MILITARIZATION VERSUS HUMAN DEVELOPMENT: RETHINKING SECURITY PRIORITIES IN PAKISTAN

Abstract

The present paper analyzes the tension in the structural aspect between the military spending and the human development investment in Pakistan over the period 2010-2024. Using secondary data of the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI), the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP), the World Bank and the own Economic Survey of Pakistan, the paper questions the existence of statistically and socially significant opportunity costs on education, healthcare and poverty reduction in case of persistent defense-sector prioritization. The score of 0.540 (2022) of the Human Development Index (HDI) (placed in the 161st out of 191 countries) is coexisting with a defense expenditure that averaged 4.92 percent of GDP over a 60-year period and reached about 17 percent of the federal budget during the peak years. Basing their arguments on the expanded security framework by Buzan (1991) and the human security paradigm proposed by UNDP (1994), the paper maintains that overmilitarization without corresponding social investment creates a security paradox: internal weakness in the form of radicalization, unemployment among young people, and a weakening of institutional legitimacy ultimately undermine the national-security objectives that military expenditure is supposed to be serving. Comparative experience in Bangladesh shows that development-oriented security policies can help to increase economic security and security in geopolitics. The paper suggests a coordinated policy architecture, which incorporates plausible deterrence and viable investment in the social sector, regional diplomatic confidence-building, and open civil-military budgeting supervision.

Keywords: Militarization, Human Development, Human Security, Pakistan, Defense Spending, Social Sector Investment, Guns vs. Butter, HDI, Civil-Military Relations, South Asia.