Securing Profit: An Empirical Assessment of Neoliberalism on Human (In)Security
Review of Radical Political Economics, 2026 (SSCI, Scopus)
- Yayın Türü: Makale / Tam Makale
- Basım Tarihi: 2026
- Doi Numarası: 10.1177/04866134261455940
- Dergi Adı: Review of Radical Political Economics
- Derginin Tarandığı İndeksler: Social Sciences Citation Index (SSCI), Scopus, IBZ Online, Periodicals Index Online, ABI/INFORM, American History and Life, EconLit, Index Islamicus, Political Science Complete, Public Affairs Index, Political Science Abstract (IPSA), Academic Search Ultimate (EBSCO), Sociology Source Ultimate (EBSCO)
- Anahtar Kelimeler: human security, informal sector, military spending, neoliberalism, profit, welfare state
- Akdeniz Üniversitesi Adresli: Evet
Özet
This article presents an empirical examination of the impact of neoliberalism, operationalized through profit share, on human security. The study utilizes an unbalanced panel data set encompassing 139 countries from 1980 to 2019. Neoliberalism is conceptualized as a dual process of welfare retrenchment and profit maximization, primarily driven by financialization. Employing fixed effects regressions, the authors demonstrate that elevated profit shares are negatively associated with human security in most model specifications, with effects that are particularly pronounced for the freedom from fear dimension, though contingent on income level and institutional context, with the size of the informal sector and military spending consistently exerting additional negative effects. The degree of democracy positively affects human security. Interaction analyses indicate that the intensity of neoliberalism is contingent upon specific institutional milieu. Specifically, nations characterized by markedly deficient redistributive and protective mechanisms, particularly in the absence of monetary sovereignty, permit neoliberalism to profoundly compromise human well-being. Altogether, the research contributes to heterodox political economy, specifically economic development debates, by establishing a key link between macroeconomic configurations and the multidimensional measures that constitute human security.