Italian Small Arms Exports: Between Incentives and International Sanctions

Adelaide Baronchelli () and Raul Caruso ()

Department of Economics and Statistics Cognetti de Martiis. Working Papers from University of Turin

Abstract: This paper empirically investigates the main drivers of Italian Small Arms and Light Weapons (SALW) exports from 1990 to 2017. Italy is a major player in the international trade of SALW being the second largest exporter of these weapons, and the largest if considering only sporting SALW. We apply data on exports from Italy to 143 countries using a gravity framework. Findings highlight that SALW trade appears to be complementary with overall military spending. In fact, Italian exports increase towards countries that are increasing military spending. Specifically, an increase of 1% in the level of the importing country’s military expenditure causes an increase of 0.6% in Italian exports to that country. In addition, results show that international embargoes reduce SALW exports. In the presence of an arms embargo, exports to the target country decrease by 64%. However, our findings also indicate a negative correlation between exports and torture. In other words, SALW demand is negatively associated with violations of human rights.

Pages: pages 36
Date: 2022-07
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-int
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Related works:
Journal Article: Italian small arms exports: between incentives and international sanctions (2023)
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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:uto:dipeco:202206

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