The arms trade and the transformation of global order: a revitalised research agenda

<p dir="ltr">The arms trade is central to the dynamics of violence, inequality, power and global order, yet International Relations (IR) has been surprisingly silent about its operation and its significance. Conversely, while discussion of the gendered, racialised and colonial character of the global capitalist economy and global insecurities is becoming increasingly prominent across critical IR and its sub-fields, rather little of this has translated into the study of the arms trade and its control. This article makes the case for, and scopes out, a revitalised research agenda that is better attuned to the dynamics of global (dis)order and (in)securities generated by the arms trade. I argue that most scholarly approaches to the arms trade and its control are stuck within the parameters of realist, liberal and constructivist theories of IR that remain wedded to variants of either state or human security. Such approaches do not adequately explain, let alone critique, the operation of power and maintenance of global order facilitated by the arms trade and its control. Meanwhile, critical approaches to war, violence and security have innovated on conceptual, theoretical and methodological questions but have largely stopped paying empirical attention to the arms trade as a phenomenon. Drawing on feminist, post- and anti-colonial critiques, I advance a framework for understanding the dynamics and effects of the arms trade that centres arms capital operating in tandem with states’ geopolitical ambitions, the racialised and gendered relations of violence within and between states that grow out of the colonial encounter and resistance to it, and the uneven scale at which armed violence is generated, facilitated and effected.</p>