymmetrically in the determination of military spending. Zielinski, Fordham, and Schilde (2014) studied the process by which growth and decline have influenced military budgets. According to them, tendencies during economic depressions are such that vast cuts take place in military spending since countries focus on more social welfare and economic recovery rather than defense. The latter is more apparent in the case of democratic regimes, where demands from society to resolve urgent economic problems could result in significant reductions in military spending.

In contrast, however, military spending increases are significantly less ambitious when an economy expands. This is especially true for left-leaning governments that may wish to place additional resources toward social programs rather than the military. The underlying idea here is that the benefits of economic growth should be socially distributed and not concentrated within the defense economy.

Case Studies: Greece and Turkey

Manamperi (2011) provides a series of case studies in which the influence of economic conditions on military spending is given. For instance, military expenditure in Greece, subject to a periodically bad economic environment, has also experienced decreases during those periods. The reasons are related to the required austerity in reducing public debt and in response to the demands of the fiscal stipulations from the European Union.

In contrast, Turkey has maintained an exceptionally high percentage of military spending, despite the current economic challenges. This persistence is due to the favorable geopolitical position that Turkey enjoys, as well as the influence of the military in Turkish politics. Within these economic downtrends, no Turkish government has been found willing to reduce the defense budget, which represents the military’s fundamental role in national defense and its overwhelming influence in governmental decisions. It’s also can be because of the influence of military spending on economic growth and private sector boosting, indicating the complex relationship between military spending, economic growth and the welfare.

The Geopolitical Environment and Its Influence on Military Spending

While such factors as domestic political dynamics and economic conditions are important determinants of military spending, the wider geopolitical environment plays no less a part.

International Threats and Defense Spending

The link between the global threats and spending on military expenditure is more or less indirect. According to Zielinski, Fordham & Schilde (2014), as much as the threats in the globe would be expected to impact military spending, the outcomes are generally long-term and differ in various countries and respective conditions. In mature democracies, therefore, a perceived increase in the level of international threat could lead to gradual development of the defense capabilities rather than a sudden surge in military expenditure.

The German circumstances provide an example and are examined in Kauder and Potrafke (2011): The perceived threat from the Soviet Union created broad and overarching political consensus in Germany during the Cold War period; thus, military spending was constant and high irrespective of which government was in office. Since the Cold War, as the likelihood of immediate security threats dissipated, military spending has increasingly become the subject of national political debate in which left governments favored cuts and the diversion of resources toward social programs.

Alliances and Global Power Dynamics

The alliance and global power play, also, influence military expenditure decisions to no small extent. Countries that form part of international coalitions such as NATO often experience external pressure to maintain certain levels of defense spending. What comes in many cases is the higher military spending by the government which would have liked to prefer social welfare investment. For instance, there is pressure on member states of NATO to spend a certain share of their GDPs on defense. What usually works out then is that some countries resist such pressures, contesting that their security needs are already well met without the need for such a high level of spending, but others succumb and do so at the expense of vital domestic social programs. This tension between national political priorities and international commitments leads to complicated and sometimes contradictory processes in military spending.

Military Spending in Developing Countries

The military expenditure of developing countries reflects a different pattern of problems and processes, usually shaped by several other domestic and international determinants.

The Demand for Military Spending in Developing Countries

By this, Dunne and Perlo-Freeman (2003) aptly underline the determinants of military expenditure for developing countries in which the role of economics and strategy is pivotal. As conveyed by the authors, external threats and internal security threats generally drive military spending in developing countries, while at the best, the economic factors are reduced to the secondary influence.

The research also outlines how the regime type influences military expenditure. For example, in a more autocratic country, the budget for defense could be high because the armed forces are one of the major sources of support for the ruling regime; jointly, they share military power to maintain internal law and order. On the other hand, military expenditure in more democratic developing countries may be inhibited by public opinion and the need to channel resources into high-priority social and economic problems. These matches with the findings of Bove and Brauner (2023) mentioned above.

Insights into Military Spending Trends

Dynamic panel data analysis, initiated by Dunne and Perlo-Freeman (2003), adds immense value to the attempt at understanding the trends and determinants of military spending in the developing world. That kind of methodology allowed researchers to confirm the evolution of military spending even more than what could be verified from observations of cross-sectional differences between countries.

In the study, one of the major findings is that military spending in developing countries is usually impacted by external conflicts and even internal wars. Additionally, empirical results from this study denote that the population size does have a negatively affecting impact on military expenditure, thereby suggesting that larger countries could depend more on their numeric advantage in matters of security compared to smaller ones.

This work also analyzes what the end of the Cold War meant in terms of the defense budgets for the developing countries and finds evidence of a dramatic shift in the demand for military spending. The results show that domestic factors, Indeed, in some areas of the world, variables associated with civil wars and regime stability started to play a more important role in determining military spending, reflecting the changing nature of security threats in such areas.

The Complex Interplay of Ideology, Economy, and Geopolitics

One of the determinants of military spending is “government ideology”; however, it is itself nested in a structure of economic conditions, domestic political institutions, and international security dynamics. Generally, leftist governments are more concerned with social spending than they are with defense. Right ones do the opposite, stressing national security and hence apt to grant high budgets to the military.

However, this effect does not occur uniformly because it always has to be moderated by other factors such as political institutional arrangements, economic conditions, and geopolitical environment. The military usually receives more attention in democracies where military spending can even be tied with the electoral cycle, while defense spending in authoritarian regimes is driven by the need for regime stability and handling of internal matters.

It is obvious that the economic situation influences military expenditure to a great extent. Usually, economic depression is followed by a slump in defense spending, especially for democratic countries. Conversely, during the rise of the leftists who promise to implement social welfare policies, economic growth does not lead to an equivalent rise in military expenditure. Finally, the broader geopolitical setting, including international coalitions and global power relations, may influence military expenditure choices, which, at times, bring about effects that contradict a government’s ideological stance.

In conclusion, Military spending has always been an issue shaped by an interactive relationship that embodies ideological perceptions, economic realities, and geopolitical contexts. Such dynamics will be important for policymakers, analysts, and academics interested in making informed decisions with respect to military spending and their implications for national and international security.

References

Albalate, D., Bel, G., & Elias, F. (2010). Institutional determinants of military spending. Defense and Peace Economics, 21(3), 195–207. Bove, V., & Brauner, J. (2023). The demand for military expenditure in authoritarian regimes. Journal of Comparative Politics, 58(2), 215–235. Bove, V., Efthyvoulou, G., & Navas, A. (2012). Political cycles in public expenditure: Butter vs. guns. Public Choice, 150(3–4), 263–283. Dunne, J. P., & Perlo-Freeman, S. (2003). The demand for military spending in developing countries: A dynamic panel analysis. Defence and Peace Economics, 14(6), 461–474. Kauder, B., & Potrafke, N. (2011). The growth in military expenditure in Germany 1951–2011: Did parties matter? European Journal of Political Economy, 27(4), 636–649. Manamperi, N. (2011). Does military expenditure hinder economic growth? Evidence from Greece and Turkey. Journal of Peace Research, 48(3), 337–349. Whitten, G. D., & Williams, L. K. (2010). Buttery guns and welfare hawks: The politics of defense spending in advanced industrial democracies. American Journal of Political Science, 54(3), 644–661. Zielinski, R. C., Fordham, B. O., & Schilde, K. E. (2014). What goes up, must come down? The asymmetric effects of economic growth and international threat on military spending. International Studies Quarterly, 58(2), 303–315.