Substituting Security: Economic Resources, Strategic Resources, and the Security Policy Choices of Minor Powers

Abstract

This dissertation addresses the question of how minor power states select strategies in order to achieve security. I develop a formal model of minor power security choices that treats security decision making as a cost minimization problem. I examine four security strategies available to minor powers: domestic arms production, alliances, arms importation and military coercion. I argue that several factors explain minor power security choices, including the amount of threat facing the state and economic resources. In addition, I argue that strategic resources, which represent the willingness of security providers to offer security to minor powers, plays an key role in determining minor power security choices. I develop hypotheses based on the role of threat, economic resources and strategies resources and test these hypotheses with both statistical and case study methods. The statistical analysis focuses on a number of minor power rivalries in the post-World War Two period, and a measure focusing on the relative amount of trade between rivals and potential security providers is used as a measure of strategic resources. I conduct a comparative case study of Taiwan and South Korea, focusing on how differences between these two states and within each state across time explain differences and change in security policies between and within the two cases. Ultimately, empirical evidence suggests that threat, economic resources and strategic resources are related to the four security strategies in the manner expected in the hypotheses.