Armed Forces & Society

Significant changes in the technology and organization of war have caused commensurate changes in the structure of the military organization. One of the major results concerns the combat-oriented image of the military role, which corresponds less and less to what officers actually do. Increasingly, many middle-level and senior appointments in Western military forces are located in central departments of defense. This article suggests that such professional role change should be accompanied by a change in professional identity; this proposition was tested in a survey of officers in the Australian Defence Force. Data were gathered from some 1,400 regular officers in the navy, army, and air force by mailed questionnaire and interview. The results show that many officers not only react negatively to service in the Australian Department of Defence but also feel less competent in their jobs there, as well as less adequately prepared for them, when compared with officers serving elsewhere in the ADF. These findings are taken as evidence of a failure in the military profession to adapt professional role identities to changed circumstances. Implications for these findings are discussed.

Federal courts are called upon to decide claims by individual members of the armed forces that they have been mistreated by their superiors. A court's decision will often depend on the judge's perception of the necessity of the action in maintaining morale and discipline. Recently, government lawyers have begun to justify commanders' actions on the grounds of unit cohesion. This article examines those justifications by applying models developed to evaluate the use of social science findings in law suits and concludes that cohesion arguments have no place in the courtroom.

This article discusses the relationship between the Romanian armed forces and the leadership of the Romanian Communist party. It suggests that this relationship has been complicated, and made more difficult, by Romania's pursuit of foreign policy autonomy from the Soviet Union. Ceausescu has relied more on direct political intervention and less on positive inducements to retain control of the armed forces than have his counterparts elsewhere in Eastern Europe. Romania's defense establishment, like other institutions in that country, has been reduced to a state of stagnation and cannot under present circumstances be expected to provide the basis for leadership alternative to that of the current Communist party elite.

This paper investigates the role of adult experience in the development of elite attitudes about defense. Specifically, the study traces the effect of differing experiences in World War I on the attitudes toward conscription held by four key Canadian ministers during World War II. W. L. Mackenzie King and C. G. Power opposed compulsory service both in World War I and in November 1944 during a crisis that came within hours of bringing down the administration of Prime Minister Mackenzie King. J. L. Ralston and T. A. Crerar, on the other hand, supported conscription both during World War I and in November 1944. During World War I, personal attachment to the anticonscriptionist head of the federal Liberal party and to parents who opposed compulsory service seemed to influence the two who opposed conscription. Firsthand exposure to opposition and a prior inclination to be sympathetic to Quebec also apparently contributed to negative attitudes.

Few empirical analyses of the relationship between military expenditures and economic performance in less-developed countries include the time factor. It has not yet been determined how long, or how many years, it takes for military spending to have an effect on economic growth or whether the nature of the relationship changes as the time lengthens. In this study the time factor is incorporated into the analyses by examining the relationship between expenditures and growth and by successively changing the number of years between the two variables. Two-wave panel regression models are employed that accommodate the analysis of relationships over time by measuring the dependent variable at two points in time while controlling for its initial level. The longitudinal analyses indicate that as the number of years between military expenditures and economic growth increase, the relationship, although null in the short run, is positive in the long run. That is, over time, an increase in military expenditures is related to an upturn in economic growth. This finding both supports previous research and provides additional information about the relationship. It is suggested that time is a critical factor when studying macrostructures and economic systems. At the national level it is necessary to allow for sufficient time for a chain of events to occur in order to discern both shortand long-term effects.

This article examines whether a significant part of Argentina's military budget over a 22-year span can be attributed to an arms race with Brazil. Multiple regression equations are estimated for the period 1961 and 1982 and several subperiods, taking into account Brazil's military spending, changes in political regimes in Argentina, and also the availability of economic resources allocated to the government. The results indicate that the rivalry existed until the mid-l970s. As a result of increased economic cooperation between the two countries since then, the arms race has gradually diminished, and other factors have become more important in determining defense spending levels in Argentina.

This article's findings contradict the conventional wisdom that Navy pilots who leave to become airline pilots do better financially. Under the most favorable assumptions for the airlines, the present value of income for a pilot who leaves the Navy as soon as eligible is 0.6 percent less than the present value for a pilot who stays. Under more plausible assumptions, the present value for the pilot who leaves the Navy is as much as 9.1 percent less. This result does not imply that the Navy pays pilots too generously. If the Navy is not reaching its retention goals and if those goals have been set optimally-then the service is not paying pilots enough, even if they receive more than civilians in comparable jobs.