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Purchasing Power: US Overseas Defense Spending and Military Statecraft

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  • Brian Blankenship
  • Renanah Miles Joyce

Abstract

The literature on economic statecraft has long focused on the effectiveness of foreign aid and trade as tools of inducement. However, existing scholarship largely neglects the role played by government procurement. By choosing to purchase goods or hire labor in foreign states, governments can provide economic benefits for strategic ends. The United States in particular leverages its defense procurement as a foreign policy tool. We introduce a new data set of US government procurement using information on all contracts executed overseas from 2000 to 2015. We develop a typology of how states use procurement to achieve foreign policy goals—power projection, counterinsurgency, and development—and provide descriptive statistics to explore variation in spending across countries and over time. We illustrate the power of the contract data by using it to code US military access in Africa, assess the relationship between spending and economic growth, and test whether economic inducements can buy influence.

Suggested Citation

  • Brian Blankenship & Renanah Miles Joyce, 2020. "Purchasing Power: US Overseas Defense Spending and Military Statecraft," Journal of Conflict Resolution, Peace Science Society (International), vol. 64(2-3), pages 545-573, February.
    • Handle: RePEc:sae:jocore:v:64:y:2020:i:2-3:p:545-573
    DOI: 10.1177/0022002719854786
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    References listed on IDEAS

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    Cited by:

    1. Theodore McLauchlin & Lee JM Seymour & Simon Pierre Boulanger Martel, 2022. "Tracking the rise of United States foreign military training: IMTAD-USA, a new dataset and research agenda," Journal of Peace Research, Peace Research Institute Oslo, vol. 59(2), pages 286-296, March.
    2. Ruixing Cao, 2025. "Domestic terrorism and the allocation of US overseas defense spending," Journal of Peace Research, Peace Research Institute Oslo, vol. 62(6), pages 2020-2032, November.
    3. Yasuki Kudo, 2025. "Rewarding loyalty: Selective reassurance and enforcement of asymmetric alliances," Journal of Peace Research, Peace Research Institute Oslo, vol. 62(6), pages 1938-1950, November.
    4. Michael A Allen & Michael E Flynn & Carla Martinez Machain, 2022. "US global military deployments, 1950–2020," Conflict Management and Peace Science, Peace Science Society (International), vol. 39(3), pages 351-370, May.
    5. Carla Martinez Machain, 2021. "Exporting Influence: U.S. Military Training as Soft Power," Journal of Conflict Resolution, Peace Science Society (International), vol. 65(2-3), pages 313-341, February.

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