Arms exports

Germany is one of the world’s largest arms exporters. While weapons can enhance security, they can also cause insecurity and fuel violent conflicts. For recipient countries, arms imports always represent an investment that cannot be made in other areas, such as education or health. This project examines the impact of arms exports and military spending around the world. We argue that a reduction in German arms exports would serve to minimise armed conflict and maximise the resources available to society for civilian purposes.

The project team collects original data from field research or secondary sources. We then analyse the data using qualitative and quantitative approaches before drawing conclusions. We are committed to applied research and seek to present evidence-based conclusions and policy recommendations to political decision-makers and the public. A key challenge is to reduce the complexity for the ‘end user’ while still doing justice to the complexity of the issue.

Our research is disseminated to the academic, policy and practitioner communities through:

• the SAD-Nexus Paper series and contributions to (popular) scientific journals;
• the Global Militarisation Index (GMI) website
• the Database on German Arms Exports and specific Country Reports
• contributions to the German annual Peace Report, the annual publication on the GMI, and by participating in public debates.