The Road to Insecurity: How Economic Growth-Oriented Development is making the World more Insecure

This paper aims to examine the complex relationship between development and security and to identify some, if not all, of the major harms brought about by the indiscriminate pursuit of economic growth. Conventionally, development has been defined and understood in terms of economic growth. Obsession with this understanding of development has begotten several threats and challenges, like environmental degradation, sea level rise, global warming, deforestation, acute centralization of wealth, etc., that are posing existential threats to the security and wellbeing of people. Thus, economic growth-oriented development has resulted in completely antagonistic consequences in terms of people and our planet. A fundamental contradiction seems to have arisen between development and security. This paper contends that if development is understood in terms of the broad concept of human development, development and security would no longer remain contradictory; on the contrary, they would become mutually interdependent and complementary. Human security cannot exist without human development, and human development cannot be imagined without human security.

Keywords:
Economic growth, development, security, inequality.