Arm in Arm: Political Economy of the Global Arms Trade

Keller, senior analyst and project director for Congress's Office of Technology Assessment, argues that superpower confrontation has given way to sporadic militarism: the rise, that is, of regional powers able to threaten local balances of power by virtue of sophisticated weapon systems. Instead of being distributed as part of coherent national strategies, this hardware is now being sold like any other product. Arms firms of different nations cooperate in transferring militarily useful technology. Many governments seek to create jobs and balance budgets by hawking their arsenals on the open market. The U.S., Keller demonstrates, has become a major participant in this process. His incisive and accessible account concludes that neither the institutions nor the insights to resolve the crisis of arms proliferation currently exist. (Nov.)