Julide Yildirim

MILITARY EXPENDITURE AND ECONOMIC GROWTH IN MIDDLE EASTERN COUNTRIES: A DYNAMIC PANEL DATA ANALYSIS

Defence expenditures have both costs and benefits to the economy. The costs of defence expenditures are mainly emphasized as opportunity costs. On the other hand, defence spending may have growth‐promoting potential benefits: a rise in defence spending may result in a higher aggregate demand, production and employment. This paper examines empirically the effects of military expenditures on economic growth for Middle Eastern countries and Turkey, for the time‐period 1989–1999. The relationship between military expenditure and economic growth is investigated by using cross‐section and dynamic panel estimation techniques. Empirical analysis indicates that military expenditure enhances economic growth in the Middle Eastern countries and Turkey as a whole.

The Demand for Turkish Defence Expenditure

Although a number of studies concerning Turkish defence-growth relation have been published in recent years, little attention is given the demand for Turkish defence expenditure. This is an important issue for understanding which variables contribute to the determination of the demand for military expenditure. However, it is difficult to develop a general theory or a standard empirical approach for the determination of the demand military expenditure. This study models and estimates the demand for Turkish defence expenditure for the period 1951-1998 using autoregressive distributed lag approach to cointegration (ARDL) following the methodology outlined in Pesaran and Shin (1999). This procedure can be applied regardless of the stationary properties of the variables in the sample and allows for inferences on long-run estimates, which is not possible under alternative cointegration procedures. The findings suggest that Turkish defence spending is determined by NATOs defence spending, Greeces defence spending and some security considerations.

Regional effects of terrorism on economic growth in Turkey: A geographically weighted regression approach

The economic growth effects of terrorism have generally been examined in a cross-country framework where socio-economic differences among the countries are ignored. This highly restrictive assumption may result in heterogeneity bias, which could be overcome by resorting to country studies rather than cross-country analysis. Moreover, the relationship between the terrorist incidents and various factors may not be stationary in space. The majority of terrorist incidents in Turkey are concentrated mainly in Eastern, and South Eastern Turkey and big cities. Thus, the geographical dispersion of terrorist incidents in Turkey may result in uneven regional impact, necessitating local parameter estimates. This study analyses the effects of terrorism on economic growth across provinces of Turkey for the time period 1987—2001. Following a traditional global regression analysis, spatial variations in the relationships are examined with geographically weighted regression (GWR) to obtain locally different parameter estimates. A GWR approach allows the modeling of relationships that vary over space by introducing distance-based weights to provide parameter estimates for each variable and each geographical location. Empirical evidence indicates that a GWR model significantly improves the model fitting over the traditional global model. Even though the traditional convergence analysis reveals that terrorism hinders economic growth, GWR results indicate that its provincial effects are more pronounced for the Eastern and South Eastern provinces compared to the Western provinces. Moreover, empirical findings suggest that there is a considerable variation in speeds of convergence of provinces, which cannot be captured by the traditional beta convergence analysis.

Military expenditure and employment in turkey

Even though the military expenditure - economic growth relationship has been intensively investigated in the defence economics literature, few studies have been devoted to investigate the nature of military expenditure related employment in armed forces, civil service and in the industries that supply defence material. In the literature, there is no general agreement concerning the effects of military expenditure on employment. Military spending would increase employment, as vast numbers of workers are employed either directly by military-related operations or in a variety of service or supporting roles, or spending on the armed forces may generate increased demand in the economy. However, military expenditure devoted to high-technology labour saving weapon systems can be expected to increase unemployment. The purpose of this study is to assess the importance of military expenditure, among other things, in determining the level of employment in Turkey. Employment equation is specified using a CES production function and modelled employing ARDL technique. Our findings indicate that military expenditure negatively effects employment in Turkey.

Income Inequality and Economic Convergence in Turkey: A Spatial Effect Analysis

Even though the convergence of regional per capita income has been a highly debated issue internationally, empirical evidence regarding Turkey is limited as well as contradictory. This article is an attempt to investigate regional income inequality and the convergence dynamics in Turkey for the time period 1987—2001. First, the Theil coefficient of concentration index is used to analyze the dispersion aspects of the convergence process. The geographically based decomposition of inequality suggests a strong correlation between the share of interregional inequality and spatial clustering. Then, we estimate convergence dynamics employing alternative spatial econometric methods. In addition to the global models, we also estimate local models taking spatial variations into account. Empirical analysis indicates that geographically weighted regression improves model fitting with better explanatory power. There is considerable variation in speed of convergence of provinces, which cannot be captured by the traditional beta convergence analysis.

ARMS RACE AND ECONOMIC GROWTH: THE CASE OF INDIA AND PAKISTAN*

The hostility between India and Pakistan is believed to have led to an arms race between the two countries, which might have contributed to their retarded economic growth. This paper investigates this twin problem of arms race and economic growth for the time period 1949–2003. The empirical results suggest that there is a mutual causal relationship between the military expenditures of India and Pakistan. Even though military expenditure does not Granger cause economic growth in Pakistan, there is causality from military expenditure to economic growth in India. A VAR analysis revealed that military expenditure hinders economic growth in India in the long‐run, but it has a growth promoting effect in the short‐run. *An earlier version of this paper has been presented at the Seventh Annual International Conference on Economics and Security held in Bristol, UK, on 26–28 June 2003.

ANALYSING THE DETERMINANTS OF TERRORISM IN TURKEY USING GEOGRAPHICALLY WEIGHTED REGRESSION

This paper investigates the determinants of provincial terrorism in Turkey taking spatial dimension into account for the time period 1990–2006. Following a traditional global regression analysis, spatial variations in the relationships are examined with geographically weighted regression (GWR) to obtain locally different parameter estimates. Empirical results indicate that increases in income and schooling ratio tend to reduce the provincial average level of terrorism, whereas an increase in unemployment enhances it. Moreover, GWR results indicate that the provincial effects of per capita income and education are more pronounced for the Eastern and South Eastern provinces compared to the Western provinces.

A System Estimation of the Defense-Growth Relation in Turkey

The effects of military expenditure on economic growth have been examined extensively in recent years. However there is no agreement regarding the question of how and in what respects military spending affects economic growth. Feder-Ram or Deger-type multi-equation models have been estimated for a number of country studies and/or groups of countries, using both time-series and cross-sectional data (for extensive literature reviews, see e.g., Dunne, 1996; Ram, 1995; Deger and Sen, 1995; and Sandler and Hartley, 1995). Empirical studies that employ multi-equation models are comprised of three to four equations such as for growth, the savings or investment ratio, the trade balance ratio, and the defense burden. These models are estimated using twostage least squares or three-stage least squares. Even though there are a variety of studies, the results concerning the military expenditureeconomic growth relationship are mixed. Among other things, the evident inconsistency of results may be due to the varying sample periods of the studies, the underlying economic models, and the econometric techniques employed.

Military expenditures, economic growth and spatial spillovers

The relationship between economic growth and military expenditure has been the subject of a large literature in defence economics. This study analyses the influence of military expenditures on economic growth in a global perspective for the time period 2000–2010 taking spatial dimension into account. The augmented Solow model is employed to investigate the defence-growth nexus using the cross-sectional data relating to 128 countries. Following a traditional regression analysis, spatial variations in the relationships are examined utilizing different spatial econometric specifications estimated by maximum likelihood. The regressions are compared with each other via likelihood ratio tests, and the spatial Durbin model is found to be the most appropriate one suggesting that the typical least-squares model is misspecified. Empirical evidence indicates that military expenditure has a positive effect on economic growth with a significant spatial dependence for the time period under consideration.

A Qualitative Evaluation of a Conditional Cash Transfer Program in Turkey: The Beneficiaries' and Key Informants' Perspectives

ABSTRACT Since the 2001 economic crisis, conditional cash transfers (CCTs) have been provided to poor families in Turkey to improve education and health outcomes of children. Under the framework of CCT programs, grants provide an incentive for poor households to use available basic social services. The aim of this study is to explore beneficiaries’ perspectives in relation to a CCT program in Turkey. The in-depth study design entailed semistructured qualitative interviews with beneficiary households and key informants. A total of 397 in-depth interviews were conducted. Analysis results suggest that the CCT program not only positively affected health and educational outcomes, but also contributed to the empowerment of women and improved the self-esteem and self-confidence of beneficiary children. Recommendations for future research are made including the need for an impact evaluation analysis that employs quantitative research methods designed to improve the provision and quality of the basic social services.