Armed Forces and Conflict Resolution (Contributions to Conflict Management, Peace, Economics and Development)

407 Pages·2008·2.64 MB·English

by  G. Caforio & G. Kummel

Contributions to
Conflict Management, Peace Economics
and Development volume 7
SERIES EDITOR
MANAS CHATTERJI
BOOKS IN THE SERIES
Eurasia: A New Peace Agenda, edited by M. D. Intriligator
Cultural Differences between the Military and Parent Society in Democratic Countries,
edited by G. Caforio
Managing Conflict in Economic Convergence of Regions in Greater Europe, edited by
F. Carluer
MilitaryMissionsandTheirImplicationsReconsidered:TheAftermathofSeptember11th,
edited by G. Caforio and G. Kuemmel
Conflict and Peace in South Asia, edited by M. Chatterji and B. M. Jain
War, Peace, and Security, edited by Jacques Fontanel and Manas Chatterji
Armed Forces and Conflict Resolution, edited by G. Caforio, G. Kuemmel and
B. Purkayastha
European Defense Policy by M. Foucault (Forthcoming)
Crisis Management and Regional Cooperation by I. J. Azis (Forthcoming)
Peace Science: Theory, Methods and Cases by P. Gangopadhyay and M. Chatterji
(Forthcoming)
Arms Embargo Implementation—Comparing Experiences for Improving Effectiveness by
Michael Brzoska and George Lopez (Forthcoming)
A Society in Conflict-The Poverty-Growth Big Paradox and Its Solution in a Brazilian
State by Raphael Bar-El (Forthcoming)
Contributions to
Conflict Management, Peace Economics
and Development volume 7
ARMED FORCES AND
CONFLICT RESOLUTION:
SOCIOLOGICAL
PERSPECTIVES
EDITED BY
GIUSEPPE CAFORIO
President of the ISA Research Committee on Armed Forces
and Conflict Resolution, Italy
GERHARD KÜMMEL
Bundeswehr Institute of Social Research, Germany
BANDANA PURKAYASTHA
University of Connecticut, USA
United Kingdom – North America – Japan
India – Malaysia – China
Emerald Group Publishing Limited
Howard House, Wagon Lane, Bingley BD16 1WA, UK
First edition 2008
Copyright ©2008 Emerald Group Publishing Limited
Reprints and permission service
Contact: [email protected]
No part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, transmitted in any
form or by any means electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise
without either the prior written permission of the publisher or a licence permitting
restricted copying issued in the UK by The Copyright Licensing Agency and in the USA
by The Copyright Clearance Center. No responsibility is accepted for the accuracy of
information contained in the text, illustrations or advertisements. The opinions expressed
in these chapters are not necessarily those of the Editor or the publisher.
British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data
A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library
ISBN: 978-1-8485-5122-0
ISSN: 1572-8323 (Series)
Awarded in recognition of
Emerald’s production
department’s adherence to
quality systems and processes
when preparing scholarly
journals for print
LIST OF CONTRIBUTORS
Manon Andres Netherlands Defense Academy,
The Netherlands
Maya Beasley Department of Sociology, University of
Connecticut, Mansfield, CT, USA
Giuseppe Caforio ISA Research Committee on Armed
Forces and Conflict Resolution RC01,
Italy
Donald J. Eberly International Association for National
Youth Service, New Zealand
Karl W. Haltiner Swiss Federal Institure of Technology,
Zurich, Switzerland
Doo-Seung Hong Department of Sociology, Seoul National
University, Seoul, Korea
Ljubica Jelusˇicˇ University of Ljubljana, Ljubljana,
Slovenia
Jelena Juvan University of Ljubljana, Ljubljana,
Slovenia
Tony Kro¨nert University of Potsdam, Potsdam,
Germany
Gerhard Ku¨mmel Bundeswehr Institute of Social Sciences,
Strausberg, Germany
Rene´ Moelker Netherlands Defense Academy,
The Netherlands
Syed Mansoob Murshed Institute of Social Studies in The Hague,
The Netherlands
Eraldo Olivetta DepartmentofSocialSciences,University
of Torino, Torino, Italy
xiii
xiv LIST OFCONTRIBUTORS
Leena Parmar University of Rajasthan, India
Dion E. Phillips University of the Virgin Islands,
St. Thomas Campus, U.S. Virgin Islands,
USA
Gabrie¨lla Poot Netherlands Defense Academy,
The Netherlands
Bandana Purkayastha Dou Department of Sociology,
University of Connecticut, CT, USA
Anke Schu¨nemann University of Potsdam, Potsdam,
Germany
Joseph L. Soeters Netherlands Defense Academy,
Tilburg University, The Netherlands
Iwan Gardono Department of Sociology,
Sudjatmiko University of Indonesia, Indonesia
Urosˇ Svete Faculty of Social Sciences,
University of Ljubljana, Slovenia
Maren Tomforde Fu¨hrungsakademie der Bundeswehr,
Hamburg, Germany
Tibor Szvircsev Tresch Swiss Federal Institute of Technology,
Zurich, Switzerland
Stephen C. Trainor Department of Leadership, Ethics and
Law, U.S. Naval Academy, Annapolis,
MD, USA
Mesut Uyar Turkish Military Academy, Ankara,
Turkey
Andrea van Dijk Netherlands Defense Academy,
Tilburg University, The Netherlands
A. Kadir Varog˘lu Facultyof EconomicsandAdministrative
Sciences, Baskent University, Ankara,
Turkey
FOREWORD
The role of the military in society has a long history beginning with the
earliest of human civilizations. Through the ages, kings, tribal leaders and
politicians have encouraged their soldiers to fight enemies (real or
imaginary) in the name of nationalism, religion, tribal loyalty, ideology,
etc. Though the means of fighting the enemy have changed, with primitive
weaponsreplacedbysuperiortechnologies,insomesocieties,particularlyin
poor, under-developed countries, the same old tools are used. However,
therearerelativelyfewwarsbetweenthedevelopedcountries(exceptingthe
waronterror),andassuchtheroleofsoldiersinthesesocietieshaschanged.
Inthesecountriesitispeacekeepingorpeacemaking,disastermanagement
and similar strategies that most military efforts concern. Further, military
recruitmenthasmovedawayfrommodelsbasedonconscription,andwesee
more and more women serving in armed forces. The traditional under-
standingofthesoldier,asaninstrumentofcrueltyandsometimestorture,is
being particularly questioned. Sometimes, even soldiers themselves are
questioning the need to fight, whom they are fighting, and what they are
fighting for. Modern modes of war and peace missions affect the physical
and mental health of soldiers even though it is fought with less immediate
and more technologically advanced equipment. All of these issues are
affecting the social, political and economic fabric of the country
tremendously. Accordingly, Military Sociology needs to be looked from
broader, interdisciplinary perspectives. The papers in the book, written by
distinguished scholars, are focused towards this.
Manas Chatterji
Binghamton, NY, June 2008
xv
GENERAL INTRODUCTION
The study of armed forces and conflict resolution has undergone
importantdevelopmentsattheturnofthemillenniumandthishasoccurred
not only due to the far-reaching work of scholars in the field, but, as often
occursinthesocialsciences,hasbeendrivenbyeventsandnewsituations.It
is well to recall in this regard that it was precisely the need for knowledge
and intervention on the military institution that brought about the
groundbreaking work done in the United States by Samuel Stouffer (see
Stoufferetal.,1949)andhisteamafterthecountryhadenteredintowar,a
work that gave rise to the contemporary history of sociology applied to
armed forces.
The fall of the Berlin Wall, the end of the Cold War, the end of history
(Fukuyama, 1989), the resurgence of nationalism and religious wars, ethnic
cleansing, September Eleven, the War on Terror, and asymmetric warfare,
along with the crisis of the United Nations and its inability to manage and
successfullyconcludeamilitaryoperation,aresomanyflashsymbolsofhow
much things have changed from the time of the Cold War, however recent,
and of how the action of the military has become more important, more
difficult,morecontroversial,moretopicaland,atthesametime,insufficient,
without parallel methods and political actions for resolving conflicts.
Armedforcesandconflictresolution:Twothemesthatneedtobetreated
as one nowadays because the prevalent military activity from 1990 to the
present has been in peace-support operations (PSOs),1 because these
operations are always carried out in a certain political framework; and
because politics, without a military arm that binds parties to the accords
reachedandforcestheunrulytorespectthem,doesnotachieveresults.But
thesethemestodayappearsocomplexthatasinglescientificdisciplineseems
too one-sided to perform analyses that take account of all the factors at
play. In actual practice, therefore, the approach to our subject of
investigation has become increasingly interdisciplinary due to the simulta-
neouspresenceintheresearch(andintheessaysofthisvolume)ofscholars
fromvariousdisciplines,andintheorybecausethefirsttheoreticalattempts
to argue the necessity of this interdisciplinarity have also made their
appearance (Caforio, 2007). As Donna Winslow, a cultural anthropologist,
xvii
xviii GENERAL INTRODUCTION
tellingly writes, mono-disciplinary analysis sees the object of investigation
from a single perspective: if we combine several mono-disciplinary analyses
together we will have a multidimensional view of the same object, and for
this reason closer to its concrete reality. More precisely, referring to the
conclusions of one of her researches, she says: ‘‘My answer to these
questions is that it depends on the perspective that you adopt. Throughout
thepaper,Ihavebeenpointingoutthestrengthsandweaknessesofallthree
perspectives and giving a few examples of how they have been used in the
study of army culture. My underlying assumption was that the strength of
the approach has been this multi dimensionality, using all three
perspectives.’’ (Winslow, 2007, p. 84)
Sothatisthereasonforthisbookwhichbringstogether,inthreesections,
contributionsfromscholarsofvariousdisciplines,aswehavesaid,onthree
themesthatappearedsignificantfortheprospectsofstudyoftoday’ssocial
sciences on the phenomenon of war, related military issues, and resolution
of conflict. The first theme is centered on the new aspects of war in the
twenty-first century where asymmetric warfare (Kaldor, 1999; Arreguı´n-
Toft,2001;Gray,2002;Barylski,2003)haschangedmanyrulesofthegame,
imposing a profound transformation on the military, not only tactical, but
also structural, preparatory, mental, and ideological.
Thesecondthemeanalyzesthedelicaterelationsbetweenthearmedforces
and societies. The ever-greater technicality of military operations and their
lower comprehensibility to the broad public as a result, together with
increased sensitivity in many countries in regard to the use of violence and
death, have created social situations and problems that deserve to be
investigated.
The third theme is conflict resolution. It spans government-sponsored
militarily,politiceandpoliticalactivitytomaintainorderandpeaceandthe
role played by other institutions and organized groups in society to build
and sustain peace. This third section draws attention to the far-ranging
effects of violence and suggests arenas that require further empirical
investigation.
A concluding note is the observation that in addition to its interdiscipli-
narity this volume is characterized by a broad internationality as scholars
from 13 different countries, both European and non-European, have
contributed to it so that the interdisciplinary vision referred to earlier is
joinedbyaplurinationalvision,comprised,thatis,ofhistorical–geographic
angles that are quite distant from each other. We feel that this is just one
more aspect that contributes to the depth and overall validity of the book
that we present.
General Introduction xix
Onelastthingremainstobedone:Weverymuchappreciatetheworkand
thetimethecontributors tothis booktook tomakethis bookpossible.We
are grateful for all their efforts because we have learned a lot from them.
Also, and finally, we thank very much Manas Chatterji who agreed to
include this volume into his series and Sarah Kennedy from the Publishing
Development Department at Emerald to publish this anthology.
NOTE
1. Data on UN peacekeeping operations only (without taking into account
operationsbyNATOandotherinternationalorganizations)showarisefrom16in
1980to 90in theyear2000(http://www.un.org/Depts/dpko/timeline).
REFERENCES
Arreguı´n-Toft,I.(2001).Howtheweakwinwars:Atheoryofasymmetricconflict.International
Security,26(1),93–128.
Barylski, V. R. (2003). Learning from the Chechenand Kosovo Wars: Standards for ethno-
nationalconflicts.PaperpresentedattheIUSBiennialConference,Chicago.
Caforio, G. (Ed.) (2007). Social sciences and the military: An interdisciplinary overview.
Abingdon:Routledge.
Gray,C.S.(2002).Thinkingasymmetricallyintimesofterror.Parameters,Spring,5–14.
Fukuyama,F.(1989).Theendofhistory.TheNationalInterest,16,3–18.
Kaldor, M. (1999). New and old wars: Organized violence in a global era. Cambridge: Polity
Press.
Stouffer, S., Arthur, A. L., Marion, H. L., et al. (1949). The American soldier. Princeton:
PrincetonUniversityPress.
Winslow,D.(2007).Militaryorganizationandculturefromthreeperspectives:Thecaseofthe
army. In: C. Giuseppe (Ed.), Social sciences and the military: An interdisciplinary
overview(pp.67–88).Abingdon:Routledge.
Giuseppe Caforio
Bandana Purkayastha
Gerhard Ku¨mmel
Editors
INTRODUCTION
Giuseppe Caforio
This first part of the book is devoted to the forms of conflict that are
characteristic of the start of the twenty-first century. As I document in the
first essay, the newest and most significant form of struggle of our times is
asymmetric warfare, which has had an enormous development as shown
alsobythegreatnumberofstudiesdedicatedtoit(seethebibliographiesof
the chapters focussed on this form of conflict).
Thereaderwill,therefore,notbesurprisedthatoutofthesevenchapters
included in this part, four are devoted to topics concerning asymmetric
warfare and an additional two deal with it as a side issue.
Oneofthechaptersspecificallydevotedtothisnewformofstruggleinits
present development is the first, The Asymmetric Warfare: In Search of a
Symmetry, which is a theoretical study aimed at introducing the topic, first
through an analysis (necessarily partial) of the existing literature and then
through a projection on the terrain, with an investigation of the tools that
might be effective in countering asymmetric warfare. The conclusion of the
studyisthattheglobalnatureofthiskindofconflictrequiressolutionsthat
are more political than military, where the functions of the armed forces
employed appear to be more conflict containment than conflict resolution.
Thenextessay,byEraldoOlivetta,MilitaryOrganizationandAsymmetric
Conflicts: Changing Approach, arrives at similar conclusions and asserts the
suitability of a global approach. Starting from a review of the differences
between such missions and the traditional role of soldiers, the author
providesguidelinesonspecificnewskillsandtechnicalknowledgeneededto
participate in these operations, writing that ‘‘success is secured by deploying
ArmedForcesandConflictResolution:SociologicalPerspectives
ContributionstoConflictManagement,PeaceEconomicsandDevelopment,Volume7,3–5
Copyrightr2008byEmeraldGroupPublishingLimited
Allrightsofreproductioninanyformreserved
ISSN:1572-8323/doi:10.1016/S1572-8323(08)07001-X
3