Warfare, Economic Development and Wellbeing

The paper sets out to analyse the relation between military spending, Warfare and some measures of Well-being, in the current context of globalisation and convergence processes. On the one hand, growth drivers are attributable to gross fixed capital formation, attraction of foreign direct investment and ability to export. On the other hand, military expenditures, once again rising in the Middle East, North Africa and Central Europe, have negative effects on economic growth paths. The aim of the current paper is to verify such trends with economic development as well as indicators of subjective Well-being and institutional development, through analyses of bivariate correlations and some econometric models. The effects of displacement of public welfare in relation to productive investment or social and educational expenditure represent clear constraints that hamper a balanced and sustainable development and, in general, the social Well-being, as measured by new indicators of democracy level and happiness.