Licensed to kill: The United Kingdom’s arms export licensing process

Anna Stavrianakis ()
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Anna Stavrianakis: University of Sussex

Economics of Peace and Security Journal, 2008, vol. 3, issue 1, 32-39

Abstract: The article addresses the U.K. government’s arms export licensing process to try to account for the discrepancy between its rhetoric of responsibility and practice of ongoing controversial exports. I describe the government’s licensing process and demonstrate how this process fails to prevent exports to states engaged in internal repression, human rights violations, or regional stability. I then set out six reasons for this failure: the vague wording of arms export guidelines; the framing of arms export policy; the limited use (from a control perspective) of a case-by-case approach; the weak role of pro-control departments within government; pre-licensing mechanisms that facilitate exports and a lack of prior parliamentary scrutiny, which means the government’s policy can only be examined retrospectively; and the wider context of the relationship between arms companies and the U.K. state. I conclude that the government’s export control guidelines do not restrict the arms trade in any meaningful way but, rather, serve predominantly a legitimating function.

Keywords: Peace; security; defense export licensing; United Kingdom (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: D74 H56 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2008
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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:epc:journl:v:3:y:2008:i:1:p:32-39

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