Small arms issue: achieving sustainable disarmament.

The relationship between disarmament and development like the old choice between "guns" and "butter" has preoccupied nation states from time immemorial. The world community created both the League of Nations and the United Nations largely to help their members grapple with these fundamental problems on an international dimension. At the founding of these institutions, representatives of all Member States understood that there was some profoundly important relationship between economic development, social justice, military expenditures and the propensity for conflict, a perspective found in both the Covenant and the Charter.

For many years now, the United Nations has devoted considerable effort to assessing the social and economic impacts of military expenditures. In 1970, at the request of the General Assembly and with the assistance of an international group of experts, Secretary-General U Thant issued a report on the economic and social consequences of disarmament that identified profound economic and social costs of national arms expenditures, costs that were found to be particularly severe for developing countries.

Then, in 1987, the General Assembly convened an International Conference on the Relationship between Disarmament and Development that was attended by 150 countries. The Conference's final document--which was adopted by consensus--found that, "The world can either continue to pursue the arms race with characteristic vigour or move consciously and with deliberate speed towards a more stable and balanced social and economic development within a more sustainable international economic and political order. It cannot do both." That statement is as valid today as it was when it was issued over 10 years ago.

The end of the cold war in the following decade gave rise to widespread hopes for a bountiful peace dividend, as resources would finally be freed to meet compelling economic and social needs. Yet, expenditures continued on weapons of mass destruction, the development of new weapons technologies and on conventional weapons. While it is true that global military expenditure has now declined to some $740 billion, many of the peoples of the United Nations have still seen little of either the dividend or peace.

And what have been the fruits of this massive "investment"? Here is what the United Nations Development Programme's (UNDP) Human Development Report for 1998 had to say about this last decade: "armed conflict has killed 2 million children, disabled 4 to 5 million, and left 12 million homeless, more than 1 million orphaned or separated from their parents and some 10 million psychologically traumatized." The UNDP report also noted that overall civilian fatalities have risen dramatically in wars over the course of this century.

The opportunity costs of these armed conflicts remain alarming. The UNDP reports that such conflict, "destroys years of progress in building social infrastructure, establishing functioning government institutions, fostering community-level solidarity and social cohesion and promoting economic development." Is it unrealistic to expect that such conditions will only breed new cycles of violence and arms races and fresh demands for additional small arms and light weapons?

Sustainable disarmament

Now, in 1998, we find ourselves considering the same old conundrum involving development and disarmament that vexed our predecessors and our attention is drawn inevitably back to the question of what is sustainable? Sustainable development has been discussed in recent years largely in terms relating to the need to balance economic growth with care for the environment, which we hold in trust for future generations. I do not need to elaborate its definition.

But sustainable disarmament is a more elusive concept. The recent nuclear detonations in South Asia underscore the futility of any global security framework that seeks to divide the world permanently into classes of nuclear haves and have-nots. History has not been kind to this approach. It failed in 1949, 1952, 1960, 1964, 1974 and again in 1998--when additional countries detonated their first nuclear devices. And it failed with respect to other states that acquired bomb capabilities without testing. The architects of global security for the coming millennium, therefore, can no longer credibly argue that the world has only one choice, between nuclear apartheid and nuclear anarchy. There is indeed a choice to be made, but it is between a nuclear-weaponized world and a nuclear-weapon-free world. And the only sustainable choice is nuclear disarmament.

But what is sustainable with respect to conventional arms? The historian Paul Kennedy has gone so far as to attribute the fall of the greatest of powers to excessive arms expenditures. And the impact of excessive arms in poor countries is even more tragic, as the UNDP has shown. Such arms not only limit social and economic options in such societies, but increase the risks and costs of violence, a dynamic which is worsened by the constant acquisition of additional arms. Though Article 51 of the Charter clearly recognizes the inherent right to self-defence, Article 26 identifies the additional--and I believe sustainable--goal of promoting this security, "with the least diversion for armaments of the world's human and economic resources."

Not every country can choose to dispense with a standing army, but those who have made that choice or who have limited their military expenditures to reasonable levels surely have more secure neighbours. Similarly, a fully "de-alerted" nuclear arsenal is less of a threat to a potential adversary than an arsenal poised to launch on warning. And the declaratory policies of no first use and negative security assurances also build confidence, if they are perceived as credible and as bridges to nuclear disarmament, rather than as artifices to perpetuate an asymmetrical status quo. It is not difficult, therefore, to distinguish what is sustainable from what is unsustainable in the realm of security policy and its symbiotic link to human security and sustainable human development.

But what are the requisites of sustainable disarmament? What will prevent this concept from becoming a will-o'-the-wisp? Sustainable disarmament can persist as a security concept if it becomes institutionalized, at both the national and international levels. Its success will require sustained efforts that only organizations can orchestrate. Sustainable disarmament cannot implement itself. It requires an infrastructure, but not world government. Institutions influence the supply and demand for arms. There is no reason why institutions cannot also affect the supply and demand of disarmament initiatives.

Sustainable disarmament must appeal to the ideals and self interests of a diverse spectrum of groups in society, especially key "opinion-leading" groups in government, industry, academia, the public interest community and the news media. It must fire the imagination. The very term "sustainable disarmament" must enter the lexicons of conventional political discourse. Sustainable disarmament would benefit from some expression in law--again both national and international--and in the elaboration of governmental rules, regulations and policies that advance the disarmament objective.

Sustainable disarmament must be susceptible to various techniques of measurement, for society must be able to gauge the extent to which it is achieving its disarmament goals. If we have indices of sustainable development, we can surely have indices of sustainable disarmament, such as the creative suggestion from Germany for a nuclear weapons register. If we require other policies to satisfy standards of efficiency and effectiveness, so should our policies of disarmament be regularly assessed both inside and outside of government.

Sustainable disarmament must ensure that international society will collectively discourage--or at least not reward--behaviour that is inconsistent with disarmament norms. Advocates of sustainable disarmament must concern themselves, in other words, not just with creating a norm, but with practical methods of maintaining it.

In summary, what ultimately makes disarmament sustainable are the benefits it brings to people throughout society, the constituencies that develop a stake in maintaining such benefits and the consistency of such a policy with public ideals.

Small arms

Achieving such goals will not be easy. This is especially true as new problems keep arising that defy solution by any one nation, problems that often attend the process of "globalization." Speaking last January at the World Economic Forum in Davos, the Secretary-General called them "problems without passports." Of these, surely few are more challenging than the problem of curbing the illicit production, sale, and use of small arms and light weapons.

Kosovo. Northern Ireland. Haiti. The Democratic Republic of the Congo. Rwanda. Burundi. Somalia. Mozambique. Afghanistan. Cambodia and my own country, Sri Lanka. These are just some of the countries from virtually all the regions of the world whose hopes for growth and prosperity are being stifled by chronic conflicts involving massive quantities of small arms and light weapons. Even some countries with highly developed and stable economies are discovering that they, too, harbour groups that are armed to the teeth with some of the most lethal military technology.

The challenges facing governments, international organizations and non-governmental groups that wish to curb the trafficking or stockpiling of such so-called conventional arms are enormous. Though arms alone may not be to blame for causing wars, it would be difficult indeed to deny that the illicit accumulation or use of such weapons has played significant roles as a catalyst of many of international society's most chronic conflicts.

And the weapons themselves and the ammunition that they require are readily available, at cheap prices and from multiple sources. They are frequently smuggled and the modest profits from primary markets often get multiplied in secondary and tertiary markets. Although these weapons are already quite deadly enough, they continue to get more lethal each year through an almost inexorable process of technological innovation, including improvements in accuracy, firepower, mobility and ease of concealment.

These weapons have proliferated both widely and deeply in society today. They are finding their way not just to more countries, but to more private arsenals within those countries including--but not limited to--militia groups, drug cartels and organized crime syndicates, creating an insidious and pervasive "gun culture." The manufacturers, trans-shippers, and even original buyers of these weapons often do not know who will ultimately use them. And this is particularly hard on the weakest in our global society. Here is what the Secretary-General had to say about this problem in his recent Report to the General Assembly on the Work of the Organization:

In the struggle for sustainable peace and development, especially in subregions where State structures are fragile, steps need to be taken to curb the flow of small arms circulating in civil society. It is estimated that 90 per cent of those killed or wounded by light military weapons are civilians and, most shockingly, that 80 per cent of those are women and children.

Yet this grim picture that I have just offered does not tell the whole story, not by any means. It depicts pains, but not gains. It provides a sobering reminder of the challenges ahead, but fails to recognize the enormous creative energies that are now being unleashed throughout international society to end this carnage.

Indeed, I would argue that it is not so much the short-age of good ideas, but their coordination that constitutes the greatest challenge to those seeking to advance our collective international security and disarmament goals. At virtually all levels of political life today--state, regional, and global--initiatives for curbing the arms trade or its consequences are proliferating almost at a daily pace.

I cannot begin to recount all of the farsighted initiatives that I see each day emerging from governments, non-governmental organizations, regional institutions and from inside the United Nations itself. My Department maintains an evolving compendium of these initiatives which when completed we will place on our small arms web page. Although even the most zealous proponents of these initiatives do not go so far as to call them panaceas, surely nobody can doubt that the military, political and economic problems created by small arms and light weapons are receiving a higher priority both within and between governments today.

Coordinating sustainable disarmament

So, let us now take stock of our successes. We have made considerable progress in elevating small arms and light weapons issues to the top of the agendas of many countries and influential international organizations. We have established some momentum that--with channelled hard work, discipline and financial support--will serve to keep these issues high on the public agenda. We have on the table several imaginative proposals to consider to address chronic problems and new ones are arriving daily.

Yet, we still have an enormous task ahead. Through a process of consensus-building, we must ensure that all the initiatives we are deliberating fit into a coherent whole. We are now in an age when disarmament has finally taken its rightful place along with economic development, social justice and peace as the most profound challenges facing the world community. We cannot achieve any one of these goals in isolation--or at the expense of--the others. Nor can any one country solve these problems globally. They require a profound commitment on the part of all countries, which implies an extraordinary level of international cooperation and consensus-building.

If we fail to coordinate our efforts, we may someday find ourselves "redoubling our effort when we have forgotten our aim." This was George Santayana's definition of "fanaticism," a scourge that enslaves many minds today and employs small arms in its pursuit.

Since I am speaking today on behalf of the Secretary-General of the United Nations, I think it is only appropriate for me to recall an additional statement from his recent report on the work of the United Nations. "Recent experience," he said, "has shown that the quest for international peace and security requires complementary action on two fronts: on the security front, where victory spells freedom from fear; and on the economic and social front, where victory spells freedom from want. Human security and equitable and sustainable development turn out to be two sides of the same coin."

Jayantha Dhanapala is the United Nations' Under-Secretary-General for Disarmament Affairs. This article is an excerpt from a speech delivered by Mr. Dhanapala on behalf of Secretary-General Kofi Annan at the International Conference on Sustainable Disarmament for Sustainable Development in Brussels, Belgium on 12 October 1998.