L’economia della pace, che vanta padri illustri quali John Maynard Keynes, Kenneth Arrow e Lawrence Klein, studia le cause e le conseguenze economiche delle guerre e di altre forme di violenza, e analizza la crescita e lo sviluppo di istituzioni volte alla risoluzione di scenari di conflittualità distruttiva. La disciplina ha dimensioni macro e micro. Esiste, infatti, una conflittualità di livello "macro" che coinvolge gli Stati, la loro politica estera e le loro politiche economiche, e una conflittualità "micro" in seno alle società nei rapporti tra Stato, gruppi sociali, formazioni intermedie e cittadini.

Peace economics has not been a mainstream field of economic research in recent decades. This book is intended to fill this vacuum. The volume is ideally split into four sections. The first presents the theoretical pillars of peace economics which take into account the distinction between productive and unproductive activities. Economic development depends on the balance between them. In fact, conflict and peace are to affect differently such balance. In the second section, the economic correlates of different types of conflicts and political violence are presented. In particular, a substantial attention is devoted to the economic causes of civil wars and terrorism. Eventually, there is a section devoted to the deadweight loss of military expenditures. Besides the empirical evidence, several conceptual points are proposed to explain the detrimental impact of military expenditures. International issues are also presented. The debate on peacefulness of international trade is expounded and also specific topics as sanctions and international arms trade are discussed. Further space is devoted to economics of peacekeeping and to the role of IMF. Eventually, guidelines for economic policy are expounded, namely: (i) the strengthening of democracies; (ii) the balance between military expenditures and public investment in education; (iii) the process of disarmament; (iv) the involvement in multilateral trade institutions; (v) the international integration in arms industry. The volume is written for scholars and students in economics, international relations and political science. Anyway, in order to reach the largest readership possible formal models have been put into appendices whereas econometric tables are presented in the main text.

Jel Codes: H56; D74; F51; O10.

Keywords: peace economics, conflict, productive and unproductive activities, military expenditures.