NATO burden-sharing: Past and future

NATO is facing major changes and challenges: enlargement, new threats, new missions, new technology, and declining defence budgets. These developments raise the question of who will pay for the changes and hence the possibili ty of new burden-sharing debates. burden-sharing was a focus of controversy in the past and ir could re-emerge in the future. A variety of burden-shar ing measures are reviewed. These range from such traditional indicators as the share of defence in GDP to a range of alternative military measures as well as civil indicators, such as contributions to UN humanitarian operatio ns and economic aid. Burden-sharing debates are affected by choice of indic ator. Different indicators give different rankings and results. Nations wil l select the indicator(s) which show that they are bearing an 'unfairly' hi gh burden of the collective defence effort. The final part of the article e xamines the likely developments in burden-sharing over the next decade (e.g . new missions, new technology, enlargement). On enlargement, emphasis is p laced on the need to assess both the benefits and costs of NATO expansion a nd the conclusion focuses on the optimal size of NATO.