Live Free or Die: Security in a World of Decentralized Arms Manufacturing

• In Event: Security at Home and Abroad

Abstract

Defense Distributed was the first, major decentralized organization publishing CAD files on the internet for the purpose of allowing people to print firearms at home. Since then other organizations such as Deterrence Dispensed have published their own open-source CAD files on the internet with the purpose of allowing readily available blueprints for people to make their own firearms. This paper looks at the complicated legal histories behind 3D printing firearms and the effects that these open-source weapons have had due to their applications in far-right terrorism as well as being used by guerillas in the civil war in Myanmar. The legality of these weapons is complicated and varies case to case. The decentralization of these organizations that make blueprints is a means to circumvent gun control laws that bar manufacturing or ownership of guns, but also as a means to increase the share of expert knowledge to create more sophisticated technology. A few main groups have taken up so-called ghost guns for their cause; far-right terrorists and anti-junta rebels in Myanmar. This paper compares these groups using a lens of critical security studies to argue that despite the dangers of the democratization of arms production, 3D printed firearms represent a means for oppressed groups to level the playing field against the state and gain emancipation through their own means. While there are inherent dangers in allowing anyone to print a firearm, that this paper will discuss, the technology can also be liberatory for oppressed peoples facing violent oppression.

Author

• Patrick Fraser Sauriol, McMaster University