If all OECD agricultural subsidies were removed and spent on the world’s poorest peoples, this would release some US$300 billion per year. A small shift between military and aid budgets (respectively, US$900 billion per year globally and US$50 billion per year globally) would make a marked difference to the human security agenda. Clearly, the economic resources do exist to put in place reforms to aid the world’s poorest and least well-off.

The question really is how we allocate our resources, to whose benefit, and to what end. For the past decades the Washington Consensus and Security Agenda has left the world with severe inequalities. These inequalities can be met by powers that exist today. It is up to the world to reshape its institutions to ensure that these problems are solved.