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The analysis of six cases of successful or failed institutionalization of civilian control in this chapter allows for a systematic tracing of the strategies of political control used by civilians; how they were linked to structural determinants; and how such strategies affected the reform of post-authoritarian civil–military relations. The three successful cases (South Korea, Chile, and Spain) show that there were important differences in the mix of strategies, particularly regarding the early-on prioritization of the role of the defense ministry and an emphasis on the democratic socialization of the military. However, control strategies that played an important role in cases of weakly institutionalized civilian control, such as the co-optation of military elites, were of little importance in the three successful countries. Second, governments in South Korea, Chile, and Spain first emphasized weak strategies but later adopted new, more robust instruments of ensuring the military’s subordination, possible because of the maturing of democratic institutions, the growth of civil societies, and good socioeconomic performance, which strengthened the legitimation of democratic institutions and political authorities. In contrast, the most striking similarity among the three cases of stagnant or weakly institutionalized civilian control (the Philippines, Russia, and Madagascar) was the attempt to personalize and centralize political control by the incumbent president. All three countries had weak civil societies and democratic institutions; a challenging economic environment; and a potential for mass discontent. In all three cases, civil–military relations were mainly dependent on the incumbent’s ability to co-opt elites in various sectors of society.

This book examines the conditions under which new democracies succeed or fail in establishing firm and lasting civilian control of the military. It introduces a multidimensional conceptual framework to evaluate the degree of civilian control in new democracies and to trace developments over time. The theory of civilian control in new democracies proposed in this book integrates rationalist, structuralist, and institutionalist arguments into a coherent model to explain when, how, and through which causal mechanism new democracies succeed or fail in establishing and sustaining civilian control over the military. This theory is tested on an original dataset on civilian control over the military in 66 countries that have undergone a democratization from authoritarianism at least once in the period from 1974 to 2010. The study traces the effects of different degrees of civilian control on the survival and democratic quality of third wave democracies. In a multi-method design, we combine large-N statistical analyses with detailed case study narratives of several countries. The study establishes a comprehensive understanding of the conditions and processes under which third wave democracies succeeded or failed in establishing firm and lasting civilian control of the military—and its consequences for the survival and quality of the new democratic structures, processes, and practices.

This chapter complements the statistical analyses in Chapter 5 with case studies to understand how the degree of civilian control affects the survival and quality of democracy in third wave democracies. First, the chapter contextualizes the statistical findings in greater detail by delving into the 18 instances of breakdown of third wave democracies from 1974–2010, distinguishing three distinct military roles as (i) perpetrator, (ii) partner, or (iii) bystander in processes of democratic regime breakdown. Second, two process tracing case studies of Brazil (weak civilian control and low democratic quality) and Taiwan (strong civilian control and high democratic quality) uncover how the development of civilian control has affected the quality of democratic institutions and processes in both countries. Overall, weak civilian control and, especially, an extensive military role in the provision of internal security are likely to lead to impingements on citizens’ political rights, civil liberties, and the rule of law. Supporting comparative case evidence from Portugal, Romania, South Africa, and Turkey reiterates the crucial importance of civilian control, not only for democratic survival, but also for the quality of third wave democracies. In sum, the case study evidence uncovered in this chapter corroborates the theoretical arguments outlined in the second chapter of this book.

This chapter describes and explains empirical patterns of civil–military relations in 71 democracy spells in 66 third wave democracies in the period 1974 to 2010. The descriptive analysis demonstrates that overall, third wave democracies have been rather successful in ensuring civilian control over Elite Recruitment and Public Policy. In contrast, National Defense and Military Organization exhibit a generally lower degree of civilian control. The chapter also shows that post-communist countries in Eastern Europe and Eurasia started out with comparatively strong traditions of civilian control and registered only moderate changes in levels of civilian control. In contrast, Latin America is the one region in which third wave democracies, on average, had the most difficult initial conditions in terms of civilian control. Despite robust changes in the post-authoritarian period, this still is the region with the lowest average degree of civilian control. In Southern Europe, third wave democracies also inherited weak institutions of civilian control but experienced the greatest change and achieved the highest average degree of civilian control in 2010. The statistical analysis finds that civil society strength and economic development are the strongest predictors of civilian control, both in the aggregate as well as across all five individual decision-making areas. In contrast, initial conditions such as praetorian legacies and military control over the mode and outcome of the democratic transition seem less relevant for explaining civilian successes in establishing civilian control over their militaries when controlling for other factors, at least in the long run.

The chapter lays out a concept of civilian control over the military in new democracies which differentiates and operationalizes five partial areas of civilian control: elite recruitment, public policy, internal security, national defense, and military organization. The theoretical model argues that the establishment of civilian control in new democracies is best explained by the interplay between civilian control strategies and the effects of three sets of conditions that can hamper or facilitate the institutionalization of civilian control: initial conditions, civilian bargaining power, and factors that shape the military bargaining power vis-à-vis civilian authorities. This analytical differentiation allows the systematic integration of an agency-model of civil–military reforms with the institutional and structural explanations that dominate the existing literature. In the remainder of the chapter, the authors discuss the relationship between the survival of democracy and the quality of different partial regimes of the “embedded democracy” on the one hand, and the strength or weakness of civilian control on the other. Two main causal mechanisms link civilian control to the breakdown of new democracies. The first is the supplantment or displacement of a democratic government or regime by the armed forces. The second is the “weak democracy” syndrome, through which the military either partners with civilian elites in the overthrow of democracy or remains a bystander while civilian incumbents move against the democratic order.

The final chapter summarizes the findings and discusses their implications for the academic study and political practice of reforming civil–military relations in new democracies. First, the chapter concludes that the more central a decision-making area is for the working of democracy, the more negative is the impact of weak civilian control on the survival and quality of democracy. Second, the more central a decision-making area is for the military’s key interests, the more difficult it is to institutionalize civilian control. Third, changes in civil–military relations in new democracies are driven by civilians who need to act prudently, systematically making use of the strategic resources at their disposal to institutionalize civilian control. These findings have a number of implications for domestic and international reformers. Civilians should adopt a gradualist approach to civil–military reforms that favors coalition building, recognizes the legitimate interests of the military, and concentrates first on ensuring the military’s acceptance of democracy and keeping the military out of the political processes of elite selection and policymaking before attempting to expand their authority into the matters of defense and military policy. External democracy promoters should recognize the crucial importance of civil–military relations for democratic stability and quality and should support domestic civilians in their attempts at institutionalizing civilian control. They, in particular, should emphasize the benefits of a gradual approach towards the restructuring of civil–military relations, and offer training and resources to strengthen civil society and build up effective civilian expertise in defense ministries and parliamentary committees.

This chapter addresses the question whether the degree of civilian control is correlated with the survival and breakdown of democracy and democratic quality in the third wave. Multivariate statistical analyses confirm that democratic survival is more likely if civilian authorities achieve a high degree of civilian control of the military. In contrast, where democratic governments lack the effective capacity to rein in the armed forces, the likelihood for a democratic breakdown remains high. To account for effects of weak or declining degree of civilian control on the quality of democracy, we statistically evaluate the relationship between civilian control and different partial regimes of the “embedded democracy.” We find that the overall degree of civilian control is a crucial determinant of political rights and civil liberties. Findings suggest that countries in which the military does not enjoy much political influence and is under the control of the democratically elected authorities do better in ensuring the political rights and civil liberties of their citizens. In contrast, the overall degree of civilian control had no effect on horizontal accountability and electoral integrity, though civilian control over Elite Recruitment has a strong, positive effect on democratic quality of the electoral regime of an embedded democracy. As suggested by extant literature on democratic quality and consolidation, socioeconomic development, measured by the GDP p.c., is the single most powerful predictor of democratic quality across all four partial regimes.

In this chapter, the authors present their arguments in favor of studying civil–military relations in third wave democracies. Normatively and functionally, civilian control of the military is a crucial institutional prerequisite of the consolidated, “embedded democracy.” For democracy to survive, the power of the armed guardians of state security must be limited by strong institutions of control. Civil–military relations are thus a vital topic for democratization and autocratization studies and international and comparative politics, as well as conflict and security studies. Yet, the importance of the topic contrasts with the scarcity of carefully specified theories and systematic theory testing that would allow to identify the conditions under which elected governments and democratically established institutions succeed or fail in ensuring civilian control of the military. Moreover, studies on civilian control of the military and democracy often fall into the “fallacy of coup-ism,” equating civilian control with the absence of military coups d’état. In contrast, the authors argue that civilian control is best defined as the exercise of the will of the country’s elected leadership over the armed forces: why theories of civilian control should center on civilian leaders as relevant actors who can initiate change in civil–military relations. They argue that the effects of different degrees of civilian control on democratic political regimes should differ by substantive decision-making areas and affect different partial regimes of a democratic regime democracy in different ways. Finally, the chapter briefly introduces the data and explains the structure and contents of the following chapters.

The debate about the characteristics and advantages of quantitative and qualitative methods is decades old. In their seminal monograph, A Tale of Two Cultures (2012, ATTC), Gary Goertz and James Mahoney argue that methods and research design practices for causal inference can be distinguished as two cultures that systematically differ from each other along 25 specific characteristics. ATTC’s stated goal is a description of empirical patterns in quantitative and qualitative research. Yet, it does not include a systematic empirical evaluation as to whether the 25 are relevant and valid descriptors of applied research. In this paper, we derive five observable implications from ATTC and test the implications against a stratified random sample of 90 qualitative and 90 quantitative articles published in six journals between 1990–2012. Our analysis provides little support for the two-cultures hypothesis. Quantitative methods are largely implemented as described in ATTC, whereas qualitative methods are much more diverse than ATTC suggests. While some practices do indeed conform to the qualitative culture, many others are implemented in a manner that ATTC characterizes as constitutive of the quantitative culture. We find very little evidence for ATTC's anchoring of qualitative research with set-theoretic approaches to empirical social science research. The set-theoretic template only applies to a fraction of the qualitative research that we reviewed, with the majority of qualitative work incorporating different method choices.

Perhaps symbolized by the election of Donald Trump and Brexit, a general consensus seems to have emerged that democracy is in crisis. A burgeoning literature, both academic and popular, has identif...

This article introduces the special issue on methodological trends in democratization research by taking stock of the overall development of methods practices and situating the findings of the individual article contributions within the broader developments. As has the broader discipline, democratization research has experienced four methodological "disruptions" over the past 60 years: the behavioural revolution of statistical methodology; the introduction of formal theory; the sophistication of qualitative, set-theoretic and multi-method research; and the increasing use of experimental methods. Surveying the methods practices in the past quarter century, we find that quantitative and multi-method research have been growth areas in recent years, but that the bulk of research is still done in comparative or single case studies. Formal theory as well as set-theoretic methods have gained a foothold in the field, but it is still a small one. In sum, democratization research is, methodologically speaking, still rather traditional. Moreover, the individual contributions to this special issue show that much of the empirical literature underutilizes the best available advice about how to develop and test theory, including standards on causal inference, case-selection, and generalization. We conclude with a plea for more transparency, humility, and collaboration within and across methodological traditions.

This article introduces a configurative theory to explain military reactions to nonviolent mass protests in dictatorships. An empirical analysis of three cases of such “dictators endgames” (Burma i...

The political role of the military and its impact on the emergence, persistence and consolidation of new democracies has generated a large body of scholarship. In the light of military coups in a number of Third Wave democracies such as Ecuador (2000), Thailand (2006 and 2014), Honduras (2006) and Mali (2012), the return to electoral competition in a number of military-dominated regimes, and the military’s pivotal role during the Arab Spring, this research has recently focused on the forms, reasons and consequences of military contestation on democratic development. This special issue contributes to this recent scholarship by analysing both the potentially beneficial as well as the deleterious implications of military contestation on democratic transitions, quality and persistence in different world regions. This article introduces the special issue by providing a broader context for the four individual contributions and relates their findings to the recent theoretical and empirical literature on ...

Latin America experienced recurring episodes of populism, and of military reaction against populists, during the twentieth century, frequently ending in coups d’etat. In the twenty-first century, military coups appear to have died out even as populist regimes returned during the third wave of democracy. This paper examines military contestation in populist regimes, both left and right, and how it has changed in the contemporary period. Combining fuzzy set Qualitative Comparative Analysis of Latin American presidencies (1982–2012) and four focused case analyses, we find that military contestation in contemporary populist regimes is driven by radical presidential policies that threaten or actually violate the institutional interests of key elites, among them the military, which in turn is facilitated by the interplay of political, social, economic, and international conditions. Counterintuitively, two of these conditions, the presence of rents and regime capacity for mass mobilization, operate in th...

Institutionalizing civilian control over the military is a crucial challenge for newly democratized nations. This paper aims to answer the question under which conditions civilian control can be established after the transition to democracy, and under which conditions civilian control fails. To answer this question, we draw on original data on civil–military relations in 28 new democracies in Africa, Asia, Europe, and Latin America and run a fuzzy set qualitative comparative analysis. We find that no single explanatory factor can be considered necessary for the success or failure of civilian control in new democracies, but identify a number of sufficient variable combinations to explain the development of civil–military relations after the transition to democracy.

The main purpose of modern militaries is the management of organized violence to defend society against external threats. Since the end of World War II, however, militaries have increasingly been c...

Democratic control of the military addresses one of the most pressing, relevant and broadly discussed problems in the history of social order and political organization: how can the unarmed elected representatives of the people establish, maintain and exert dominance over the military, an organization that due to its overwhelming coercive capabilities potentially is a constant threat to social order and stability. Democratic control, however, comprises more than the mere absence of a military take-over of the government. It also requires that elected decision-makers have effective authority and oversight over defense and military policy; that the mechanisms, instruments and institutions that ensure democratic control over defense and military policy work effectively; and that military subordination under democratic civilian leadership is achieved without undermining the military’s social function. This chapter provides an overview of the scholarship on these aspects of democratic control in both established and new democracies, and surveys its different analytical perspectives and recent empirical findings.

While much research has been done on the institutional reforms of security policy in the new democracies of Latin America, much of this literature has focused, with good cause, on civil-military re...

In 1987, South Korea made the transition to electoral democracy after three decades of military rule. Democratic institutions started working sufficiently quickly after the end of authoritarian rule and civilian presidents succeeded in pushing the military out of politics by the mid-1990s. However, effective civilian control of defense and military policy was a long way to come and was only realized more than a decade after the transition with the establishment of the National Security Council. This chapter traces the development of civilian control over South Korea’s defense and military policy since the transition to democracy in 1987 to the end of President Lee Myung-bak’s term in office in 2012. It argues that the slow but ultimately successful establishment of civilian control over defense and military policy was the result of a protracted power struggle between civilian presidents and the military leadership who, despite contrary preferences, were reluctant to engage in open civil-military conflict, not least because of the ongoing security threat posed by North Korea. Democratization and the ‘Northern Threat’ also had tremendous impact on the country’s military effectiveness. Even though the transition to democracy did not fundamentally alter the threat situation in relation to North Korea, it did provide the political momentum to modernize defense and security policy, to strengthen the institutions necessary for an effective defense and military policy, and to ensure that the military remains well-funded, well-staffed, and well-equipped.

After much research on the function of pseudo-democratic institutions such as elections, legislatures or parties within authoritarian politics, scholars have recently paid increasing attention to r...

(2013). Book Review: The Political Resurgence of the Military in Southeast Asia: Conflict and Leadership. South East Asia Research: Vol. 21, No. 4, pp. 697-701.

Kuehn, David.February, 2016.Institutionalising civilian control of the military in new democracies,Reports,HamburgGerman Institute of Global and Area Studies,German Institute of Global and Area Studies Working Paper/282,34

This article argues that process tracing provides a useful, although underestimated, avenue for empirically testing deductive game theoretical arguments. In-depth case analysis allows for a systematic evaluation of the crucial assumptions underlying the models and for making internally valid measurements of the model's core concepts. Furthermore, process tracing enables the researcher to overcome the weak conceptions of processes encountered in many game theoretic arguments. After outlining the usefulness of combining deductive game theory and process tracing, as well as discussing the limits of such an approach, the article illustrates the argument with an example from substantive research on civil–military relations in new democracies.

This article discusses the structure-agency problem in explaining civilian control of the military in new democracies. The authors first provide a systematic analysis of the core contents of the structure-agency problem and its implications for theory-building in civil-military research: the agential entities whose interactions are constitutive of civil-military relations, the relevant environmental factors, and the theoretical argument which links agents’ behaviour with the environment. Based on these meta-theoretical deliberations, the authors analyze four recent attempts to explicitly connect structure and agency in explaining civil-military relations in new democracies. The analysis shows that while being important contributions to theory development in the field, none of these theories have consistently dealt with the agency-structure problem in explaining civil-military relations in new democracies.

Civil-military relations have long been an important topic for political science scholars. In spite of its long tradition, however, the field has been repeatedly criticised as being too detached from the greater domain of political science and being too conservative in its conceptual, theoretical and methodological foundations. In recent years, however, a new generation of civil-military research has emerged which has considerably promoted the development of the field beyond the confines of the classical texts. This symposium comprises four articles by European scholars who share a conviction to furthering the study of civil-military relations and developing closer links between the mother discipline of political science and its more specific subfields of comparative and theoretical military studies.

Establishing civilian control of the military is an important challenge for new democracies. Surprisingly, however, there is no established conceptual framework for understanding what civilian control entails and how exactly weak or absent civilian control impinges upon democratic quality. This article addresses these lacunae, developing a new concept of civilian control for emerging democracies. It proposes to understand civilian control as the situation in which civilians have decision-making power in all relevant political matters. Differentiating civilian control as consisting of five decision-making areas, this new concept allows for a nuanced analysis of civilian control and comparative analysis. It also provides a comprehensive framework for systematically assessing the impact of incomplete civilian control on the various dimensions of liberal democracy.

It is consensus in the democratization literature that civilian control of the military is a necessary ingredient for democracy and democratic consolidation. However, there is considerable disagreement on what civilian control of the military exactly entails and there is a lack of solid theoretical arguments for how weak or absent civilian control affects democratic governance. Furthermore, a considerable portion of the research literature is captured by the fallacy of coup-ism, ignoring the many other forms in which military officers can constrain the authority of democratically elected political leaders to make political decisions and get them implemented. This article addresses these lacunae by providing a new conceptual framework for the analysis of civil–military relations in emerging democracies. From democracy theory it derives a definition of civilian control as a certain distribution of decision-making power between civilian leaders and military officers. Based on this definition, the authors dev...

Successful institutionalization of civilian control of the military is a necessary condition for the consolidation of democracy. This is particularly relevant for East Asia, where the military used to be a key player in the previous authoritarian regimes. This article analyzes the changes, advances, and setbacks in achieving civilian control in five countries that have made the transition from authoritarian to democratic rule: Indonesia, the Philippines, South Korea, Taiwan, and Thailand. The empirical analysis is built on a conception of civilian control that distinguishes three areas of political decisionmaking: political recruitment and overall public policymaking, national defense, and internal security. The study shows that only in Taiwan and South Korea have civilians succeeded in curtailing military influence in politics. In contrast, in Indonesia, the Philippines, and Thailand, the military has shown itself more or less resilient in guarding its prerogatives in the postauthoritarian era. This seriously impedes the democratically elected authorities' effective power to govern in these countries and has led to democratic deterioration in Thailand and the Philippines. The article highlights three arguments to account for the profound difference between the cases: historical legacies of authoritarian rule and the path of democratic transition, the internal security role of the military, and the relationship between development and democratic consolidation.

Over the last 20 years, Taiwan has witnessed an impressive transition from authoritarian one-party rule to liberal democracy. This included considerable changes in the relations between the civilian political elites and the armed forces. While under the emergency laws of the authoritarian regime the military had been a powerful political force, during democratization the elected civilians have managed to curb military political power and have successively widened their influence over former exclusively military prerogatives. This article argues that the development of Taiwan's civil–military relations can be explained as the result of civilians using increasingly robust strategies to enhance their influence over the military. This was made possible by a highly beneficial combination of historical conditions and factors inside and outside the military that strengthened the political power of the civilian elites and weakened the military's bargaining power. The article finds that even though partisan exploi...

The mass protests during the so-called “Arab Spring” have motivated renewed scholarly interest in the authoritarian regimes of the Middle East and Northern Africa (MENA) and beyond. One of the main...