![]() ![]() Moreover, US President Joe Biden, who took office in January 2021, consistently and clearly pledged to come to the defense of NATO allies if they were attacked. In 2021 the United States spent $766 billion on defense, which was over twice what the rest of NATO members spent on their defense combined. The world of 2022 seemed to provide the perfect environment for European free riding according to the logic the critics have outlined. Why 2022 should have been the free-riding perfect storm If a NATO member does not see Russia as a threat to its territorial integrity, for example, it is not free riding off of US defense spending by spending 1 percent of its GDP on defense it is providing a spending level appropriate to its perceived threat environment. Finally, collective action logic only applies if all actors agree on the nature of both the problem and the solution. Second, some NATO members spend far more on their defense as a percentage of their GDP than others, and the straightforward free-riding critique cannot explain that variance even when taking into account variance in the ally’s size. ![]() Given that each NATO member can decide to contribute to or withhold its military from NATO operations (see the “as it deems necessary” clause of Article 5), the best one can say is that NATO member defense spending contributes to the potential for a better allied defense. First, the total amount that all NATO members spend on defense is hardly a public good. Scholars and experts have long noted problems in applying free-riding theory to alliances such as NATO, however. In this view, US taxpayers are gullible suckers, providing security to Europeans who, in turn, spend lavishly on social welfare and infrastructure instead of ensuring their own defense. Obama, Trump, and others who accuse NATO allies of free riding argue that the allies choose to spend less on defense than they otherwise would because of the massive US military budget and the US commitment to defend Europe against attack. When one actor makes a particularly large contribution to the public good, potential free riders choose to rationally abstain from contributing, knowing that the good will be provided. The insight is that individual actors who can consume a public good without providing for it will do so-they will take a “free ride” off of others’ contributions. The problem with the free-riding critiqueįree riding provides a compelling explanation of collective action problems. The evidence shows that the United States’ European allies make defense spending decisions based on the threats they perceive, and US actions and criticisms are not as important as Americans would like to think. Yet recently released evidence suggests that most of NATO’s members have increased their defense spending in the past year or plan to do so in the near term. Has all of this criticism led to meaningful policy change? Or has it mostly created division within the Alliance?Īt first glance, events since Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine have seemed to validate the free-riding critique: The United States has clarified its commitment to defend NATO members, and its defense spending dwarfs the rest of the Alliance. The 2014 Wales summit agreement that NATO members “aim to move towards” spending 2 percent of GDP on defense within a decade has since been used by US policymakers and commentators to push for NATO allies to meet the 2 percent threshold. The free-riding critique extends far beyond Obama and Trump. Trump reportedly threatened that the United States would “do its own thing” if NATO allies did not spend at least 2 percent of their gross domestic product (GDP) on defense. Obama said that “free riders aggravate me” and pressured the British (seen by many as the United States’ closest ally) to spend more on defense. Yet both former US presidents critiqued NATO allies for “free riding” off of US military power. Barack Obama and Donald Trump agreed on very little.
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