Search

Whether military expenditure, health, and education are strange bed-fellows, antagonists, or complementary to modernization, economic development and the physical quality of life are the major questions addressed in this paper. Fundamental military roles in underdeveloped countries are discussed; and empirical cross-national analyses of aggregate data from the U.S. Arms Control and Disarmament Agency (ACDA), the World Bank, and world political and social indicators, are used to test competing hypotheses. Educational expenditures as related to human capital formation and the percentage of labor force in industry are found to be the best allies in predicting economic development. Other findings indicate that military expenditures are adversarial (or antagonistic) to health and the physical quality of life. The theoretical and policy implications of the findings are discussed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Given that the U.S. military uses science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM) exposure as a key recruitment tool, one should expect that military service is associated with STEM outcomes. While research demonstrates this pattern for women veterans, we know little about racialized and intersectional patterns. This article uses the American Community Survey data (2014–2018) to examine the association between military service, race/ethnicity, and gender to STEM degrees earned. We find that military service operates contingently: White men's plus white, Hispanic, and multiracial/other women's predicted probability of earning a STEM degree increases with military service. In contrast, for other minority groups, military service is not associated with a higher predicted probability of earning a STEM degree. Indeed, for groups typically overrepresented in STEM fields (i.e., Asian veterans), a negative association exists. These findings inform extant research on the long-term impact of military service on civilian reintegration, including educational and occupational outcomes. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Typically, 30 percent of an enlisting cohort leave before completing the first term. and attrition rates remain near this level even though over 90 percent of recent cohorts are high school graduates. This paper uses individual-level data to analyze attrition among high school graduates who enlisted in spring 1979. To control for selectivity bias, enlistment is analyzed jointly with attrition. Three variables observable at the time of enlistment are found to have a strong negative effect on attrition: positive expectations of further education, months in the Delayed Entry Program, and employment stability. As a set, these variables discriminate a wide range of attrition likelihood. No evidence of selectivity bias is found for this cohort; hence, results are applicable not only to enlistees but also to prospects. Policy implications are discussed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The "civil–military gap" is a significant factor that can hinder the success of complex comprehensive approach missions. Perhaps nowhere is this gap more apparent than in the relationship between military and civilian nongovernmental organizations. Interagency education and training have been suggested as ways to diminish this divide. This research describes one Canadian approach to interagency education: the Civil–Military Seminar. Quantitative and qualitative results demonstrate the promise of both the assessment approach used and the positive outcomes that may help to narrow the civil–military gap. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Which types of militarization affect child mortality? Which type appears to lower it; which appears to push it higher? This article focuses on social militarization (i.e., troops as a proportion of workforce-aged population) and praetorian militarization (i.e., the military's control or strong influence over the government), investigating their impact on child mortality using pooled time series analysis covering 142 countries from 1996 through 2008. We find that social and praetorian militarization have opposite effects even after controlling for potentially confounding influences. Access to basic public health infrastructures and education mediates between each type of militarization and child mortality. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article analyzes the ways in which civil–military relations shape professional military education (PME). Its main argument is that military education benefits from a civil–military partnership. In doing so, the article examines the role of civil–military relations in shaping PME in India. While describing the evolution of military education in India, it analyzes its weaknesses and argues that this is primarily due to its model of civil–military relations, with a limited role for civilians. Theoretically, this argument challenges Samuel Huntington’s notion of “objective control”—which envisaged a strict separation between the civil and military domains. Conceptually, this article argues for a greater dialogue on military education among civilians, both policy makers and academics, and military officers and not to leave it to the military’s domain—as is currently the practice in most countries. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Armed Forces & Society (AF&S) was founded in 1974 with the overall intention of creating an international arena for interdisciplinary approaches to the study of the military institution and the intersection of armed forces and their society. The present study is both a follow-up and an update of Morten Enders’s article “Authorship and Affiliation in Armed Forces & Society” covering 1,139 articles in the 41 volumes published from 1974 until 2015. The scope has been to look for the evolving trends on Authorship and Affiliation (A&A) within AF&S so as to say something about what AF&S has become over these years, as a consequence of whom the authors are and where they come from. Our findings suggest a developmental narrative of A&A in AF&S of a continuously higher author–article ratio, an increased female authorship ratio, and a wider range of disciplines from more continents, countries, and institutions, plus a trend of increased cross-national coauthorship. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article illustrates the role of sociology at the Swedish military academies. Finding a suitable balance between theoretical and practical education seems to have been a major thread in Swedish officer education from the eighteenth century to the present day. The emphasis has been on education that is closely linked to military war positions, with extensive elements of combat planning and carrying out military operations. But as tasks have changed, areas such as leadership and organizations have become more important, and the positions of sociological theories and perspective have gradually increased. The belief put forward here is that the demand for sociology will increase for two reasons: the current struggle to make Swedish officer education more university-like and, more important, the need for sociological knowledge that will grow the more the Defense Forces will be engaged in the international arena. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Sociology and the Sociology Program at the United States Military Academy at West Point, New York, are described. Grounded in the academy's mission of educating and inspiring future leaders of character, this article focuses on the history of the Sociology Program, alignment with American Sociological Association standards, sociodemographics of cadet sociology majors, recent graduates, the curriculum, extracurricular activities, and the sociology faculty and their productivity. The Sociology Program has made significant progress in multiple areas while concomitantly being handicapped in other areas. The conclusion addresses the significance of social science in military officer education. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article recounts the course of sociology as a teaching subject at the French military academy from the personal perspective of one of its local protagonists. Having placed its introduction in context, it points up the motives behind a reform of studies (1982) which gave academic education greater scope and in which sociology played a central part. It goes through the various stages in the institution-building process that led from initially mixed reception to full internal acceptance as part of a common core of subjects. It analyzes the reasons for another major reconsideration, in 2000, of curricula and avenues of access, which endorsed and radicalized the previous reform's philosophy and turned sociology into a truly pivotal discipline-one that allows better integration of the academic and military sides of officer education. It assesses, in conclusion, the factors behind such a (fragile) success story. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The authors use data from the Federal Human Capital Survey to measure comparative leadership and management performance among executives in the military bureaucracy. The authors evaluate whether differences in executive backgrounds, training, and management environments influence employee evaluations of leadership, management, and work climate. Military service agencies get systematically higher evaluations in leadership and work climate, but not management. Among the services, the Air Force consistently received the highest evaluations. Air Force managers have the highest ranks, the longest military service, and a high level of graduate education when they assume executive positions; these characteristics are positively correlated with performance. Other managerial characteristics associated with high performance were long job tenures and private management experience. The authors conclude that greater attention to graduate training, exploring ways to increase tenure, and the selection of retired officers with private management experience for important executive posts may improve performance. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

American military officers who advance to the highest levels of responsibility need to acquire broader perspectives and increased sensitivity to the larger implications of politico-military policy-making. During the academic year of 1972-1973 at the Naval War College, three groups were questioned on their arms control attitudes. After one year's schooling, 10% more officers were willing to commit themselves on some arms control issues. Relatively few changed perspectives and their shifts were in the more "pragmatic" and less "absolutist" direction. The majority of those shifting were students in the civilian program. There are implications that advanced educational experiences produce persons better prepared to assume responsibilities in that some officers acquired opinions on previously undecided issues and their perspective became more in accord with the American foreign policy shift toward greater reliance on arms control measures and other forms of non-hostile relations with China and the Soviet Union. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]