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Civilian control of the militaryCivilian control of the military is a doctrine in military and political science that places ultimate responsibility for a country's strategic decision-making in the

hands of the civilian political leadership, rather than professional military officers. The reverse situation, where professional military officers control national

politics, is called a military dictatorship. A lack of control over the military may result in a state within a state. One author, paraphrasing Samuel P. Huntington's

writings in The Soldier and the State, has summarized the civilian control ideal as "the proper subordination of a competent, professional military to the ends of

policy as determined by civilian authority".[1]

Civilian control is often seen as a prerequisite feature of a stable liberal democracy. Use of the term in scholarly analyses tends to take place in the context of a

democracy governed by elected officials, though the subordination of the military to political control is not unique to these societies. One example is the People's

Republic of China. Mao Zedong stated that "Our principle is that the Party commands the gun, and the gun must never be allowed to command the Party,"

reflecting the primacy of the Communist Party of China (and communist parties in general) as decision-makers in Marxist–Leninist and Maoist theories of

democratic centralism.[2]

As noted by University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill professor Richard H. Kohn, "civilian control is not a fact but a process".[3] Affirmations of respect for the

values of civilian control notwithstanding, the actual level of control sought or achieved by the civilian leadership may vary greatly in practice, from a statement of

broad policy goals that military commanders are expected to translate into operational plans, to the direct selection of specific targets for attack on the part of

governing politicians. National Leaders with limited experience in military matters often have little choice but to rely on the advice of professional military

commanders trained in the art and science of warfare to inform the limits of policy; in such cases, the military establishment may enter the bureaucratic arena to

advocate for or against a particular course of action, shaping the policy-making process and blurring any clear-cut lines of civilian control.

Rationales

Liberal theory and the American Founding Fathers

Domestic law enforcement

Maoist approach

Methods of asserting civilian control

A civilian commander-in-chief

Composition of the military

Contents

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Technological developments

Restrictions on Political Activities

Political officers

Military dislike of political directives

Case study: United States

Extent

See also

References

Further reading

Advocates of civilian control generally take a Clausewitzian view of war, emphasizing its political

character. The words of Georges Clemenceau, "War is too serious a matter to entrust to military men"

(also frequently rendered as "War is too important to be left to the generals"), wryly reflect this view.

Given that broad strategic decisions, such as the decision to declare a war, start an invasion, or end a

conflict, have a major impact on the citizens of the country, they are seen by civilian control advocates as

best guided by the will of the people (as expressed by their political representatives), rather than left

solely to an elite group of tactical experts. The military serves as a special government agency, which is

supposed to implement, rather than formulate, policies that require the use of certain types of physical

force. Kohn succinctly summarizes this view when he writes that:

The point of civilian control is to make security subordinate to the larger purposes of a

nation, rather than the other way around. The purpose of the military is to defend society,

not to define it.[3]

A state's effective use of force is an issue of great concern for all national leaders, who must rely on the

military to supply this aspect of their authority. The danger of granting military leaders full autonomy or

sovereignty is that they may ignore or supplant the democratic decision-making process, and use physical

force, or the threat of physical force, to achieve their preferred outcomes; in the worst cases, this may

Rationales

Admiral John B. Nathman (far right) and AdmiralWilliam J. Fallon salute during honors arrival ofSecretary of the Navy Gordon R. England at achange of command ceremony in 2005. Asubordinate of the civilian Secretary of Defense,the Secretary of the Navy is the civilian Head ofthe Department of the Navy, which includes theU.S. Navy and the Marine Corps.

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lead to a coup or military dictatorship. A related danger is the use of the military to crush domestic political opposition through intimidation or sheer physical

force, interfering with the ability to have free and fair elections, a key part of the democratic process. This poses the paradox that "because we fear others we create

an institution of violence to protect us, but then we fear the very institution we created for protection".[4] Also, military personnel, because of the nature of their

job, are much more willing to use force to settle disputes than civilians because they are trained military personnel that specialize strictly in warfare. The military is

authoritative and hierarchical, rarely allowing discussion and prohibiting dissention.[5] For instance, in the Empire of Japan, prime ministers and almost everyone

in high positions were military people like Hideki Tojo, and advocated and basically pressured the leaders to start military conflicts against China and others

because they believed that they would ultimately be victorious.

Many of the Founding Fathers of the United States were suspicious of standing militaries. As Samuel Adams wrote in 1768, "Even when there is a necessity of the

military power, within a land, a wise and prudent people will always have a watchful and jealous eye over it".[6] Even more forceful are the words of Elbridge Gerry,

a delegate to the American Constitutional Convention, who wrote that "[s]tanding armies in time of peace are inconsistent with the principles of republican

Governments, dangerous to the liberties of a free people, and generally converted into destructive engines for establishing despotism."[6]

In Federalist No. 8, one of The Federalist papers documenting the ideas of some of the Founding Fathers, Alexander Hamilton expressed concern that maintaining

a large standing army would be a dangerous and expensive undertaking. In his principal argument for the ratification of the proposed constitution, he argued that

only by maintaining a strong union could the new country avoid such a pitfall. Using the European experience as a negative example and the British experience as a

positive one, he presented the idea of a strong nation protected by a navy with no need of a standing army. The implication was that control of a large military force

is, at best, difficult and expensive, and at worst invites war and division. He foresaw the necessity of creating a civilian government that kept the military at a

distance.

James Madison, another writer of many of The Federalist papers,[7] expressed his concern about a standing military in comments before the Constitutional

Convention in June 1787:

In time of actual war, great discretionary powers are constantly given to the Executive Magistrate. Constant apprehension of War, has the same

tendency to render the head too large for the body. A standing military force, with an overgrown Executive, will not long be safe companions to

liberty. The means of defense against foreign danger, have been always the instruments of tyranny at home. Among the Romans it was a standing

maxim to excite a war, whenever a revolt was apprehended. Throughout all Europe, the armies kept up under the pretext of defending, have enslaved

the people.

[8]

The United States Constitution placed considerable limitations on the legislature. Coming from a tradition of legislative superiority in government, many were

concerned that the proposed Constitution would place so many limitations on the legislature that it would become impossible for such a body to prevent an

executive from starting a war. Hamilton argued in Federalist No. 26 that it would be equally as bad for a legislature to be unfettered by any other agency and that

Liberal theory and the American Founding Fathers

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restraints would actually be more likely to preserve liberty. James Madison, in Federalist No. 47, continued Hamilton’s argument that distributing powers among

the various branches of government would prevent any one group from gaining so much power as to become unassailable. In Federalist No. 48, however, Madison

warned that while the separation of powers is important, the departments must not be so far separated as to have no ability to control the others.

Finally, in Federalist No. 51, Madison argued that to create a government that relied primarily on the good nature of the incumbent to ensure proper government

was folly. Institutions must be in place to check incompetent or malevolent leaders. Most importantly, no single branch of government ought to have control over

any single aspect of governing. Thus, all three branches of government must have some control over the military, and the system of checks and balances

maintained among the other branches would serve to help control the military.

Hamilton and Madison thus had two major concerns: (1) the detrimental effect on liberty and democracy of a large standing army and (2) the ability of an

unchecked legislature or executive to take the country to war precipitously. These concerns drove American military policy for the first century and a half of the

country’s existence. While armed forces were built up during wartime, the pattern after every war up to and including World War II was to demobilize quickly and

return to something approaching pre-war force levels. However, with the advent of the Cold War in the 1950s, the need to create and maintain a sizable peacetime

military force "engendered new concerns" of militarism and about how such a large force would affect civil–military relations in the United States.[9]

The United States' Posse Comitatus Act, passed in 1878, prohibits any part of the Army or the Air Force (since the U.S. Air Force evolved from the U.S. Army) from

engaging in domestic law enforcement activities unless they do so pursuant to lawful authority. Similar prohibitions apply to the Navy and Marine Corps by service

regulation, since the actual Posse Comitatus Act does not apply to them. The Coast Guard is exempt from Posse Comitatus since it normally operates under the

Department of Homeland Security versus the Department of Defense and enforces U.S. laws, even when operating as a service with the U.S. Navy.

The act is often misunderstood to prohibit any use of federal military forces in law enforcement, but this is not the case. For example, the President has explicit

authority under the Constitution and federal law to use federal forces or federalized militias to enforce the laws of the United States. The act's primary purpose is to

prevent local law enforcement officials from utilizing federal forces in this way by forming a "posse" consisting of federal Soldiers or Airmen.[10]

There are, however, practical political concerns in the United States that make the use of federal military forces less desirable for use in domestic law enforcement.

Under the U.S. Constitution, law and order is primarily a matter of state concern. As a practical matter, when military forces are necessary to maintain domestic

order and enforce the laws, state militia forces under state control i.e., that state's Army National Guard and/or Air National Guard are usually the force of first

resort, followed by federalized state militia forces i.e., the Army National Guard and/or Air National Guard "federalized" as part of the U.S. Army and/or U.S. Air

Force, with active federal forces (to include "federal" reserve component forces other than the National Guard) being the least politically palatable option.

Domestic law enforcement

Maoist approach

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Maoist military-political theories of people's war and democratic centralism also support the subordination of military forces to the directives of the communist

party (although the guerrilla experience of many early leading Communist Party of China figures may make their status as civilians somewhat ambiguous). In a

1929 essay On Correcting Mistaken Ideas in the Party, Mao explicitly refuted "comrades [who] regard military affairs and politics as opposed to each other and

[who] refuse to recognize that military affairs are only one means of accomplishing political tasks", prescribing increased scrutiny of the People's Liberation Army

by the Party and greater political training of officers and enlistees as a means of reducing military autonomy [11]. In Mao's theory, the military—which serves both

as a symbol of the revolution and an instrument of the dictatorship of the proletariat—is not merely expected to defer to the direction of the ruling non-uniformed

Party members (who today exercise control in the People's Republic of China through the Central Military Commission), but also to actively participate in the

revolutionary political campaigns of the Maoist era.

Civilian leaders cannot usually hope to challenge their militaries by means of force, and thus must guard against any potential usurpation of powers through a

combination of policies, laws, and the inculcation of the values of civilian control in their armed services. The presence of a distinct civilian police force, militia, or

other paramilitary group may mitigate to an extent the disproportionate strength that a country's military possesses; civilian gun ownership has also been justified

on the grounds that it prevents potential abuses of power by authorities (military or otherwise). Opponents of gun control have cited the need for a balance of

power in order to enforce the civilian control of the military.

The establishment of a civilian president or other government figure as the military's commander-in-chief within the chain of command is one legal construct for

the propagation of civilian control.

In the United States, Article I of the Constitution gives the Congress the power to declare war (in the War Powers Clause), while Article II of the Constitution

establishes the President as the commander-in-chief. Ambiguity over when the President could take military action without declaring war resulted in the War

Powers Resolution of 1973.

American presidents have used the power to dismiss high-ranking officers as a means to assert policy and strategic control. Three examples include Abraham

Lincoln's dismissal of George McClellan in the American Civil War when McClellan failed to pursue the Confederate Army of Northern Virginia following the Battle

of Antietam, Harry S. Truman relieving Douglas MacArthur of command in the Korean War after MacArthur repeatedly contradicted the Truman administration's

stated policies on the war's conduct, and Barack Obama's acceptance of Stanley McChrystal's resignation in the War in Afghanistan after a Rolling Stone article was

published where he mocked several members of the Obama administration, including Vice President Joe Biden.

Methods of asserting civilian control

A civilian commander-in-chief

Composition of the military

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Differing opinions exist as to the desirability of distinguishing the military as a body separate from the larger society.

In The Soldier and the State, Huntington argued for what he termed "objective civilian control", "focus[ing] on a

politically neutral, autonomous, and professional officer corps".[1] This autonomous professionalism, it is argued, best

inculcates an esprit de corps and sense of distinct military corporateness that prevents political interference by sworn

servicemen and -women. Conversely, the tradition of the citizen-soldier holds that "civilianizing" the military is the

best means of preserving the loyalty of the armed forces towards civilian authorities, by preventing the development of

an independent "caste" of warriors that might see itself as existing fundamentally apart from the rest of society. In the

early history of the United States, according to Michael Cairo,

[the] principle of civilian control... embodied the idea that every qualified citizen was responsible for the

defense of the nation and the defense of liberty, and would go to war, if necessary. Combined with the

idea that the military was to embody democratic principles and encourage citizen participation, the only

military force suitable to the Founders was a citizen militia, which minimized divisions between officers

and the enlisted.[6]

In a less egalitarian practice, societies may also blur the line between "civilian" and "military" leadership by making

direct appointments of non-professionals (frequently social elites benefitting from patronage or nepotism) to an officer

rank. A more invasive method, most famously practiced in the Soviet Union and People's Republic of China, involves

active monitoring of the officer corps through the appointment of political commissars, posted parallel to the

uniformed chain of command and tasked with ensuring that national policies are carried out by the armed forces. The

regular rotation of soldiers through a variety of different postings is another effective tool for reducing military

autonomy, by limiting the potential for soldiers' attachment to any one particular military unit. Some governments

place responsibility for approving promotions or officer candidacies with the civilian government, requiring some

degree of deference on the part of officers seeking advancement through the ranks.

Historically, direct control over military forces deployed for war was hampered by the technological limits of command, control, and communications; national

leaders, whether democratically elected or not, had to rely on local commanders to execute the details of a military campaign, or risk centrally-directed orders'

obsolescence by the time they reached the front lines. The remoteness of government from the action allowed professional soldiers to claim military affairs as their

own particular sphere of expertise and influence; upon entering a state of war, it was often expected that the generals and field marshals would dictate strategy and

tactics, and the civilian leadership would defer to their informed judgments.

An immensely popular hero of WorldWar II, General Douglas MacArthur'spublic insistence on the need toexpand the Korean War, over theobjections of President Harry S.Truman, led to the termination ofhis command.

Technological developments

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Improvements in information technology and its application to wartime command and control (a process sometimes

labeled the "Revolution in Military Affairs") has allowed civilian leaders removed from the theater of conflict to assert

greater control over the actions of distant military forces. Precision-guided munitions and real-time videoconferencing

with field commanders now allow the civilian leadership to intervene even at the tactical decision-making level,

designating particular targets for destruction or preservation based on political calculations or the counsel of non-

uniformed advisors.

In the United States the Hatch Act of 1939 does not directly apply to the military, however, Department of Defense

Directive 1344.10 (DoDD 1344.10) essentially applies the same rules to the military. This helps to ensure a non-

partisan military and ensure smooth and peaceful transitions of power.

Political officers screened for appropriate ideology have been integrated into supervisory roles within militaries as a

way to maintain the control by political rulers. Historically they are associated most strongly with the Soviet Union and

China rather than liberal democracies.

While civilian control forms the normative standard in almost every society outside of military dictatorships, its

practice has often been the subject of pointed criticism from both uniformed and non-uniformed observers, who object

to what they view as the undue "politicization" of military affairs, especially when elected officials or political

appointees micromanage the military, rather than giving the military general goals and objectives (like "Defeat Country

X"), and letting the military decide how best to carry those orders out. By placing responsibility for military decision-

making in the hands of non-professional civilians, critics argue, the dictates of military strategy are subsumed to the

political, with the effect of unduly restricting the fighting capabilities of the nation's armed forces for what should be immaterial or otherwise lower priority

concerns.

The "Revolt of the Admirals" that occurred in 1949 was an attempt by senior US Navy personnel, to force a change in budgets directly opposed to the directives

given by the Civilian leadership.

During the term of Lyndon B.Johnson, the President and hisadvisors often chose specificbombing targets in Vietnam on thebasis of larger geopoliticalcalculations, without professionalknowledge of the weapons ortactics. Apropos of LBJ's direction ofthe bombing campaign in Vietnam,no air warfare specialists attendedthe Tuesday lunches at which thetargeting decisions were made.[12]

Restrictions on Political Activities

Political officers

Military dislike of political directives

Case study: United States

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U.S. President Bill Clinton faced frequent allegations throughout his time in office (particularly after the Battle of Mogadishu) that he was ignoring military goals

out of political and media pressure—a phenomenon termed the "CNN effect". Politicians who personally lack military training and experience but who seek to

engage the nation in military action may risk resistance and being labeled "chickenhawks" by those who disagree with their political goals.

In contesting these priorities, members of the professional military leadership and their non-uniformed supporters may participate in the bureaucratic bargaining

process of the state's policy-making apparatus, engaging in what might be termed a form of regulatory capture as they attempt to restrict the policy options of

elected officials when it comes to military matters. An example of one such set of conditions is the "Weinberger Doctrine", which sought to forestall another

American intervention like that which occurred in the Vietnam War (which had proved disastrous for the morale and fighting integrity of the U.S. military) by

proposing that the nation should only go to war in matters of "vital national interest", "as a last resort", and, as updated by Weinberger's disciple Colin Powell, with

"overwhelming force". The process of setting military budgets forms another contentious intersection of military and non-military policy, and regularly draws

active lobbying by rival military services for a share of the national budget.

Nuclear weapons in the U.S. are controlled by the civilian United States Department of Energy, not by the Department of Defense.

During the 1990s and 2000s, public controversy over LGBT policy in the U.S. military led to many military leaders and personnel being asked for their opinions on

the matter and being given deference although the decision was ultimately not theirs to make.

During his tenure, Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld raised the ire of the military by attempting to reform its structure away from traditional infantry and

toward a lighter, faster, more technologically driven force. In April 2006, Rumsfeld was severely criticized by some retired military officers for his handling of the

Iraq war, while other retired military officers came out in support of Rumsfeld. Although no active military officers have spoken out against Rumsfeld, the actions

of these officers is still highly unusual. Some news accounts have attributed the actions of these generals to the Vietnam war experience, in which officers did not

speak out against the administration's handling of military action. Later in the year, immediately after the November elections in which the Democrats gained

control of the Congress, Rumsfeld resigned.

As of 2015, Military dictatorships, where there is no civilian control of the military, are:

Thailand

Other countries generally have civilian control of the military, to one degree or another. Strong democratic control of the military is a prerequisite for membership

in NATO. Strong democracy and rule of law, implying democratic control of the military, are prerequisites for membership in the European Union.

Civil–military relations

Might makes right

Extent

See also

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Military–industrial complex

National Security Act

Political commissar

Revolt of the Admirals

Separation of powers

State within a state

Armed Forces & Society

1. Taylor, Edward R. Command in the 21st Century: An Introduction to Civil-Military Affairs (http://handle.dtic.mil/100.2/ADA346358) (pdf), United States NavyPostgraduate School thesis. 1998: 30-32.

2. Mao Zedong, English language translation by Marxists.org. Problems of War and Strategy (http://www.marxists.org/reference/archive/mao/selected-works/v

olume-2/mswv2_12.htm). 1938. (See also: Wikiquote: Mao Zedong.)3. Kohn, Richard H. An Essay on Civilian Control of the Military (http://www.unc.edu/depts/diplomat/AD_Issues/amdipl_3/kohn.html). 1997.4. Peter D. Feaver. 1996. "The Civil-Military Problematique: Huntington, Janowitz and the Question of Civilian Control." Armed Forces & Society (http://afs.sage

pub.com/cgi/reprint/23/2/149). 23(2): 149–78.5. "Kohn: Civilian Control" (http://www.unc.edu/depts/diplomat/AD_Issues/amdipl_3/kohn.html). Unc.edu. Retrieved 2015-12-11.6. Cairo, Michael F. Democracy Papers: Civilian Control of the Military (https://web.archive.org/web/20051026185242/http://usinfo.state.gov/products/pubs/de

mocracy/dmpaper12.htm), U.S. Department of State International Information Programs.7. Gottfried Dietze. 1960. The Federalist: A Classic on Federalism and Free Government. Baltimore: The Johns Hopkins Press.8. Max Farrand. 1911. Records of the Federal Convention of 1787 (http://memory.loc.gov/ammem/amlaw/lwfr.html). New Haven: Yale University Press. 1:465.9. Donald S. Inbody. 2009. Grand Army of the Republic or Grand Army of the Republicans? Political Party and Ideological Preferences of American Enlisted

Personnel. Faculty Publications – Political Science (http://ecommons.txstate.edu/polsfacp/51). Paper 51.10. Hendell, Garri B. "[1] (http://publius.oxfordjournals.org/content/41/2/336)" "Domestic Use of the Armed Forces to Maintain Law and Order—posse comitatus

Pitfalls at the Inauguration of the 44th President" Publius (2011) 41(2): 336-348 first published online May 6, 2010 doi:10.1093/publius/pjq014 (https://doi.org/10.1093%2Fpublius%2Fpjq014)

11. Mao Zedong, English language translation by Marxists.org. On Correcting Mistaken Ideas in the Party (http://www.marxists.org/reference/archive/mao/select

ed-works/volume-1/mswv1_5.htm). 1929.12. "Washington's Management of the Rolling Thunder Campaign" (http://www.history.navy.mil/colloquia/cch4c.htm), M. Jacobsen, US Naval Historical Center

Colloquium on Contemporary History Project

References

Further reading

1/14/2018 Civilian control of the military - Wikipedia

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von Clausewitz, Carl. On War – Volume One

1832 German language edition available on the internet at the Clausewitz Homepage (http://www.clausewitz.com/CWZHOME/VomKriege/VKTOC.htm)

1874 English language translation by Colonel J.J. Granham downloadable here (http://www.gutenberg.org/etext/1946) from Project Gutenberg.

1982 Penguin Classics paperback version, ISBN 0-14-044427-0.

Desch, Michael C. Civilian Control of the Military: The Changing Security Environment Johns Hopkins University Press, 2001. ISBN 0-8018-6059-8

Feaver, Peter D. Armed Servants: Agency, Oversight, and Civil-Military Relations. Harvard University Press, 2005 ISBN 0-674-01761-7

Finer, Samel E. The Man on Horseback: The Role of the Military in Politics. Transaction Publishers, 2002. ISBN 0-7658-0922-2

Hendell, Garri B. "Domestic Use of the Armed Forces to Maintain Law and Order – posse comitatus Pitfalls at the Inauguration of the 44th President" Publius

(2011) 41(2): 336–48 first published online May 6, 2010 doi:10.1093/publius/pjq014 (https://doi.org/10.1093%2Fpublius%2Fpjq014)

Huntington, Samuel P.. Soldier and the State: The Theory and Politics of Civil-Military Relations. Belknap Press, 1981 edition. ISBN 0-674-81736-2

Levy, Yagil. "A Revised Model of Civilian Control of the Military: The Interaction between the Republican Exchange and the Control Exchange" (http://afs.sagepub.com/content/38/4/529.abstract), Armed Forces & Society, Vol. 38, No. 4 (2012)

Janowitz, Morris. The Professional Soldier. Free Press, 1964, ISBN 0-02-916180-0.

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What is meant by ‘democratic control of

armed forces’?

How is democratic control related

to other concepts addressing the

relationship between the armed forces

and society?

What are the key features of an eff ective

system of democratic control?

Why is democratic control important?

How are democratic control norms

implemented?

What are the main functions of the

actors involved in democratic control?

What are the main international norms

for democratic control?

What are some of the special challenges

of post-authoritarian and post-confl ict

environments?

What are some of the key debates

concerning democratic control?

D CA F

Democratic Control of Armed Forces

DCAF Backgrounder

What is meant by ‘democratic control of

armed forces’?

Democratic control of armed forces refers to the norms

and standards governing the relationship between

the armed forces and society, whereby the armed forces

are subordinated to democratically-elected authorities

and subject to the oversight of the judiciary as well as

the media and civil society organisations. Democratic

control of armed forces is not to be confused with DCAF,

the international foundation under Swiss law that

sponsors this Backgrounder series and whose founding

was inspired by the importance attached to the principles

of democratic control.

In current usage, armed forces are often understood

as meaning all statutory bodies with a capacity to use force,

including the military, police, gendarmerie, intelligence

services, border, coast and penitentiary guards and other

public security forces, as well as non-statutory armed

groups. For the purposes of this Backgrounder, the term

‘armed forces’ is used in the traditional way and refers

only to the military, namely, the army, navy, air force and

special forces such as marines. However, many of the

observations made in this Backgrounder about the

relationship between the military and society also apply

to the relationship between other armed forces and

society.

How is democratic control related to other

concepts addressing the relationship between

the armed forces and society?

Thinking about the relationship between the armed

forces and society has evolved through several phases.

The notion of civil-military relations constituted the

dominant approach during the Cold War. It focused on

the need for the military to be subordinate to society,

not a self-serving actor pursuing its own interests and

objectives. With the end of the Cold War, there was a

growing emphasis on the idea that the military not

only had to be subject to societal control, but that this

control needed to be democratically constituted. In 1994,

negotiations in the then CSCE led to an agreement by

all participating states on a politically binding Code of

This document is part of the DCAF Backgrounder series, which provides practitioners with concise introductions to a variety of issues in the fi eld of Security Sector Governance and Security Sector Reform.

Geneva Centre for theDemocratic Control

of Armed Forces

05/2008

2

Democratic Control of Armed Forces

Conduct on Political-Military Aspects of Security.

The Code represented a further progression in

that it called for the democratic control of internal

security forces in addition to the military.

The last decade has witnessed further progress

as the focus has shifted to the need for democratic

governance of the entire security sector.

Security sector reform and governance (SSR/G)

have generated new thinking on the subject

of the armed forces-society relationship. For

example, SSR/G has encouraged the adoption

of a more comprehensive understanding of the

security sector to include such non-statutory

actors as private security and military companies,

as well as the traditional non-state security forces

that often play an important role in providing

security in developing countries.

What are the key features of an eff ective

system of democratic control?

An eff ective system of democratic control is

characterised by the following elements:

• Civilian control. Civilian authorities

have control over the military’s missions,

composition, budget and procurement

policies. Military policy is defi ned or approved

by the civilian leadership, but the military

enjoys substantial operational autonomy in

determining which operations are required

to achieve the policy objectives defi ned by

the civilian authority.

• Democratic governance. Democratic

parliamentary and judicial institutions, a

strong civil society and an independent media

oversee the performance of the military.

This ensures its accountability to both the

population and the government, and promotes

transparency in its decisions and actions.

• Civilian expertise. Civilians have the necessary

expertise to fulfi l their defence management

and oversight responsibilities. This is tempered

by respect for the professional expertise of the

military, in particular as civilians often have

limited operational experience.

• Non-interference in domestic politics.

Neither the military as an institution nor

individual military leaders attempt to infl uence

domestic politics.

• Ideological neutrality. The military does

not endorse any particular ideology or ethos

beyond that of allegiance to the country.

• Minimal role in the national economy. The

military may be the largest national employer

and have links to defence-related economic

sectors. This does not, however, dilute the

military’s loyalty to the democratic civilian

leadership, undermine its primary mission

or lead to disproportionate competition or

interference with the civilian industrial sector.

• Eff ective chain of command. There is an

eff ective chain of command within the military

that ensures accountability to society and its

oversight institutions, promotes respect for all

Evolution of the military-society relationship

civil-military relations

democratic control of all the armed forces

democratic control of the military

democratic governance of the security sector

Geneva Centre for the Democratic Control of Armed Forces

3

relevant laws and regulations, and seeks to

ensure professionalism in the military.

• Respect for the rights of military personnel.

Members of the armed forces are free to

exercise their rights.

Why is democratic control important?

Democratic control of armed forces is a pre-

condition for ensuring that

• the political supremacy of the democratically-

elected civilian authorities is respected,

• the rule of law and human rights are

safeguarded,

• the armed forces serve the interests of the

population and enjoy popular support and

legitimacy,

• the policies and capabilities of the military are

in line with the country’s political objectives

and commensurate with its resources and

• the military is not misused for political

purposes.

Since the end of the Cold War, several

developments have pushed the issue of

democratic control to the forefront:

• the unprecedented wave of democratisation

and the proliferation of fragile and failed states,

where the need for, or the lack of, democratic

control has been of key importance;

• the use of democratic control norms as inter-

state confi dence-building measures, such as

in the case of the OSCE Code of Conduct on

Political-Military Aspects of Security;

• the enlargements of the EU, NATO and the

Council of Europe, with their democratic

control-related admission requirements;

• the increased emphasis on the democratic

control of armed forces in the context of peace

agreements, peacebuilding, confl ict prevention

and sustainable development;

• the transformation of the armed forces of

many states in the international community in

response to new strategic conditions.

How are democratic control norms

implemented?

The principles of democratic control are

implemented through a variety of mechanisms:

1) a clear legal framework that incorporates the

main principles of democratic control:

• democratic control principles may be explicitly

addressed in a country’s constitution; for

example, as in the U.S. Constitution (1787) and

its Polish counterpart (1997)

• national parliaments may adopt specifi c laws

introducing or strengthening democratic

control principles; recent examples include

Ukraine’s Law on Democratic Civil Control

of State Military and Law-Enforcement

Organizations (2003) and Sierra Leone’s Lomé

Peace Agreement (Ratifi cation) Act (1999),

which stipulate that the military shall be

accountable to civilian leadership.

2) the creation of institutional mechanisms that

• guarantee that the rule of law is respected

throughout the ranks with the assistance of

institutions such as military ombudspersons

or inspectors general; in Canada, for example,

Democratic Control of Armed Forces

Geneva Centre for the Democratic Control of Armed Forces

Democratic Control Paradigms

There are two main control paradigms. One is based

on the way control is exercised. Vertical control is

the exercise of ‘top-down’ infl uence over the military.

Horizontal control entails commenting on or

otherwise informally infl uencing matters of defence

policy and occurs via the media and civil society

organisations. Self-control refers to the actions that

the military itself performs to ensure that rules are

respected.

Another classifi cation is based on the timing of the

controls. Proactive control consists of steps aimed

at addressing future problems. Reactive control

occurs after decisions have been made and

includes review of defence policies or the audit of

expenditures. Operational control takes place

during military operations and involves a political

intervention in the decisions of the military chain of

command.

4Geneva Centre for the Democratic Control of Armed Forces

Actor Primary role Functions

Legi

slat

ure

parliament and relevant committees (security and defence, budget, etc.)

Legality and legitimacy

Vert

ical

con

trol - defi nition of basic policy

directions

- adoption of constitution, laws and budget oversight through ‘purse control’, hearings, debates

Exec

utiv

e

government, prime minister, president,national defence/ security council, ministries of defence, fi nance, internal and external affairs

Effectiveness and effi ciency

Vert

ical

con

trol - development and

implementation of security policy

- force planning management and fi nancial control

Judi

ciar

y constitutional court, supreme court, court of appeal,lower courts and prosecution offi ces, ombudsmen offi ces, independent auditing bodies

Rule of lawand respect for

human rights

Vert

ical

con

trol

- protection of constitution and laws

- administration of justice in the security sector

- investigation and resolution of complaints reported by citizens

Med

ia a

nd

Civi

l Soc

iety

media,non-governmental organisations, research institutes, think tanks, independent experts, political parties and security-related corporate actors

Transparency,accountability, education and

capacity-building

Hor

izon

tal c

ontr

ol - public debate and oversight

- development of security policy

- training and awareness-building

- fi nancial supervision

Arm

ed f

orce

s

military inspectorate, military courts, general staff, offi cers corps, enlisted personnel

Self-control, neutrality and professionalism

Vert

ical

+ h

oriz

onta

l co

ntro

l - internal control

- protection of human rights

- respect for laws and professional standards

What are the main functions of the actors involved in democratic control ?

The table below provides an overview of the actors involved in the democratic control of armed

forces and the typical forms of management and control of the military:

Democratic Control of Armed Forces

5

the creation of an ombudsman was prompted

by the involvement of Canadian peacekeepers

in human rights abuses in Somalia.

• conduct audits to prevent corruption and

fraud that might otherwise remain concealed

from the public due to the classifi ed nature

of some military information; such audits are

carried out by independent parliamentary

and media investigations, as for example

in Indonesia where an audit to scrutinise

the fi nancial practices of military-owned

foundations was carried out in 2000.

3) the development of educational measures

that

• attempt to inculcate a new security culture

in civilian and military communities through

a focus on such issues as civil-military co-

operation and better integration of armed

forces within society; for example, after World

War II Germany adopted the concept of

soldiers as ‘citizens in uniform’ to ensure that

military personnel operated as part of, rather

than apart from, the civilian population.

• involve training of security personnel on such

issues as democratic values, human rights,

international humanitarian law and democratic

control of armed forces norms developed by

international organisations; the Swiss army, for

instance, conducts courses on international

humanitarian law for its own personnel and

for members of the armed forces of other

countries.

What are the main international norms

for democratic control?

The need to respect democratic control norms

and standards has been articulated in a variety of

contexts. The norms contained in the OSCE Code

of Conduct on Politico-Military Aspects of Security

are by far the furthest reaching. Apart from these,

democratic control norms have fi gured in UN

reports and resolutions, the Carnovale-Simon

test for NATO entry, EU development assistance

and membership policies, Council of Europe

Recommendations and the draft ECOWAS Code

of Conduct for Armed and Security Forces.

Democratic Control of Armed Forces

Democratic control norms in

the OSCE Code of Conduct

Maintenance of military capabilities commensurate

with individual or collective security needs

Determination of military capabilities on the basis of

democratic procedures

Non-imposition of military domination over other

OSCE states

Stationing of armed forces on the territory of

another state in accordance with freely negotiated

agreements and international law

Democratic political control of military, paramilitary,

internal security forces, intelligence services and

police

Integration of armed forces with civil society

Eff ective guidance to and control of military,

paramilitary and security forces by constitutionally

established authorities vested with democratic

legitimacy

Legislative approval of defence expenditures

Restraint in military expenditure

Transparency and public access to information

related to the armed forces

Political neutrality of armed forces

Measures to guard against accidental or unauthorised

use of military means

No toleration or support for forces that are not

accountable to or controlled by their constitutionally

established authorities

Paramilitary forces not to be permitted to acquire

combat capabilities in excess of those for which they

were established

Recruitment or call-up to be consistent with human

rights and fundamental freedoms

Refl ection in laws or other relevant documents of the

rights and duties of armed forces personnel

Armed forces’ compliance with the provisions of

international humanitarian law

Armed forces personnel’s individual accountability

under national and international law

Protection of the rights of personnel serving in the

armed forces

(The OSCE Code of Conduct on Politico-Military Aspects of

Security, 1995)

•

•

•

•

•

•

•

•

•

•

•

•

•

•

•

•

•

•

•

6

What are some of the special challenges

of post-authoritarian and post-confl ict

environments?

In post-authoritarian and post-confl ict countries,

democratic control may be particularly diffi cult to

implement for a number of reasons:

• a lack of political consensus among the

country’s main communities and institutions;

• illegitimate civilian and military institutions,

and a marginalised civil society;

• the existence of rebel groups and the need to

integrate them into the state’s armed forces;

• a lack of civilian managerial and oversight

capacity, and insuffi cient domestic expertise in

defence aff airs;

• a resistance to reform on the part of the military

or other actors;

• low public trust in the military, owing to past

abuses and continuing impunity;

• a lack of domestic resources to design and

implement reforms.

In post-confl ict environments, the government

may additionally face such problems as residual

violence, predatory behaviour against the local

population on the part of rogue elements within

the military and the prevalence of non-statutory

armed groups.

In such environments, the following measures

may be called for:

• the establishment of a truth and reconciliation

mechanism to help society and the military to

move beyond past abuses;

• the disarmament, demobilisation, and re-

integration (DDR) of former combatants, and

vetting of the security forces;

• the de-politicisation of the military command

and, as necessary, of the rank and fi le, as

well as programmes to reorient the role of

the military and (re-)create a functional link

between the military and the rest of society;

• the (re-)building of military management and

oversight capacity as well as military-relevant

civilian expertise.

In post-authoritarian and post-confl ict

environments, external donors may need to be

associated with eff orts to restore democratic

control, providing both professional expertise

and the necessary resources required to support

reform.

What are some of the key debates

concerning democratic control?

Control over defence policy: While the military

has expertise in many areas of national security,

military advisors to the civil leadership may be

biased towards goals such as increasing the

defence budget at the expense of addressing

other aspects of security. At the same time, the

civilian leadership may lack experience in defence

aff airs, which is crucial to policy formulation and

oversight. The military must be involved in the

defence planning process, but an appropriately-

informed civilian leadership should have fi nal say

on all matters.

Civil-military gap: The military tends to be an

insular institution, due in part to its desire to

preserve characteristics it often perceives as

crucial to its effi ciency, such as esprit de corps,

a strong work ethic and in some cases,

conservative social values. When the cultural,

political and ethnic composition of the military

diff ers from that of society as a whole, a ‘civil-

Democratic Control of Armed Forces

Code of Conduct for Armed and Security Forces

in West Africa

In 2006, the ECOWAS Code of Conduct for Armed and

Security Forces in West Africa was adopted by the chiefs of

staff of the fi fteen ECOWAS member states. Largely inspired

by the internal and cross-border confl icts that have plagued

West Africa in recent years, the ECOWAS Code, is more

advanced than the OSCE Code in terms of democratic

control. It is also more detailed in regard to implementation,

in particular as concerns the institutions of national and

sub-regional ombudsmen, which are not mentioned in the

OSCE Code. DCAF has facilitated the development of the

ECOWAS Code, whose approval by the ECOWAS Council of

Ministers and Heads of States is pending.

Geneva Centre for the Democratic Control of Armed Forces

7

military gap’ can emerge. For example, if

the military is not committed to the notion

of civil supremacy over military aff airs,

there is an increased risk of inappropriate

military involvement in the country’s political

life. A civil-military gap can also reduce public

acceptance of the military, which can in turn

lead to its further isolation. In particular, the

military should not exclude individuals based

on characteristics such as race, ethnicity, class,

religion, gender or sexual orientation. In cases

where certain groups are marginalised in

society, special measures may be necessary in

order to increase their representation in the

military.

Role of civilian leadership in time of confl ict:

Military offi cials often advocate maintaining

complete control over operations once the

political decision to deploy troops or use force

has been made. However, many operational

decisions have political ramifi cations, and it is

therefore important for the civil leadership to

exercise close scrutiny over actions in the fi eld

in order to ensure that operations are consistent

with the country’s political objectives. The

challenge is to devise systems of accountability

and oversight that incorporate the legitimate

concerns of both the military and civilian

leadership.

The duty to obey… and to disobey: Soldiers are,

of course, required to follow their commanding

offi cers’ orders, but not when these orders are

unconstitutional and/or illegal, say, from the

standpoint of IHL. While the distinction is widely

recognized, it is often not accepted by states

whose armed forces are not under democratic

control.

Conscription versus all-volunteer army:

Having a conscripted army can ensure that the

population at large is engaged in supporting the

military’s role in national security. However, in

the experience of countries as diverse as Russia

and the United States (where there is no longer

a draft), it has proven nigh impossible to ensure

that all able-bodied men and women fulfi l the

service requirement. Volunteer armies tend to

attract more motivated personnel and off er

greater training opportunities, therefore

contributing to both higher levels of

professionalism and reduced costs. A professional

soldier may cost more to train and equip,

but he or she also tends to be more skilled.

The main drawback with the volunteer army

model is that professional soldiers may become

progressively more remote from the society they

are supposed to protect. A society whose sons

and daughters are not on the front line is a society

that may be more ready to go to war.

Further Information

Democratic Oversight of The Security Sector:

What Does It Mean? Born, 2002

http://www.dcaf.ch/docs/WP09(E).pdf

Parliamentary Oversight of the Security Sector:

Principles, Mechanisms and Practices, Born, Fluri

and Johnsson, 2003

http://www.dcaf.ch/oversight/

Oversight and Guidance: The Relevance of

Parliamentary Oversight for the Security Sector

and Its Reform, Born, Fluri and Lunn, 2003

www.dcaf.ch/docs/dcaf_doc4.pdf

Categorization of Democratic Civilian Control

(DCC) Lambert, 2005

http://www.dcaf.ch/docs/WP164.pdf

Code of Conduct for Armed and Security Forces

in West Africa

http://www.dcaf.ch/code_conduct-armed-forces-

west-africa/_index.cfm

Democratic Control of Armed Forces

Geneva Centre for the Democratic Control of Armed Forces

THE DCAF BACKGROUNDER SERIESon Security Sector Governance and Reform

DCAF Backgrounders provide concise introductions to contemporary issues in security sector governance and reform. The series

is designed for the use of practitioners and policymakers. Your feedback is encouraged. Please send comments and suggestions to

backgrounders@dcaf.ch

David Law is the editor of the Backgrounder series. The material for this backgrounder was generated by Jamina Glisic and Alexandre

Lambert. Oksana Myshlovska and Jamie Stocker provided additional input and editorial assistance. Katie Meline and Gabriel Real de Azua

also assisted with the preparation of the fi nal draft of this Backgrounder.

The Geneva Centre for the Democratic Control of Armed Forces (DCAF) promotes good governance and reform of the

security sector. The Centre conducts research on good practices, encourages the development of appropriate norms

at the national and international levels, makes policy recommendations and provides in-country advice and assistance

programmes. DCAF’s partners include governments, parliaments, civil society, international organisations and the range

of security sector actors such as police, judiciary, intelligence agencies, border security services and the military.

Visit us at www.dcaf.ch

DCAF

• Child Soldiers

• Contemporary Challenges for the

Intelligence Community

• Defence Attachés

• Democratic Control of Armed Forces

• Intelligence Services

• Military Ombudsman

• Multiethnic Armed Forces

• National Security Policy

• Parliamentary Committees on Defence

and Security

Available Backgrounders

• Parliamentary Oversight of Intelligence

Services

• Parliament’s Role in Defence

Budgeting

• Parliaments ’s Role in Defence

Procurement

• Private Military Companies

• Sending Troops Abroad

• States of Emergency

• Traffi cking in Human Beings

• Vetting for the Security Sector

www.dcaf.ch/backgrounders

1/14/2018 Democracy - Wikipedia

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DemocracyDemocracy (Greek: δημοκρατία dēmokratía, literally "rule of the people"), in modern usage, is a

system of government in which the citizens exercise power directly or elect representatives from

among themselves to form a governing body, such as a parliament.[2] Democracy is sometimes

referred to as "rule of the majority".[3] Democracy is a system of processing conflicts in which

outcomes depend on what participants do, but no single force controls what occurs and its

outcomes.

The uncertainty of outcomes is inherent in democracy, which makes all forces struggle repeatedly

for the realization of their interests, being the devolution of power from a group of people to a set of

rules.[4] Western democracy, as distinct from that which existed in pre-modern societies, is

generally considered to have originated in city states such as Classical Athens and the Roman

Republic, where various schemes and degrees of enfranchisement of the free male population were

observed before the form disappeared in the West at the beginning of late antiquity. The English

word dates to the 16th century, from the older Middle French and Middle Latin equivalents.

According to political scientist Larry Diamond, democracy consists of four key elements: (a) A

political system for choosing and replacing the government through free and fair elections; (b) The

active participation of the people, as citizens, in politics and civic life; (c) Protection of the human

rights of all citizens, and (d) A rule of law, in which the laws and procedures apply equally to all

citizens.[5]

The term appeared in the 5th century BC, to denote the political systems then existing in Greek city-

states, notably Athens, to mean "rule of the people", in contrast to aristocracy (ἀριστοκρατία,

aristokratía), meaning "rule of an elite". While theoretically these definitions are in opposition, in

practice the distinction has been blurred historically.[6] The political system of Classical Athens, for

example, granted democratic citizenship to free men and excluded slaves and women from political

participation. In 1906, Finland became the first government to herald a more inclusive democracy at

the national level. In virtually all democratic governments throughout ancient and modern history,

democratic citizenship consisted of an elite class until full enfranchisement was won for all adult

citizens in most modern democracies through the suffrage movements of the 19th and 20th centuries.

Most democratic (closest to 10) Least democratic (closest to 0)

Democracy's de facto status in the world as of 2016,according to Democracy Index by The Economist.[1]

Democracy's de jure status in the world as of 2008.Only Saudi Arabia, Myanmar, Brunei and the Vaticanofficially admit to be undemocratic.

1/14/2018 Democracy - Wikipedia

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Democracy contrasts with forms of government where power is either held by an individual, as in an absolute

monarchy, or where power is held by a small number of individuals, as in an oligarchy. Nevertheless, these

oppositions, inherited from Greek philosophy,[7] are now ambiguous because contemporary governments have

mixed democratic, oligarchic, and monarchic elements. Karl Popper defined democracy in contrast to

dictatorship or tyranny, thus focusing on opportunities for the people to control their leaders and to oust them

without the need for a revolution.[8]

Characteristics

History

Ancient origins

Middle Ages

Modern eraEarly modern period

18th and 19th centuries

20th and 21st centuries

Measurement of democracy

Types of governmental democracies

Basic formsDirect

Representative

Hybrid or semi-direct

VariantsConstitutional monarchy

Republic

Liberal democracy

Socialist

Anarchist

A person casts vote in the second round ofthe 2007 French presidential election.

Contents

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Sortition

Consociational

Consensus democracy

Supranational

Inclusive

Participatory politics

Cosmopolitan

Creative democracy

Guided democracy

Non-governmental democracy

Theory

Aristotle

Early Republican theory

RationaleAggregative

Deliberative

Radical

Criticism

Inefficiencies

Popular rule as a façade

Mob rule

Political instability

Fraudulent elections

Opposition

Development

See also

References

1/14/2018 Democracy - Wikipedia

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Further reading

External links

No consensus exists on how to define democracy, but legal equality, political freedom and rule of law have been identified as important characteristics.[9][10] These

principles are reflected in all eligible citizens being equal before the law and having equal access to legislative processes. For example, in a representative

democracy, every vote has equal weight, no unreasonable restrictions can apply to anyone seeking to become a representative, and the freedom of its eligible

citizens is secured by legitimised rights and liberties which are typically protected by a constitution.[11][12] Other uses of "democracy" include that of direct

democracy.

One theory holds that democracy requires three fundamental principles: (1) upward control, i.e. sovereignty residing at the lowest levels of authority, (2) political

equality, and (3) social norms by which individuals and institutions only consider acceptable acts that reflect the first two principles of upward control and political

equality.[13]

The term "democracy" is sometimes used as shorthand for liberal democracy, which is a variant of representative democracy that may include elements such as

political pluralism; equality before the law; the right to petition elected officials for redress of grievances; due process; civil liberties; human rights; and elements of

civil society outside the government. Roger Scruton argues that democracy alone cannot provide personal and political freedom unless the institutions of civil

society are also present.[14]

In some countries, notably in the United Kingdom which originated the Westminster system, the dominant principle is that of parliamentary sovereignty, while

maintaining judicial independence.[15][16] In the United States, separation of powers is often cited as a central attribute. In India, parliamentary sovereignty is

subject to the Constitution of India which includes judicial review.[17] Though the term "democracy" is typically used in the context of a political state, the

principles also are applicable to private organisations.

Majority rule is often listed as a characteristic of democracy. Hence, democracy allows for political minorities to be oppressed by the "tyranny of the majority" in

the absence of legal protections of individual or group rights. An essential part of an "ideal" representative democracy is competitive elections that are substantively

and procedurally "fair," i.e., just and equitable. In some countries, freedom of political expression, freedom of speech, freedom of the press, and internet democracy

are considered important to ensure that voters are well informed, enabling them to vote according to their own interests.[18][19]

It has also been suggested that a basic feature of democracy is the capacity of all voters to participate freely and fully in the life of their society.[20] With its

emphasis on notions of social contract and the collective will of all the voters, democracy can also be characterised as a form of political collectivism because it is

defined as a form of government in which all eligible citizens have an equal say in lawmaking.[21]

While representative democracy is sometimes equated with the republican form of government, the term "republic" classically has encompassed both democracies

and aristocracies.[22][23] Many democracies are constitutional monarchies, such as the United Kingdom.

Characteristics

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The term "democracy" first appeared in ancient Greek political and philosophical thought in the city-state of Athens during

classical antiquity.[24][25] The word comes from demos, "common people" and kratos, strength.[26] Led by Cleisthenes,

Athenians established what is generally held as the first democracy in 508–507 BC. Cleisthenes is referred to as "the father of

Athenian democracy."[27]

Athenian democracy took the form of a direct democracy, and it had two distinguishing features: the random selection of

ordinary citizens to fill the few existing government administrative and judicial offices,[28] and a legislative assembly consisting

of all Athenian citizens.[29] All eligible citizens were allowed to speak and vote in the assembly, which set the laws of the city

state. However, Athenian citizenship excluded women, slaves, foreigners (μέτοικοι / métoikoi), non-landowners, and men

under 20 years of age. The exclusion of large parts of the population from the citizen body is closely related to the ancient

understanding of citizenship. In most of antiquity the benefit of citizenship was tied to the obligation to fight war

campaigns.[30]

Athenian democracy was not only direct in the sense that decisions were made by the assembled people, but also the mostdirect in the sense that the people through the assembly, boule and courts of law controlled the entire political process and a large proportion of citizens were

involved constantly in the public business.[31] Even though the rights of the individual were not secured by the Athenian constitution in the modern sense (the

ancient Greeks had no word for "rights"[32]), the Athenians enjoyed their liberties not in opposition to the government but by living in a city that was not subject to

another power and by not being subjects themselves to the rule of another person.[33]

Range voting appeared in Sparta as early as 700 BC. The Apella was an assembly of the people, held once a month, in which every male citizen of at least 30 years

of age could participate. In the Apella, Spartans elected leaders and cast votes by range voting and shouting. Aristotle called this "childish", as compared with the

stone voting ballots used by the Athenians. Sparta adopted it because of its simplicity, and to prevent any bias voting, buying, or cheating that was predominant in

the early democratic elections.[34][35]

Even though the Roman Republic contributed significantly to many aspects of democracy, only a minority of Romans were citizens with votes in elections for

representatives. The votes of the powerful were given more weight through a system of gerrymandering, so most high officials, including members of the Senate,

came from a few wealthy and noble families.[36] In addition, the Roman Republic was the first government in the western world to have a Republic as a nation-

state, although it didn't have much of a democracy. The Romans invented the concept of classics and many works from Ancient Greece were preserved.[37]

Additionally, the Roman model of governance inspired many political thinkers over the centuries,[38] and today's modern representative democracies imitate more

the Roman than the Greek models because it was a state in which supreme power was held by the people and their elected representatives, and which had an

History

Cleisthenes, "father ofAthenian democracy",modern bust

Ancient origins

1/14/2018 Democracy - Wikipedia

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elected or nominated leader.[39] Other cultures, such as the Iroquois Nation in the Americas between around 1450 and 1600 AD also developed a form of

democratic society before they came in contact with the Europeans. This indicates that forms of democracy may have been invented in other societies around the

world.

During the Middle Ages, there were various systems involving elections or assemblies, although often only involving a small part of the population. These included:

the Frostating, Gulating, Eidsivating and Borgarting in Norway,

the Althing in Iceland,

the Løgting in the Faeroe Islands,

Scandinavian Things,

the election of Uthman in the Rashidun Caliphate,

the South Indian Kingdom of the Chola in the state of Tamil Nadu in the Indian Subcontinent had an electoral system at 920 A.D., about 1100 years ago,[40]

Carantania, old Slavic/Slovenian principality, the Ducal Inauguration from 7th to 15th century,

the upper-caste election of the Gopala in the Bengal region of the Indian Subcontinent,

the Holy Roman Empire's Hoftag and Imperial Diets (mostly Nobles and Clergy),

Frisia in the 10th–15th Century (Weight of vote based on landownership)

the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth (10% of population),

certain medieval Italian city-states such as Venice, Genoa, Florence, Pisa, Lucca, Amalfi, Siena and San Marino

the Cortes of León,

the tuatha system in early medieval Ireland,

the Veche in Novgorod and Pskov Republics of medieval Russia,

The States in Tirol and Switzerland,

the autonomous merchant city of Sakai in the 16th century in Japan,

Volta-Nigeric societies such as Igbo.

the Mekhk-Khel system of the Nakh peoples of the North Caucasus, by which representatives to the Council of Elders for each teip (clan) were popularlyelected by that teip's members.

The 10th Sikh Guru Gobind Singh ji (Nanak X) established the world's first Sikh democratic republic state ending the aristocracy on day of 1st Vasakh 1699and Gurbani as sole constitution of this Sikh republic on the Indian subcontinent.

Middle Ages

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Most regions in medieval Europe were ruled by clergy or feudal lords.

The Kouroukan Fouga divided the Mali Empire into ruling clans (lineages) that were represented at a great assembly called the Gbara. However, the charter made

Mali more similar to a constitutional monarchy than a democratic republic. A little closer to modern democracy were the Cossack republics of Ukraine in the 16th

and 17th centuries: Cossack Hetmanate and Zaporizhian Sich. The highest post – the Hetman – was elected by the representatives from the country's districts.

The Parliament of England had its roots in the restrictions on the power of kings written into Magna Carta

(1215), which explicitly protected certain rights of the King's subjects and implicitly supported what

became the English writ of habeas corpus, safeguarding individual freedom against unlawful imprisonment

with right to appeal.[41][42] The first representative national assembly in England was Simon de

Montfort's Parliament in 1265.[43][44] The emergence of petitioning is some of the earliest evidence of

parliament being used as a forum to address the general grievances of ordinary people. However, the

power to call parliament remained at the pleasure of the monarch.[45]

In 17th century England, there was renewed interest in Magna Carta.[46] The Parliament of England

passed the Petition of Right in 1628 which established certain liberties for subjects. The English Civil War (1642–1651) was fought between the King and an

oligarchic but elected Parliament,[47][48] during which the idea of a political party took form with groups debating rights to political representation during the

Putney Debates of 1647.[49] Subsequently, the Protectorate (1653-59) and the English Restoration (1660) restored more autocratic rule, although Parliament

passed the Habeas Corpus Act in 1679 which strengthened the convention that forbade detention lacking sufficient cause or evidence. After the Glorious Revolution

of 1688, the Bill of Rights was enacted in 1689 which codified certain rights and liberties, and is still in effect. The Bill set out the requirement for regular elections,

rules for freedom of speech in Parliament and limited the power of the monarch, ensuring that, unlike much of Europe at the time, royal absolutism would not

prevail.[50][51]

In North America, representative government began in Jamestown, Virginia, with the election of the House of Burgesses (forerunner of the Virginia General

Assembly) in 1619. English Puritans who migrated from 1620 established colonies in New England whose local governance was democratic and which contributed

to the democratic development of the United States;[52] although these local assemblies had some small amounts of devolved power, the ultimate authority was

held by the Crown and the English Parliament. The Puritans (Pilgrim Fathers), Baptists, and Quakers who founded these colonies applied the democratic

organisation of their congregations also to the administration of their communities in worldly matters.[53][54][55]

Magna Carta, 1215, England

Modern era

Early modern period

18th and 19th centuries

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The first Parliament of Great Britain was established in 1707, after the merger of the Kingdom of England and the

Kingdom of Scotland under the Acts of Union. Although the monarch increasingly became a figurehead,[56] only a

small minority actually had a voice; Parliament was elected by only a few percent of the population (less than 3% as

late as 1780).[57] During the Age of Liberty in Sweden (1718–1772), civil rights were expanded and power shifted from

the monarch to parliament. The taxed peasantry was represented in parliament, although with little influence, but

commoners without taxed property had no suffrage.

The creation of the short-lived Corsican Republic in 1755 marked the first nation in modern history to adopt a

democratic constitution (all men and women above age of 25 could vote[58]). This Corsican Constitution was the first

based on Enlightenment principles and included female suffrage, something that was not granted in most other

democracies until the 20th century.

In the American colonial period before 1776, and for some time after, often only adult white male property owners

could vote; enslaved Africans, most free black people and most women were not extended the franchise.[59] On the

American frontier, democracy became a way of life, with more widespread social, economic and political equality.[60]

Although not described as a democracy by the founding fathers,[61] they shared a determination to root the American experiment in the principles of natural

freedom and equality.[62]

The American Revolution led to the adoption of the United States Constitution in 1787, the oldest surviving, still active, governmental codified constitution. The

Constitution provided for an elected government and protected civil rights and liberties for some, but did not end slavery nor extend voting rights in the United

States beyond white male property owners (about 6% of the population).[63] The Bill of Rights in 1791 set limits on government power to protect personal freedoms

but had little impact on judgements by the courts for the first 130 years after ratification.[64]

In 1789, Revolutionary France adopted the Declaration of the Rights of Man and of the Citizen and, although short-lived, the National Convention was elected by

all men in 1792.[66] However, in the early 19th century, little of democracy – as theory, practice, or even as word – remained in the North Atlantic world.[67]

During this period, slavery remained a social and economic institution in places around the world. This was particularly the case in the United States, and

especially in the last fifteen slave states that kept slavery legal in the American South until the Civil War. A variety of organisations were established advocating the

movement of black people from the United States to locations where they would enjoy greater freedom and equality.

The United Kingdom's Slave Trade Act 1807 banned the trade across the British Empire, which was enforced internationally by the Royal Navy under treaties

Britain negotiated with other nations.[68] As the voting franchise in the U.K. was increased, it also was made more uniform in a series of reforms beginning with

the Reform Act 1832. In 1833, the United Kingdom passed the Slavery Abolition Act which took effect across the British Empire.

Universal male suffrage was established in France in March 1848 in the wake of the French Revolution of 1848.[69] In 1848, several revolutions broke out in

Europe as rulers were confronted with popular demands for liberal constitutions and more democratic government.[70]

The establishment of universal malesuffrage in France in 1848 was animportant milestone in the history ofdemocracy.

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In the 1860 United States Census, the slave population in the United States had grown to four million,[71] and in

Reconstruction after the Civil War (late 1860s), the newly freed slaves became citizens with a nominal right to vote

for men. Full enfranchisement of citizens was not secured until after the Civil Rights Movement gained passage by

the United States Congress of the Voting Rights Act of 1965.[72][73]

20th-century transitions to liberal democracy have come in successive "waves of democracy", variously resulting

from wars, revolutions, decolonisation, and religious and economic circumstances.[74] Global waves of "democratic

regression" reversing democratization, have also occurred in the 1920s and 30s, in the 1960s and 1970s, and in the

2010s.[75][76]

World War I and the dissolution of the Ottoman and Austro-Hungarian empires resulted in the creation of new

nation-states from Europe, most of them at least nominally democratic.

In the 1920s democracy flourished and women's suffrage advanced, but the Great Depression brought

disenchantment and most of the countries of Europe, Latin America, and Asia turned to strong-man rule or

dictatorships. Fascism and dictatorships flourished in Nazi Germany, Italy, Spain and Portugal, as well as non-

democratic governments in the Baltics, the Balkans, Brazil, Cuba, China, and Japan, among others.[77]

World War II brought a definitive reversal of this trend in western Europe. The democratisation of the American,

British, and French sectors of occupied Germany (disputed[78]), Austria, Italy, and the occupied Japan served as a

model for the later theory of government change. However, most of Eastern Europe, including the Soviet sector of

Germany fell into the non-democratic Soviet bloc.

The war was followed by decolonisation, and again most of the new independent states had nominally democratic

constitutions. India emerged as the world's largest democracy and continues to be so.[79] Countries that were once

part of the British Empire often adopted the British Westminster system.[80][81]

By 1960, the vast majority of country-states were nominally democracies, although most of the world's populations lived in nations that experienced sham

elections, and other forms of subterfuge (particularly in "Communist" nations and the former colonies.)

A subsequent wave of democratisation brought substantial gains toward true liberal democracy for many nations. Spain, Portugal (1974), and several of the

military dictatorships in South America returned to civilian rule in the late 1970s and early 1980s (Argentina in 1983, Bolivia, Uruguay in 1984, Brazil in 1985, and

Chile in the early 1990s). This was followed by nations in East and South Asia by the mid-to-late 1980s.

Statue of Athena, the patron goddessof Athens, in front of the AustrianParliament Building. Athena has beenused as an international symbol offreedom and democracy since at leastthe late eighteenth century.[65]

20th and 21st centuries

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Economic malaise in the 1980s, along with resentment of Soviet oppression, contributed to the collapse of the Soviet

Union, the associated end of the Cold War, and the democratisation and liberalisation of the former Eastern bloc

countries. The most successful of the new democracies were those geographically and culturally closest to western

Europe, and they are now members or candidate members of the European Union.

The liberal trend spread to some nations in Africa in the 1990s, most prominently in South Africa. Some recent

examples of attempts of liberalisation include the Indonesian Revolution of 1998, the Bulldozer Revolution in

Yugoslavia, the Rose Revolution in Georgia, the Orange Revolution in Ukraine, the Cedar Revolution in Lebanon, the

Tulip Revolution in Kyrgyzstan, and the Jasmine Revolution in Tunisia.

According to Freedom House, in 2007 there were 123 electoral democracies (up from 40 in 1972).[82] According to

World Forum on Democracy, electoral democracies now represent 120 of the 192 existing countries and constitute

58.2 percent of the world's population. At the same time liberal democracies i.e. countries Freedom House regards as

free and respectful of basic human rights and the rule of law are 85 in number and represent 38 percent of the global population.[83]

In 2007 the United Nations declared September 15 the International Day of Democracy.[84]

According to Freedom House, starting in 2005, there have been eleven consecutive years in which declines in political rights and civil liberties throughout the

world have outnumbered improvements,[85] as populist and nationalist political forces have gained ground everywhere from Poland (under the Law and Justice

Party) to the Philippines (under Rodrigo Duterte).[85][75]

Several freedom indices are published by several organisations according to their own various definitions of the term:

Freedom in the World published each year since 1972 by the U.S.-based Freedom House ranks countries by political rights and civil liberties that are derivedin large measure from the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. Countries are assessed as free, partly free, or unfree.[87]

Worldwide Press Freedom Index is published each year since 2002 (except that 2011 was combined with 2012) by France-based Reporters Without Borders.Countries are assessed as having a good situation, a satisfactory situation, noticeable problems, a difficult situation, or a very serious situation.[88]

The Index of Freedom in the World is an index measuring classical civil liberties published by Canada's Fraser Institute, Germany's Liberales Institute, andthe U.S. Cato Institute.[89] It is not currently included in the table below.

The CIRI Human Rights Data Project measures a range of human, civil, women's and workers rights.[90] It is now hosted by the University of Connecticut. Itwas created in 1994.[91] In its 2011 report, the U.S. was ranked 38th in overall human rights.[92]

The number of nations 1800–2003scoring 8 or higher on Polity IVscale, another widely used measureof democracy

Measurement of democracy

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The Democracy Index, published by the U.K.-based Economist Intelligence Unit, is anassessment of countries' democracy. Countries are rated to be either Full Democracies,Flawed Democracies, Hybrid Regimes, or Authoritarian regimes. Full democracies, flaweddemocracies, and hybrid regimes are considered to be democracies, and the authoritariannations are considered to be dictatorial. The index is based on 60 indicators grouped in fivedifferent categories.[93]

The U.S.-based Polity data series is a widely used data series in political science research. Itcontains coded annual information on regime authority characteristics and transitions for allindependent states with greater than 500,000 total population and covers the years 1800–2006. Polity's conclusions about a state's level of democracy are based on an evaluation ofthat state's elections for competitiveness, openness and level of participation. Data from thisseries is not currently included in the table below. The Polity work is sponsored by the PoliticalInstability Task Force (PITF) which is funded by the U.S. Central Intelligence Agency.However, the views expressed in the reports are the authors' alone and do not represent theviews of the US Government.

MaxRange, a dataset defining level of democracy and institutional structure(regime-type) on a100-graded scale where every value represents a unique regime type. Values are sorted from1–100 based on level of democracy and political accountability. MaxRange defines the valuecorresponding to all states and every month from 1789 to 2015 and updating. MaxRange iscreated and developed by Max Range, and is now associated with the university of Halmstad,Sweden.[94]

Democracy has taken a number of forms, both in theory and practice. Some varieties of democracy

provide better representation and more freedom for their citizens than others.[95][96] However, if

any democracy is not structured so as to prohibit the government from excluding the people from the legislative process, or any branch of government from

altering the separation of powers in its own favour, then a branch of the system can accumulate too much power and destroy the democracy.[97][98][99]

Country ratings from the US based Freedom House'sFreedom in the World 2017 survey, concerning thestate of world freedom in 2016[86]

Free (86) Partly Free (59) Not Free (50)

Countries designated "electoral democracies" inFreedom House's 2017 survey "Freedom in the World",

covering the year 2016[87]Types of governmental democracies

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World's states coloured by form of government1

Full presidential republics2 Semi-presidential republics2

Parliamentary republics with an executivepresident dependent on the legislature

Parliamentary republics2

Parliamentary constitutional monarchies Constitutional monarchies which have aseparate head of government but where royaltystill hold significant executive and/or legislativepower

Absolute monarchies One-party states

Countries where constitutional provisions forgovernment have been suspended (e.g. militarydictatorships)

Countries which do not fit any of the abovesystems

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1This map was compiled according to the Wikipedia list of countries by system of government. See there for sources. 2Severalstates constitutionally deemed to be multiparty republics are broadly described by outsiders as authoritarian states. This mappresents only the de jure form of government, and not the de facto degree of democracy.

The following kinds of democracy are not exclusive of one another: many specify details of aspects that are independent of one another and can co-exist in a single

system.

Several variants of democracy exist, but there are two basic forms, both of which concern how the whole body of all eligible citizens executes its will. One form of

democracy is direct democracy, in which all eligible citizens have active participation in the political decision making, for example voting on policy initiatives

directly.[100] In most modern democracies, the whole body of eligible citizens remain the sovereign power but political power is exercised indirectly through

elected representatives; this is called a representative democracy.

Direct democracy is a political system where the citizens participate in the decision-making personally, contrary to

relying on intermediaries or representatives. The use of a lot system, a characteristic of Athenian democracy, is unique

to direct democracies. In this system, important governmental and administrative tasks are performed by citizens

picked from a lottery.[101] A direct democracy gives the voting population the power to:

1. Change constitutional laws,

2. Put forth initiatives, referendums and suggestions for laws,

3. Give binding orders to elective officials, such as revoking them before the end of their elected term, or initiatinga lawsuit for breaking a campaign promise.

Within modern-day representative governments, certain electoral tools like referendums, citizens' initiatives and recall

elections are referred to as forms of direct democracy.[102] Direct democracy as a government system currently exists

in the Swiss cantons of Appenzell Innerrhoden and Glarus,[103] and kurdish cantons of Rojava.[104]

Representative democracy involves the election of government officials by the people being represented. If the head of state is also democratically elected then it is

called a democratic republic.[105] The most common mechanisms involve election of the candidate with a majority or a plurality of the votes. Most western

countries have representative systems.[103]

Basic forms

Direct

A Landsgemeinde (in 2009) of theCanton of Glarus, an example ofdirect democracy in Switzerland

Representative

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Representatives may be elected or become diplomatic representatives by a particular district (or constituency), or

represent the entire electorate through proportional systems, with some using a combination of the two. Some

representative democracies also incorporate elements of direct democracy, such as referendums. A characteristic of

representative democracy is that while the representatives are elected by the people to act in the people's interest, they

retain the freedom to exercise their own judgement as how best to do so. Such reasons have driven criticism upon

representative democracy,[106][107] pointing out the contradictions of representation mechanisms with

democracy[108][109]

Parliamentary democracy is a representative democracy where government is appointed by, or can be dismissed by,

representatives as opposed to a "presidential rule" wherein the president is both head of state and the head of

government and is elected by the voters. Under a parliamentary democracy, government is exercised by delegation to

an executive ministry and subject to ongoing review, checks and balances by the legislative parliament elected by the

people.[110][111][112][113]

Parliamentary systems have the right to dismiss a Prime Minister at any point in time that they feel he or she is not

doing their job to the expectations of the legislature. This is done through a Vote of No Confidence where the legislature decides whether or not to remove the

Prime Minister from office by a majority support for his or her dismissal.[114] In some countries, the Prime Minister can also call an election whenever he or she so

chooses, and typically the Prime Minister will hold an election when he or she knows that they are in good favour with the public as to get re-elected. In other

parliamentary democracies extra elections are virtually never held, a minority government being preferred until the next ordinary elections. An important feature

of the parliamentary democracy is the concept of the "loyal opposition". The essence of the concept is that the second largest political party (or coalition) opposes

the governing party (or coalition), while still remaining loyal to the state and its democratic principles.

Presidential Democracy is a system where the public elects the president through free and fair elections. The president serves as both the head of state and head of

government controlling most of the executive powers. The president serves for a specific term and cannot exceed that amount of time. Elections typically have a

fixed date and aren't easily changed. The president has direct control over the cabinet, specifically appointing the cabinet members.[114]

The president cannot be easily removed from office by the legislature, but he or she cannot remove members of the legislative branch any more easily. This

provides some measure of separation of powers. In consequence however, the president and the legislature may end up in the control of separate parties, allowing

one to block the other and thereby interfere with the orderly operation of the state. This may be the reason why presidential democracy is not very common outside

the Americas, Africa, and Central and Southeast Asia.[114]

A semi-presidential system is a system of democracy in which the government includes both a prime minister and a president. The particular powers held by the

prime minister and president vary by country.[114]

In Switzerland, without needing toregister, every citizen receives ballotpapers and information brochuresfor each vote (and can send it backby post). Switzerland has a directdemocracy system and votes areorganised about four times a year.

Parliamentary

Presidential

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Some modern democracies that are predominantly representative in nature also heavily rely upon forms of political action that are directly democratic. These

democracies, which combine elements of representative democracy and direct democracy, are termed hybrid democracies,[115] semi-direct democracies or

participatory democracies. Examples include Switzerland and some U.S. states, where frequent use is made of referendums and initiatives.

The Swiss confederation is a semi-direct democracy.[103] At the federal level, citizens can propose changes to the constitution (federal popular initiative) or ask for

a referendum to be held on any law voted by the parliament.[103] Between January 1995 and June 2005, Swiss citizens voted 31 times, to answer 103 questions

(during the same period, French citizens participated in only two referendums).[103] Although in the past 120 years less than 250 initiatives have been put to

referendum. The populace has been conservative, approving only about 10% of the initiatives put before them; in addition, they have often opted for a version of

the initiative rewritten by government.

In the United States, no mechanisms of direct democracy exists at the federal level, but over half of the states and many localities provide for citizen-sponsored

ballot initiatives (also called "ballot measures", "ballot questions" or "propositions"), and the vast majority of states allow for referendums. Examples include the

extensive use of referendums in the US state of California, which is a state that has more than 20 million voters.[116]

In New England, Town meetings are often used, especially in rural areas, to manage local government. This creates a hybrid form of government, with a local direct

democracy and a state government which is representative. For example, most Vermont towns hold annual town meetings in March in which town officers are

elected, budgets for the town and schools are voted on, and citizens have the opportunity to speak and be heard on political matters.[117]

Many countries such as the United Kingdom, Spain, the Netherlands, Belgium, Scandinavian countries, Thailand, Japan and Bhutan turned powerful monarchs

into constitutional monarchs with limited or, often gradually, merely symbolic roles. For example, in the predecessor states to the United Kingdom, constitutional

monarchy began to emerge and has continued uninterrupted since the Glorious Revolution of 1688 and passage of the Bill of Rights 1689.[15][50]

In other countries, the monarchy was abolished along with the aristocratic system (as in France, China, Russia, Germany, Austria, Hungary, Italy, Greece and

Egypt). An elected president, with or without significant powers, became the head of state in these countries.

Elite upper houses of legislatures, which often had lifetime or hereditary tenure, were common in many nations. Over time, these either had their powers limited

(as with the British House of Lords) or else became elective and remained powerful (as with the Australian Senate).

Hybrid or semi-direct

Variants

Constitutional monarchy

Republic

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The term republic has many different meanings, but today often refers to a representative democracy with an elected head of

state, such as a president, serving for a limited term, in contrast to states with a hereditary monarch as a head of state, even if

these states also are representative democracies with an elected or appointed head of government such as a prime

minister.[118]

The Founding Fathers of the United States rarely praised and often criticised democracy, which in their time tended to

specifically mean direct democracy, often without the protection of a constitution enshrining basic rights; James Madison

argued, especially in The Federalist No. 10, that what distinguished a democracy from a republic was that the former became

weaker as it got larger and suffered more violently from the effects of faction, whereas a republic could get stronger as it got

larger and combats faction by its very structure.

What was critical to American values, John Adams insisted,[119] was that the government be "bound by fixed laws, which the

people have a voice in making, and a right to defend." As Benjamin Franklin was exiting after writing the U.S. constitution, a

woman asked him "Well, Doctor, what have we got—a republic or a monarchy?". He replied "A republic—if you can keep

it."[120]

A liberal democracy is a representative democracy in which the ability of the elected representatives to exercise decision-making power is subject to the rule of law,

and moderated by a constitution or laws that emphasise the protection of the rights and freedoms of individuals, and which places constraints on the leaders and

on the extent to which the will of the majority can be exercised against the rights of minorities (see civil liberties).

In a liberal democracy, it is possible for some large-scale decisions to emerge from the many individual decisions that citizens are free to make. In other words,

citizens can "vote with their feet" or "vote with their dollars", resulting in significant informal government-by-the-masses that exercises many "powers" associated

with formal government elsewhere.

Socialist thought has several different views on democracy. Social democracy, democratic socialism, and the dictatorship of the proletariat (usually exercised

through Soviet democracy) are some examples. Many democratic socialists and social democrats believe in a form of participatory, industrial, economic and/or

workplace democracy combined with a representative democracy.

Within Marxist orthodoxy there is a hostility to what is commonly called "liberal democracy", which they simply refer to as parliamentary democracy because of its

often centralised nature. Because of their desire to eliminate the political elitism they see in capitalism, Marxists, Leninists and Trotskyists believe in direct

democracy implemented through a system of communes (which are sometimes called soviets). This system ultimately manifests itself as council democracy and

begins with workplace democracy. (See Democracy in Marxism.)

Queen Elizabeth II, aconstitutional monarch

Liberal democracy

Socialist

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Democracy cannot consist solely of elections that are nearly always fictitious and managed by rich landowners and professional politicians.

— Che Guevara, Speech, Uruguay, 1961[121]

Anarchists are split in this domain, depending on whether they believe that a majority-rule is tyrannic or not. The only form of democracy considered acceptable to

many anarchists is direct democracy. Pierre-Joseph Proudhon argued that the only acceptable form of direct democracy is one in which it is recognised that

majority decisions are not binding on the minority, even when unanimous.[122] However, anarcho-communist Murray Bookchin criticised individualist anarchists

for opposing democracy,[123] and says "majority rule" is consistent with anarchism.[124]

Some anarcho-communists oppose the majoritarian nature of direct democracy, feeling that it can impede individual liberty and opt in favour of a non-

majoritarian form of consensus democracy, similar to Proudhon's position on direct democracy.[125] Henry David Thoreau, who did not self-identify as an

anarchist but argued for "a better government"[126] and is cited as an inspiration by some anarchists, argued that people should not be in the position of ruling

others or being ruled when there is no consent.

Anarcho-capitalists, voluntaryists and other right-anarchists oppose institutional democracy as they consider it in conflict with widely held moral values and

ethical principles and their conception of individual rights. The a priori Rothbardian argument is that the state is a coercive institution which necessarily violates

the non-aggression principle (NAP). Some right-anarchists also criticise democracy on a posteriori consequentialist grounds, in terms of inefficiency or disability

in bringing about maximisation of individual liberty. They maintain the people who participate in democratic institutions are foremost driven by economic self-

interest.[127][128]

Sometimes called "democracy without elections", sortition chooses decision makers via a random process. The intention is that those chosen will be representative

of the opinions and interests of the people at large, and be more fair and impartial than an elected official. The technique was in widespread use in Athenian

Democracy and Renaissance Florence[129] and is still used in modern jury selection.

A consociational democracy allows for simultaneous majority votes in two or more ethno-religious constituencies, and policies are enacted only if they gain

majority support from both or all of them.

Anarchist

Sortition

Consociational

Consensus democracy

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A consensus democracy, in contrast, would not be dichotomous. Instead, decisions would be based on a multi-option approach, and policies would be enacted if

they gained sufficient support, either in a purely verbal agreement, or via a consensus vote—a multi-option preference vote. If the threshold of support were at a

sufficiently high level, minorities would be as it were protected automatically. Furthermore, any voting would be ethno-colour blind.

Qualified majority voting is designed by the Treaty of Rome to be the principal method of reaching decisions in the European Council of Ministers. This system

allocates votes to member states in part according to their population, but heavily weighted in favour of the smaller states. This might be seen as a form of

representative democracy, but representatives to the Council might be appointed rather than directly elected.

Inclusive democracy is a political theory and political project that aims for direct democracy in all fields of social life: political democracy in the form of face-to-face

assemblies which are confederated, economic democracy in a stateless, moneyless and marketless economy, democracy in the social realm, i.e. self-management in

places of work and education, and ecological democracy which aims to reintegrate society and nature. The theoretical project of inclusive democracy emerged from

the work of political philosopher Takis Fotopoulos in "Towards An Inclusive Democracy" and was further developed in the journal Democracy & Nature and its

successor The International Journal of Inclusive Democracy.

The basic unit of decision making in an inclusive democracy is the demotic assembly, i.e. the assembly of demos, the citizen body in a given geographical area

which may encompass a town and the surrounding villages, or even neighbourhoods of large cities. An inclusive democracy today can only take the form of a

confederal democracy that is based on a network of administrative councils whose members or delegates are elected from popular face-to-face democratic

assemblies in the various demoi. Thus, their role is purely administrative and practical, not one of policy-making like that of representatives in representative

democracy.

The citizen body is advised by experts but it is the citizen body which functions as the ultimate decision-taker . Authority can be delegated to a segment of the

citizen body to carry out specific duties, for example to serve as members of popular courts, or of regional and confederal councils. Such delegation is made, in

principle, by lot, on a rotation basis, and is always recallable by the citizen body. Delegates to regional and confederal bodies should have specific mandates.

A Parpolity or Participatory Polity is a theoretical form of democracy that is ruled by a Nested Council structure. The guiding philosophy is that people should have

decision making power in proportion to how much they are affected by the decision. Local councils of 25–50 people are completely autonomous on issues that

affect only them, and these councils send delegates to higher level councils who are again autonomous regarding issues that affect only the population affected by

that council.

Supranational

Inclusive

Participatory politics

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A council court of randomly chosen citizens serves as a check on the tyranny of the majority, and rules on which body gets to vote on which issue. Delegates may

vote differently from how their sending council might wish, but are mandated to communicate the wishes of their sending council. Delegates are recallable at any

time. Referendums are possible at any time via votes of most lower-level councils, however, not everything is a referendum as this is most likely a waste of time. A

parpolity is meant to work in tandem with a participatory economy.

Cosmopolitan democracy, also known as Global democracy or World Federalism, is a political system in which democracy is implemented on a global scale, either

directly or through representatives. An important justification for this kind of system is that the decisions made in national or regional democracies often affect

people outside the constituency who, by definition, cannot vote. By contrast, in a cosmopolitan democracy, the people who are affected by decisions also have a say

in them.[130]

According to its supporters, any attempt to solve global problems is undemocratic without some form of cosmopolitan democracy. The general principle of

cosmopolitan democracy is to expand some or all of the values and norms of democracy, including the rule of law; the non-violent resolution of conflicts; and

equality among citizens, beyond the limits of the state. To be fully implemented, this would require reforming existing international organisations, e.g. the United

Nations, as well as the creation of new institutions such as a World Parliament, which ideally would enhance public control over, and accountability in,

international politics.

Cosmopolitan Democracy has been promoted, among others, by physicist Albert Einstein,[131] writer Kurt Vonnegut, columnist George Monbiot, and professors

David Held and Daniele Archibugi.[132] The creation of the International Criminal Court in 2003 was seen as a major step forward by many supporters of this type

of cosmopolitan democracy.

Creative Democracy is advocated by American philosopher John Dewey. The main idea about Creative Democracy is that democracy encourages individual

capacity building and the interaction among the society. Dewey argues that democracy is a way of life in his work of "Creative Democracy: The Task Before Us"[133]

and an experience built on faith in human nature, faith in human beings, and faith in working with others. Democracy, in Dewey's view, is a moral ideal requiring

actual effort and work by people; it is not an institutional concept that exists outside of ourselves. "The task of democracy", Dewey concludes, "is forever that of

creation of a freer and more humane experience in which all share and to which all contribute".

Guided democracy is a form of democracy which incorporates regular popular elections, but which often carefully "guides" the choices offered to the electorate in a

manner which may reduce the ability of the electorate to truly determine the type of government exercised over them. Such democracies typically have only one

central authority which is often not subject to meaningful public review by any other governmental authority. Russian-style democracy has often been referred to

as a "Guided democracy."[134] Russian politicians have referred to their government as having only one center of power/ authority, as opposed to most other forms

of democracy which usually attempt to incorporate two or more naturally competing sources of authority within the same government.[135]

Cosmopolitan

Creative democracy

Guided democracy

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Aside from the public sphere, similar democratic principles and mechanisms of voting and representation have been used to govern other kinds of groups. Many

non-governmental organisations decide policy and leadership by voting. Most trade unions and cooperatives are governed by democratic elections. Corporations

are controlled by shareholders on the principle of one share, one vote. An analogous system, that fuses elements of democracy with sharia law, has been termed

islamocracy.[136]

Aristotle contrasted rule by the many (democracy/polity), with rule by the few (oligarchy/aristocracy), and with rule by a single

person (tyranny or today autocracy/absolute monarchy). He also thought that there was a good and a bad variant of each

system (he considered democracy to be the degenerate counterpart to polity).[137][138]

For Aristotle the underlying principle of democracy is freedom, since only in a democracy the citizens can have a share in

freedom. In essence, he argues that this is what every democracy should make its aim. There are two main aspects of freedom:

being ruled and ruling in turn, since everyone is equal according to number, not merit, and to be able to live as one pleases.

But one factor of liberty is to govern and be governed in turn; for the popular principle of justice is to have

equality according to number, not worth, ... And one is for a man to live as he likes; for they say that this is the

function of liberty, inasmuch as to live not as one likes is the life of a man that is a slave.

— Aristotle, Politics 1317b (Book 6, Part II)

A common view among early and renaissance Republican theorists was that democracy could only survive in small political communities.[139] Heeding the lessons

of the Roman Republic's shift to monarchism as it grew larger, these Republican theorists held that the expansion of territory and population inevitably led to

tyranny.[139] Democracy was therefore highly fragile and rare historically, as it could only survive in small political units, which due to their size were vulnerable to

conquest by larger political units.[139] Montesquieu famously said, "if a republic is small, it is destroyed by an outside force; if it is large, it is destroyed by an

internal vice."[139] Rousseau asserted, "It is, therefore the natural property of small states to be governed as a republic, of middling ones to be subject to a

monarch, and of large empires to be swayed by a despotic prince."[139]

Non-governmental democracy

Theory

A marble statue of Aristotle

Aristotle

Early Republican theory

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Among modern political theorists, there are three contending conceptions of the fundamental rationale for democracy: aggregative democracy, deliberativedemocracy, and radical democracy.[140]

The theory of aggregative democracy claims that the aim of the democratic processes is to solicit citizens' preferences and aggregate them together to determine

what social policies society should adopt. Therefore, proponents of this view hold that democratic participation should primarily focus on voting, where the policy

with the most votes gets implemented.

Different variants of aggregative democracy exist. Under minimalism, democracy is a system of government in which citizens have given teams of political leaders

the right to rule in periodic elections. According to this minimalist conception, citizens cannot and should not "rule" because, for example, on most issues, most of

the time, they have no clear views or their views are not well-founded. Joseph Schumpeter articulated this view most famously in his book Capitalism, Socialism,and Democracy.[141] Contemporary proponents of minimalism include William H. Riker, Adam Przeworski, Richard Posner.

According to the theory of direct democracy, on the other hand, citizens should vote directly, not through their representatives, on legislative proposals.

Proponents of direct democracy offer varied reasons to support this view. Political activity can be valuable in itself, it socialises and educates citizens, and popular

participation can check powerful elites. Most importantly, citizens do not really rule themselves unless they directly decide laws and policies.

Governments will tend to produce laws and policies that are close to the views of the median voter—with half to their left and the other half to their right. This is

not actually a desirable outcome as it represents the action of self-interested and somewhat unaccountable political elites competing for votes. Anthony Downs

suggests that ideological political parties are necessary to act as a mediating broker between individual and governments. Downs laid out this view in his 1957 book

An Economic Theory of Democracy.[142]

Robert A. Dahl argues that the fundamental democratic principle is that, when it comes to binding collective decisions, each person in a political community is

entitled to have his/her interests be given equal consideration (not necessarily that all people are equally satisfied by the collective decision). He uses the term

polyarchy to refer to societies in which there exists a certain set of institutions and procedures which are perceived as leading to such democracy. First and

foremost among these institutions is the regular occurrence of free and open elections which are used to select representatives who then manage all or most of the

public policy of the society. However, these polyarchic procedures may not create a full democracy if, for example, poverty prevents political participation.[143]

Similarly, Ronald Dworkin argues that "democracy is a substantive, not a merely procedural, ideal."[144]

Deliberative democracy is based on the notion that democracy is government by deliberation. Unlike aggregative democracy, deliberative democracy holds that,

for a democratic decision to be legitimate, it must be preceded by authentic deliberation, not merely the aggregation of preferences that occurs in voting. Authenticdeliberation is deliberation among decision-makers that is free from distortions of unequal political power, such as power a decision-maker obtained through

Rationale

Aggregative

Deliberative

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economic wealth or the support of interest groups.[145][146][147] If the decision-makers cannot reach consensus after authentically deliberating on a proposal,

then they vote on the proposal using a form of majority rule. Many theorists is discussing the conception of Debliberative Democracy, considering specially the

thought of Jürgen Habermas.

Radical democracy is based on the idea that there are hierarchical and oppressive power relations that exist in society. Democracy's role is to make visible and

challenge those relations by allowing for difference, dissent and antagonisms in decision making processes.

Some economists have criticized the efficiency of democracy, citing the premise of the irrational voter, or a voter who

makes decisions without all of the facts or necessary information in order to make a truly informed decision. Another

argument is that democracy slows down processes because of the amount of input and participation needed in order to

go forward with a decision. A common example often quoted to substantiate this point is the high economic

development achieved by China (a non-democratic country) as compared to India (a democratic country). According to

economists, the lack of democratic participation in countries like China allows for unfettered economic growth.[148]

On the other hand, Socrates was of the belief that democracy without educated masses (educated in the more broader sense of being knowledgeable and

responsible) would only lead to populism being the criteria to become an elected leader, and not competence. This would ultimately lead to a demise of the nation.

This was quoted by Plato in book 10 of The Republic, in Socrates' conversation with Adimantus.[149] Socrates was of the opinion that the right to vote must not be

an indiscriminate right (for example by birth or citizenship), but must be given only to people who thought sufficiently of their choice.

The 20th-century Italian thinkers Vilfredo Pareto and Gaetano Mosca (independently) argued that democracy was illusory, and served only to mask the reality of

elite rule. Indeed, they argued that elite oligarchy is the unbendable law of human nature, due largely to the apathy and division of the masses (as opposed to the

drive, initiative and unity of the elites), and that democratic institutions would do no more than shift the exercise of power from oppression to manipulation.[150]

As Louis Brandeis once professed, "We may have democracy, or we may have wealth concentrated in the hands of a few, but we can't have both."[151]

Between 1946 and 2000 Soviet Union/Russia and USA have intervened in at least 117 elections across the world including in the Philippines and in Taiwan.[152]

Radical

Criticism

Protests

Inefficiencies

Popular rule as a façade

Mob rule

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Plato's The Republic presents a critical view of democracy through the narration of Socrates: "Democracy, which is a charming form of government, full of variety

and disorder, and dispensing a sort of equality to equals and unequaled alike."[153] In his work, Plato lists 5 forms of government from best to worst. Assuming

that the Republic was intended to be a serious critique of the political thought in Athens, Plato argues that only Kallipolis, an aristocracy led by the unwilling

philosopher-kings (the wisest men), is a just form of government.[154]

James Madison critiqued direct democracy (which he referred to simply as "democracy") in Federalist No. 10, arguing that representative democracy—which he

described using the term "republic"—is a preferable form of government, saying: "... democracies have ever been spectacles of turbulence and contention; have ever

been found incompatible with personal security or the rights of property; and have in general been as short in their lives as they have been violent in their deaths."

Madison offered that republics were superior to democracies because republics safeguarded against tyranny of the majority, stating in Federalist No. 10: "the same

advantage which a republic has over a democracy, in controlling the effects of faction, is enjoyed by a large over a small republic".

More recently, democracy is criticised for not offering enough political stability. As governments are frequently elected on and off there tends to be frequent

changes in the policies of democratic countries both domestically and internationally. Even if a political party maintains power, vociferous, headline grabbing

protests and harsh criticism from the popular media are often enough to force sudden, unexpected political change. Frequent policy changes with regard to

business and immigration are likely to deter investment and so hinder economic growth. For this reason, many people have put forward the idea that democracy is

undesirable for a developing country in which economic growth and the reduction of poverty are top priorities.[155]

This opportunist alliance not only has the handicap of having to cater to too many ideologically opposing factions, but it is usually short lived since any perceived or

actual imbalance in the treatment of coalition partners, or changes to leadership in the coalition partners themselves, can very easily result in the coalition partner

withdrawing its support from the government.

Biased media has been accused of causing political instability, resulting in the obstruction of democracy, rather than its promotion.[156]

In representative democracies, it may not benefit incumbents to conduct fair elections. A study showed that incumbents who rig elections stay in office 2.5 times as

long as those who permit fair elections.[157] Democracies in countries with high per capita income have been found to be less prone to violence, but in countries

with low incomes the tendency is the reverse.[157] Election misconduct is more likely in countries with low per capita incomes, small populations, rich in natural

resources, and a lack of institutional checks and balances. Sub-Saharan countries, as well as Afghanistan, all tend to fall into that category.[157]

Governments that have frequent elections tend to have significantly more stable economic policies than those governments who have infrequent elections.

However, this trend does not apply to governments where fraudulent elections are common.[157]

Political instability

Fraudulent elections

Opposition

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Democracy in modern times has almost always faced opposition from the previously existing government, and many times it has faced opposition from social

elites. The implementation of a democratic government within a non-democratic state is typically brought about by democratic revolution.

Post-Enlightenment ideologies such as fascism, nazism, and neo-fundamentalism oppose democracy on different grounds, generally citing that the concept of

democracy as a constant process is flawed and detrimental to a preferable course of development.

Several philosophers and researchers have outlined historical and social factors seen as supporting the evolution of democracy. Cultural factors like Protestantism

influenced the development of democracy, rule of law, human rights and political liberty (the faithful elected priests, religious freedom and tolerance has been

practiced).

Other commentators have mentioned the influence of wealth (e.g. S. M. Lipset, 1959). In a related theory, Ronald Inglehart suggests that improved living-

standards can convince people that they can take their basic survival for granted, leading to increased emphasis on self-expression values, which is highly

correlated to democracy.[158]

Carroll Quigley concludes that the characteristics of weapons are the main predictor of democracy:[159][160] Democracy tends to emerge only when the best

weapons available are easy for individuals to buy and use.[161] By the 1800s, guns were the best personal weapons available, and in America, almost everyone

could afford to buy a gun, and could learn how to use it fairly easily. Governments couldn't do any better: it became the age of mass armies of citizen soldiers with

guns[161] Similarly, Periclean Greece was an age of the citizen soldier and democracy.[162]

Recent theories stress the relevance of education and of human capital – and within them of cognitive ability to increasing tolerance, rationality, political literacy

and participation. Two effects of education and cognitive ability are distinguished: a cognitive effect (competence to make rational choices, better information-

processing) and an ethical effect (support of democratic values, freedom, human rights etc.), which itself depends on intelligence.[163][164][165]

Evidence that is consistent with conventional theories of why democracy emerges and is sustained has been hard to come by. Recent statistical analyses have

challenged modernisation theory by demonstrating that there is no reliable evidence for the claim that democracy is more likely to emerge when countries become

wealthier, more educated, or less unequal.[166] Neither is there convincing evidence that increased reliance on oil revenues prevents democratisation, despite a

vast theoretical literature on "the Resource Curse" that asserts that oil revenues sever the link between citizen taxation and government accountability, seen as the

key to representative democracy.[167] The lack of evidence for these conventional theories of democratisation have led researchers to search for the "deep"

determinants of contemporary political institutions, be they geographical or demographic.[168][169] More inclusive institutions lead to democracy because as

people gain more power, they are able to demand more from the elites, who in turn have to concede more things to keep their position. This virtuous circle, may

end up in democracy.

An example of this is the disease environment. Places with different mortality rates had different populations and productivity levels around the world. For

example, in Africa, the Tsetse fly which is harmful to humans and livestock reduced the ability of the Africans to plow the land. This made Africa less settled. As a

consequence, political power was less concentrated.[170] This also affected the colonial institutions that where set in place by the European countries in Africa.[171]

Development

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If the colonial settlers could live or not in a place made them develop different institutions which led to different economic and social paths. This also affected the

distribution of power and the collective actions people could take. As a result, some African countries ended up having democracies and others autocracies.

Another example of geographical determinants for democracy is having access to coastal areas and rivers. This natural endowment has a positive relation with

economic development thanks to the benefits of trade.[172] Trade brought economic development, which in turn, broaden the power. If the ruler wanted to

increase his revenues, he had to protect property rights to create incentives for people to invest. As more people had more power, more concessions had to be made

by the ruler and in many places this process lead to democracy. These determinants defined the structur of the society moving the balance of political power.[173]

In the 21st century, democracy has become such a popular method of reaching decisions that its application beyond politics to other areas such as entertainment,

food and fashion, consumerism, urban planning, education, art, literature, science and theology has been criticised as "the reigning dogma of our time".[174] The

argument suggests that applying a populist or market-driven approach to art and literature (for example), means that innovative creative work goes unpublished or

unproduced. In education, the argument is that essential but more difficult studies are not undertaken. Science, as a truth-based discipline, is particularly

corrupted by the idea that the correct conclusion can be arrived at by popular vote. However, more recently, theorists have also advanced the concept epistemic

democracy to assert that democracy actually does a good job tracking the truth.

Robert Michels asserts that although democracy can never be fully realised, democracy may be developed automatically in the act of striving for democracy: "The

peasant in the fable, when on his death-bed, tells his sons that a treasure is buried in the field. After the old man's death the sons dig everywhere in order to

discover the treasure. They do not find it. But their indefatigable labor improves the soil and secures for them a comparative well-being. The treasure in the fable

may well symbolise democracy."[175]

Dr. Harald Wydra, in his book Communism and The Emergence of Democracy (2007), maintains that the development of democracy should not be viewed as a

purely procedural or as a static concept but rather as an ongoing "process of meaning formation".[176] Drawing on Claude Lefort's idea of the empty place of

power, that "power emanates from the people [...] but is the power of nobody", he remarks that democracy is reverence to a symbolic mythical authority as in

reality, there is no such thing as the people or demos. Democratic political figures are not supreme rulers but rather temporary guardians of an empty place. Any

claim to substance such as the collective good, the public interest or the will of the nation is subject to the competitive struggle and times of for gaining the

authority of office and government. The essence of the democratic system is an empty place, void of real people which can only be temporarily filled and never be

appropriated. The seat of power is there, but remains open to constant change. As such, what "democracy" is or what is "democratic" progresses throughout history

as a continual and potentially never ending process of social construction.

In 2010 a study by a German military think-tank analyzed how peak oil might change the global economy. The study raises fears for the survival of democracy

itself. It suggests that parts of the population could perceive the upheaval triggered by peak oil as a general systemic crisis. This would create "room for ideological

and extremist alternatives to existing forms of government".[177]

Constitutional liberalism

Democracy Index

Democracy Ranking

Democratic peace theory

E-democracy

Empowered democracy

See also

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Foucault–Habermas debate

Good governance

Parliament in the Making

Shadow government (conspiracy)

Spatial Citizenship

Statism

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ocracy012004.htm); Diamond, L. and Morlino, L., The quality of democracy (2016). In Diamond, L., In Search of Democracy. London: Routledge. ISBN 978-0-415-78128-2.

6. Wilson, N. G. (2006). Encyclopedia of ancient Greece. New York: Routledge. p. 511. ISBN 0-415-97334-1.7. Barker, Ernest (1906). The Political Thought of Plato and Aristotle (https://books.google.com/books?id=1HUrAAAAYAAJ). Chapter VII, Section 2: G. P.

Putnam's Sons.8. Jarvie, 2006, pp. 218–199. Staff writer (22 August 2007). "Liberty and justice for some" (http://www.economist.com/markets/rankings/displaystory.cfm?story_id=8908438). The

Economist. Economist Group.10. O'Donnell, Guillermo (2005), "Why the rule of law matters", in Diamond, Larry; Morlino, Leonardo, Assessing the quality of democracy, Baltimore: Johns

Hopkins University Press, pp. 3–17, ISBN 9780801882876. Preview. (https://books.google.com/books?id=-eXJMXnraPQC&pg=PA3)11. Dahl, Robert A.; Shapiro, Ian; Cheibub, José Antônio (2003). The democracy sourcebook. Cambridge, Massachusetts: MIT Press. ISBN 9780262541473.

Details. (https://books.google.com/books?id=B8THIuSkiqgC)12. Hénaff, Marcel; Strong, Tracy B. (2001). Public space and democracy. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press. ISBN 9780816633883.13. Kimber, Richard (September 1989). "On democracy" (https://dx.doi.org/10.1111/j.1467-9477.1989.tb00090.x). Scandinavian Political Studies. Wiley. 12 (3):

201, 199–219. doi:10.1111/j.1467-9477.1989.tb00090.x (https://doi.org/10.1111%2Fj.1467-9477.1989.tb00090.x). Full text. (https://tidsskrift.dk/index.php/scandinavian_political_studies/article/view/13057/24875)

14. Scruton, Roger (9 August 2013). "A Point of View: Is democracy overrated?" (http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-23607302). BBC News. BBC.15. Kopstein, Jeffrey; Lichbach, Mark; Hanson, Stephen E., eds. (2014). Comparative Politics: Interests, Identities, and Institutions in a Changing Global Order (h

ttps://books.google.com/books?id=L2jwAwAAQBAJ&pg=PA38&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwjIwsWGi6jMAhWJK8AKHQfJCy4Q6AEIKzAD#v=onepage&q&f=false) (4, revised ed.). Cambridge University Press. pp. 37–39. ISBN 1139991388.

16. "Parliamentary sovereignty" (http://www.parliament.uk/about/how/sovereignty/). UK Parliament. Retrieved 18 August 2014; "Independence" (http://www.judiciary.gov.uk/about-the-judiciary/the-judiciary-the-government-and-the-constitution/jud-acc-ind/independence/). Courts and Tribunals Judiciary. Retrieved9 November 2014.

17. Daily Express News (2 August 2013). "All-party meet vows to uphold Parliament supremacy" (http://newindianexpress.com/nation/All-party-meet-vows-to-uphold-Parliament-supremacy/2013/08/02/article1713808.ece). The New Indian Express. Express Publications (Madurai) Limited. Retrieved 18 August 2013.

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19. Kelsen, Hans (October 1955). "Foundations of democracy" (https://dx.doi.org/10.1086/291036). Ethics, special issue: Part 2: Foundations of Democracy.Chicago Journals. 66 (1): 1–101. doi:10.1086/291036 (https://doi.org/10.1086%2F291036). JSTOR 2378551 (https://www.jstor.org/stable/2378551).

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History, Volume I: To 1740 (Boston and New York: Bedford/St. Martin's, 2007), 44.28. Aristotle Book 629. Grinin, Leonid E. (2004). The Early State, Its Alternatives and Analogues (http://www.socionauki.ru/book/early_state_en/). Uchitel' Publishing House.30. Susan Lape, Reproducing Athens: Menander's Comedy, Democratic Culture, and the Hellenistic City, Princeton University Press, 2009, p. 4, ISBN 140082591131. Raaflaub, Ober & Wallace 2007, p. 5.32. Ober & Hedrick 1996, p. 107.33. Clarke, 2001, pp. 194–20134. "Full historical description of the Spartan government" (http://rangevoting.org/SpartaBury.html). Rangevoting.org. Retrieved 2013-09-28.35. Terrence A. Boring, Literacy in Ancient Sparta, Leiden Netherlands (1979). ISBN 90-04-05971-736. "Ancient Rome from the earliest times down to 476 A.D" (http://annourbis.com/Ancient-Rome/8rome10.html). Annourbis.com. Retrieved 2010-08-22.37. Watson 2005, p. 28538. Livy 2002, p. 3439. Watson 2005, p. 27140. "Constitution 1,000 years ago" (http://www.hindu.com/fr/2008/07/11/stories/2008071151250300.htm). The Hindu. Chennai, India. 2008-07-11.41. "Magna Carta: an introduction" (http://www.bl.uk/magna-carta/articles/magna-carta-an-introduction). The British Library. Retrieved 28 January 2015.

"Magna Carta is sometimes regarded as the foundation of democracy in England. ...Revised versions of Magna Carta were issued by King Henry III (in 1216,1217 and 1225), and the text of the 1225 version was entered onto the statute roll in 1297. ...The 1225 version of Magna Carta had been granted explicitlyin return for a payment of tax by the whole kingdom, and this paved the way for the first summons of Parliament in 1265, to approve the granting oftaxation."

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44. "Simon de Montfort: The turning point for democracy that gets overlooked" (http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-30849472). BBC. 19 January 2015.Retrieved 19 January 2015; "The January Parliament and how it defined Britain" (http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/politics/11355822/The-January-Parliament-and-how-it-defined-Britain.html). The Telegraph. 20 January 2015. Retrieved 28 January 2015.

45. "Origins and growth of Parliament" (http://www.nationalarchives.gov.uk/pathways/citizenship/citizen_subject/origins.htm). The National Archives. Retrieved2013-11-17.

46. "From legal document to public myth: Magna Carta in the 17th century" (https://www.bl.uk/magna-carta/videos/from-legal-document-to-public-myth-magna-carta-in-the-17th-century). The British Library. Retrieved 2017-10-16; "Magna Carta: Magna Carta in the 17th Century" (https://www.sal.org.uk/events/2015/06/magna-carta-magna-carta-in-the-17th-century/). The Society of Antiquaries of London. Retrieved 2017-10-16.

47. "Origins and growth of Parliament" (http://www.nationalarchives.gov.uk/pathways/citizenship/citizen_subject/origins.htm). The National Archives. Retrieved7 April 2015.

48. "Rise of Parliament" (http://www.nationalarchives.gov.uk/pathways/citizenship/rise_parliament/citizenship2.htm). The National Archives. Retrieved 7 April2015.

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1. pp. 385–472, Sections 5 to 10. doi:10.1016/S1574-0684(05)01006-3 (https://doi.org/10.1016%2FS1574-0684%2805%2901006-3).174. Farrelly, Elizabeth (2011-09-15). "Deafened by the roar of the crowd" (http://www.smh.com.au/opinion/society-and-culture/deafened-by-roar-of-the-crowd-2

0110914-1k9lo.html). The Sydney Morning Herald. Retrieved 2011-09-17.175. Robert Michels (1999) [1962 by Crowell-Collier]. Political Parties (https://books.google.com/books?id=ijae_UIez38C). Transaction Publishers. p. 243.

ISBN 978-1-4128-3116-1. Retrieved 5 June 2013.176. Harald Wydra, Communism and the Emergence of Democracy, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2007, pp. 22–27.177. Military Study Warns of a Potentially Drastic Oil Crisis (http://www.spiegel.de/international/germany/0,1518,715138,00.html)". Spiegel Online. September 1,

2010

Appleby, Joyce. (1992). Liberalism and Republicanism in the Historical Imagination. Harvard University Press.Archibugi, Daniele, The Global Commonwealth of Citizens. Toward Cosmopolitan Democracy, Princeton University Press (http://press.princeton.edu/titles/8737.html) ISBN 978-0-691-13490-1Becker, Peter, Heideking, Juergen, & Henretta, James A. (2002). Republicanism and Liberalism in America and the German States, 1750–1850. CambridgeUniversity Press. ISBN 978-0-521-80066-2Benhabib, Seyla. (1996). Democracy and Difference: Contesting the Boundaries of the Political. Princeton University Press. ISBN 978-0-691-04478-1

Further reading

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Blattberg, Charles. (2000). From Pluralist to Patriotic Politics: Putting Practice First, Oxford University Press, ISBN 978-0-19-829688-1.Birch, Anthony H. (1993). The Concepts and Theories of Modern Democracy. London: Routledge. ISBN 978-0-415-41463-0Bittar, Eduardo C. B. (2016). "Democracy, Justice and Human Rights: Studies of Critical Theory and Social Philosophy of Law". Saarbrücken: LAP, 2016.ISBN 978-3-659-86065-2Castiglione, Dario. (2005). "Republicanism and its Legacy (http://www.huss.ex.ac.uk/politics/research/readingroom/CastiglioneRepublicanism.pdf#search=%22republicanism%20historiography%22)." European Journal of Political Theory. pp 453–65.Copp, David, Jean Hampton, & John E. Roemer. (1993). The Idea of Democracy. Cambridge University Press. ISBN 978-0-521-43254-2Caputo, Nicholas. (2005). America's Bible of Democracy: Returning to the Constitution. SterlingHouse Publisher, Inc. ISBN 978-1-58501-092-9Dahl, Robert A. (1991). Democracy and its Critics. Yale University Press. ISBN 978-0-300-04938-1Dahl, Robert A. (2000). On Democracy. Yale University Press. ISBN 978-0-300-08455-9Dahl, Robert A. Ian Shapiro & Jose Antonio Cheibub. (2003). The Democracy Sourcebook. MIT Press. ISBN 978-0-262-54147-3Dahl, Robert A. (1963). A Preface to Democratic Theory. University of Chicago Press. ISBN 978-0-226-13426-0Davenport, Christian. (2007). State Repression and the Domestic Democratic Peace. Cambridge University Press. ISBN 978-0-521-86490-9Diamond, Larry & Marc Plattner. (1996). The Global Resurgence of Democracy. Johns Hopkins University Press. ISBN 978-0-8018-5304-3Diamond, Larry & Richard Gunther. (2001). Political Parties and Democracy. JHU Press. ISBN 978-0-8018-6863-4Diamond, Larry & Leonardo Morlino. (2005). Assessing the Quality of Democracy. JHU Press. ISBN 978-0-8018-8287-6Diamond, Larry, Marc F. Plattner & Philip J. Costopoulos. (2005). World Religions and Democracy. JHU Press. ISBN 978-0-8018-8080-3Diamond, Larry, Marc F. Plattner & Daniel Brumberg. (2003). Islam and Democracy in the Middle East. JHU Press. ISBN 978-0-8018-7847-3Elster, Jon. (1998). Deliberative Democracy. Cambridge University Press. ISBN 978-0-521-59696-1Emerson, Peter (2007) "Designing an All-Inclusive Democracy." Springer. ISBN 978-3-540-33163-6Emerson, Peter (2012) "Defining Democracy." Springer. ISBN 978-3-642-20903-1Everdell, William R. (2003) The End of Kings: A History of Republics and Republicans. Chicago: University of Chicago Press. ISBN 0-226-22482-1.Gabardi, Wayne. (2001). Contemporary Models of Democracy. Polity.Gutmann, Amy, and Dennis Thompson. (1996). Democracy and Disagreement. Princeton University Press. ISBN 978-0-674-19766-4Gutmann, Amy, and Dennis Thompson. (2002). Why Deliberative Democracy? Princeton University Press. ISBN 978-0-691-12019-5Haldane, Robert Burdone (1918). The future of democracy. London: Headley Bros. Publishers Ltd.Halperin, M. H., Siegle, J. T. & Weinstein, M. M. (2005). The Democracy Advantage: How Democracies Promote Prosperity and Peace. Routledge. ISBN 978-0-415-95052-7Hansen, Mogens Herman. (1991). The Athenian Democracy in the Age of Demosthenes. Oxford: Blackwell. ISBN 978-0-631-18017-3Held, David. (2006). Models of Democracy. Stanford University Press. ISBN 978-0-8047-5472-9Inglehart, Ronald. (1997). Modernisation and Postmodernisation. Cultural, Economic, and Political Change in 43 Societies. Princeton University Press.ISBN 978-0-691-01180-6Isakhan, Ben and Stockwell, Stephen (co-editors). (2011) The Secret History of Democracy. Palgrave MacMillan. ISBN 978-0-230-24421-4

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Jarvie, I. C.; Milford, K. (2006). Karl Popper: Life and time, and values in a world of facts Volume 1 of Karl Popper: A Centenary Assessment, Karl Milford (https://books.google.com/books?id=w-BEoTj0axoC). Ashgate Publishing, Ltd. ISBN 978-0-7546-5375-2.Khan, L. Ali. (2003). A Theory of Universal Democracy: Beyond the End of History. Martinus Nijhoff Publishers. ISBN 978-90-411-2003-8Köchler, Hans. (1987). The Crisis of Representative Democracy. Peter Lang. ISBN 978-3-8204-8843-2Lijphart, Arend. (1999). Patterns of Democracy: Government Forms and Performance in Thirty-Six Countries. Yale University Press. ISBN 978-0-300-07893-0Lipset, Seymour Martin. (1959). "Some Social Requisites of Democracy: Economic Development and Political Legitimacy". American Political Science Review.53 (1): 69–105. doi:10.2307/1951731 (https://doi.org/10.2307%2F1951731). JSTOR 1951731 (https://www.jstor.org/stable/1951731).Macpherson, C. B. (1977). The Life and Times of Liberal Democracy. Oxford University Press. ISBN 978-0-19-289106-8Morgan, Edmund. (1989). Inventing the People: The Rise of Popular Sovereignty in England and America. Norton. ISBN 978-0-393-30623-1Mosley, Ivo (2003). Democracy, Fascism, and the New World Order. Imprint Academic. ISBN 0 907845 649.Mosley, Ivo (2013). In The Name Of The People. Imprint Academic. ISBN 9781845402624.Ober, J.; Hedrick, C. W. (1996). Dēmokratia: a conversation on democracies, ancient and modern. Princeton University Press. ISBN 0-691-01108-7.Plattner, Marc F. & Aleksander Smolar. (2000). Globalisation, Power, and Democracy. JHU Press. ISBN 978-0-8018-6568-8Plattner, Marc F. & João Carlos Espada. (2000). The Democratic Invention. Johns Hopkins University Press. ISBN 978-0-8018-6419-3Putnam, Robert. (2001). Making Democracy Work. Princeton University Press. ISBN 978-5-551-09103-5Raaflaub, Kurt A.; Ober, Josiah; Wallace, Robert W (2007). Origins of Democracy in Ancient Greece. University of California Press. ISBN 978-0-520-24562-4.Riker, William H.. (1962). The Theory of Political Coalitions. Yale University Press.Sen, Amartya K. (1999). "Democracy as a Universal Value". Journal of Democracy. 10 (3): 3–17. doi:10.1353/jod.1999.0055 (https://doi.org/10.1353%2Fjod.1999.0055).Tannsjo, Torbjorn. (2008). Global Democracy: The Case for a World Government. Edinburgh University Press. ISBN 978-0-7486-3499-6. Argues that not onlyis world government necessary if we want to deal successfully with global problems it is also, pace Kant and Rawls, desirable in its own right.Thompson, Dennis (1970). The Democratic Citizen: Social Science and Democratic Theory in the 20th Century. Cambridge University Press. ISBN 978-0-521-13173-5Vinje, Victor Condorcet (2014). The Versatile Farmers of the North; The Struggle of Norwegian Yeomen for Economic Reforms and Political Power, 1750–

1814. Nisus Publications. https://www.amazon.com/dp/B00HU4KHI4/ref=cm_sw_r_cp_dp_T1_u0ypzb4AM7QD3Volk, Kyle G. (2014). Moral Minorities and the Making of American Democracy. New York: Oxford University Press.Weingast, Barry. (1997). "The Political Foundations of the Rule of Law and Democracy". American Political Science Review. 91 (2): 245–263.doi:10.2307/2952354 (https://doi.org/10.2307%2F2952354). JSTOR 2952354 (https://www.jstor.org/stable/2952354).Weatherford, Jack. (1990). Indian Givers: How the Indians Transformed the World. New York: Fawcett Columbine. ISBN 978-0-449-90496-1Whitehead, Laurence. (2002). Emerging Market Democracies: East Asia and Latin America. JHU Press. ISBN 978-0-8018-7219-8Willard, Charles Arthur. (1996). Liberalism and the Problem of Knowledge: A New Rhetoric for Modern Democracy. University of Chicago Press. ISBN 978-0-226-89845-2Wood, E. M. (1995). Democracy Against Capitalism: Renewing historical materialism. Cambridge University Press. ISBN 978-0-521-47682-9Wood, Gordon S. (1991). The Radicalism of the American Revolution. Vintage Books. ISBN 978-0-679-73688-2 examines democratic dimensions ofrepublicanism

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Democracy (http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/democracy) at the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy

Dictionary of the History of Ideas: Democracy (http://etext.lib.virginia.edu/cgi-local/DHI/dhi.cgi?id=dv1-78)

The Economist Intelligence Unit's index of democracy (https://web.archive.org/web/20081214000000/http://a330.g.akamai.net/7/330/25828/20081021185552/graphics.eiu.com/PDF/Democracy%20Index%202008.pdf)

Alexis de Tocqueville, Democracy in America (http://xroads.virginia.edu/~HYPER/DETOC/home.html) Full hypertext with critical essays on America in 1831–32 from American Studies at the University of Virginia

Data visualizations of data on democratisation and list of data sources on political regimes (https://web.archive.org/web/20140608221353/http://www.ourworldindata.org/data/political-regimes/democratisation/) on 'Our World in Data', by Max Roser.

[1] (http://www.hh.se/english/schoolofeducationhumanitiesandsocialsciences/research/maxrange.65441985_en.html) MaxRange Classifying political regimetype and democracy level to all states and months 1789–2015

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External links

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National Democracy Narodowa Demokracja

Leader Roman DmowskiFounded 1886Dissolved 1947Headquarters Warsaw, PolandIdeology Polish nationalism

Nationalconservatism[1] Anti-Semitism[2][3][4][5][6]

Politics of PolandPolitical parties

Elections

National Democracy

This article is about a Polish political movement. For the Italian party, see National Democracy (Italy).

For the Spanish party, see National Democracy (Spain). For the Czech party, see National Democracy

(Czech Republic). For the Swedish party, see National Democrats (Sweden). For the major wing in

Ukraine's parliament, see Political parties in Ukraine#Major parties and political camps For the

Philippines, see National Democracy Movement (Philippines). For the German political party, see

National Democratic Party of Germany.

National Democracy (Polish: Narodowa Demokracja, also known from its abbreviation ND as "Endecja"

[ɛnˈdɛt sjä]) was a Polish political movement active from the second half of the 19th century under the foreign

partitions of the country until the end of the Second Polish Republic.[7] It ceased to exist after the Nazi-Soviet

invasion of Poland of 1939. In its long history, National Democracy went through several stages of

development.[7] Created with the intention of promoting the fight for Poland's sovereignty against the

repressive imperial regimes, the movement acquired its right-wing nationalist character following the return

to independence.[7] A founder and principal ideologue was Roman Dmowski. Other ideological fathers of the

movement included Zygmunt Balicki and Jan Ludwik Popławski.[8]

The National Democracy's main stronghold was Greater Poland (western Poland), where much of the

movement's early impetus derived from efforts to counter Imperial Germany's policy of Germanizing its

Polish territorial holdings. Later, the ND's focus would shift to countering what it saw as Polish-Jewish

economic competition with Catholic Poles. Party support was made up of the ethnically Polish intelligentsia,

the urban lower middle class, some elements of the greater middle class, and its extensive youth movement.

During the interbellum Second Republic, the ND was a strong proponent for the Polonization of the country's

German minority and of other non-Polish (chiefly Ukrainian and Belarusian) populations in Poland's eastern

border regions (the Kresy). With the end of World War II and the occupation of the country by the Soviet

Union and its communist puppet regime, the National Democracy movement effectively ceased to exist.

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Origins

Second Republic

World War II

Righteous among the Nations

After the war

Today's Poland

Notables

See also

Notes

References

Further reading

The origins of the ND can be traced to the 1864 failure of the January 1863 Uprising and to the era of Positivism in Poland. After that Uprising – the last in a series

of 19th-century Polish uprisings – had been bloodily crushed by Poland's partitioners, a new generation of Polish patriots and politicians concluded that Poland's

independence would not be won through force on the battlefield, but through education and culture.

In 1886 the secret Polish League (Liga Polska) was founded. In 1893 it was renamed National League (Liga Narodowa). From 1895 the League published a

newspaper, Przegląd Wszechpolski (The All-Polish Review), and from 1897 it had an official political party, the National-Democratic Party (Stronnictwo

Narodowo-Demokratyczne). Unlike the Polish Socialist Party (PPS), the ND advocated peaceful negotiations, not armed resistance. Influenced by Roman

Dmowski's radical nationalist and social-Darwinist ideas, National Democrats soon turned against other nationalities within the Polish lands, most notably the

Jews; anti-Semitism became an element of ND ideology.[9]

During World War I, while the PPS under Józef Piłsudski supported the Central Powers against Russia (through the Polish Legions), the ND first allied itself with

the Russian Empire (supporting the creation of the Puławy Legion) and later with the Western Powers (supporting the Polish Blue Army in France). At war's end,

many ND politicians enjoyed more influence abroad than in Poland. This allowed them to use their leverage to share power with Piłsudski, who had much more

Contents

Origins

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support in the military and in the country proper than they did. And because of their support abroad ND politicians such as Dmowski and Ignacy Paderewski were

able to gain backing for of their demands at the Paris Peace Conference of 1919 and in the Treaty of Versailles.

In the newly independent Second Polish Republic, the ND was represented first by the Popular National Union (Związek Ludowo-Narodowy), a conservative

political party advocating their program through democratic and parliamentary political means. After Piłsudski's May 1926 Coup d'État, the ND found itself in

constant opposition to his Sanacja government. The tightening of Sanacja's controls on opposition parties and its general authoritarian drift led to the gradual

radicalization of the ND movement. In December 1926, the Camp of Great Poland (Obóz Wielkiej Polski) was created as an extra-parliamentary organization in

opposition to the Sanacja government. The youth faction of the Camp of Great Poland gradually took control over the whole organization, and from 1931 the camp

quickly radicalized and even adopted some militaristic elements.[10]

In 1928 the National Party (Stronnictwo Narodowe) was founded, as a successor party to the Popular National Union. In the beginning, the new party adopted the

same political line as its predecessor.[11] After the official banning of the Camp of Great Poland, radicalized youth entered the National Party. The ideological clash

between the old and new generation of National Democrats culminated at the party convention in 1935 where the younger activists were elected to lead the

party.[12] In 1936-1939 the personal changes within the party continued, and the young generation totally began its complete domination. The older generation of

National Democrats, disagreeing with the new course, left active politics or exited the party completely. A chief characteristic of ND policies at this time was their

emphasis on Polonization of minorities: ND politicians such as Dmowski and Stanisław Grabski contributed to the failure of Piłsudski's proposed Międzymorzefederation and the alliance with the Ukrainian leader Symon Petlura, as well as to the alienation of Poland's ethnic minorities.

Simultaneously the ND emphasized its anti-Semitic stance, intending to exclude Jews from Polish social and economic life and ultimately to push them to

emigration out of Poland.[13] Antisemitic actions and incidents – boycotts, demonstrations, even attacks – organized or inspired by National Democrats occurred

during the 1930s. The most notorious actions were taken by a splinter group of radical young former NDs who formed the fascist-inspired National Radical Camp

(Obóz Narodowo-Radykalny).[14]

During World War II, the ND became part of a coalition which formed the Polish Government in Exile. It was closely linked with the National Armed Forces(Narodowe Siły Zbrojne), an underground organization that became part of the Polish resistance movement. ND armed organizations fought not only against Nazi

Germany but also against the Soviet Union. Both occupying forces regarded members of the movement as their mortal enemy, and its leaders were hunted down

and killed in mass executions, in concentration camps, and in the Katyń massacre. Among those killed are:

Leopold Bieńkowski (father of Zygmunt Witymir Bieńkowski), arrested by the NKVD in early 1940, died in a Gulag near Arkhangelsk in 1941

reverend Feliks Bolt, a senator of the Republic of Poland, died in Stutthof in 1940

Tadeusz Fabiani, a lawyer, shot at Pawiak in 1940

Second Republic

World War II

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Stanisław Głąbiński, died in NKVD prison in Lubyanka in 1940

doctor Wincenty Harembski, shot in NKVD prison in Kharkiv in 1940

Tadeusz Zygmunt Hernes, journalist, killed in Katyń massacre

Czesław Jóźwiak, murdered by the Gestapo in 1940 in Dresden prison

Jan Mosdorf, Auschwitz

reverend Marceli Nowakowski, shot in Warsaw in December 1939

Stanisław Piasecki, writer, shot in Palmiry in June 1941

reverend Józef Prądzyński, died in the Dachau concentration camp in 1942

Jozefat Sikorski, murdered by the Gestapo in the Berlin-Plotzensee prison in 1942

Michał Starczewski, murdered in the Katyn massacre

Tadeusz Szefer, murdered in the Katyn massacre

Jan Szturmowski, murdered by the Germans in September 1939

Jan Waliński, murdered by the NKVD in Kharkiv in 1940

Antoni Wolniewicz, murdered by the Gestapo in the Berlin-Plotzensee prison in 1942

Jan Wujastyk, murdered in the Katyń massacre

Edward Kemnitz [15]

Marceli Godlewski [16]

After the war, when a communist, pro-Soviet government took power in Poland, most remaining NDs either emigrated to the West or continued to oppose the

Soviet occupation. Others joined the new regime – most notably, the ONR-Falanga leader Bolesław Piasecki, who co-organized a Catholic movement.

Since the fall of communism, with Poland once again a democratically governed country, several political parties have sought to re-establish some ND traditions;

their adherents prefer to call themselves the "national movement" (ruch narodowy). The only significant party that declared itself a successor to the ND was the

League of Polish Families (Liga Polskich Rodzin), founded in 2001 by Roman Giertych, grandson of Jędrzej Giertych, a pre-war ND politician. It received 8% of the

Righteous among the Nations

After the war

Today's Poland

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parliamentary vote in 2001 and 16% in 2004, but then fell below the 5% threshold in 2007 and lost all its parliamentary seats.

Another Polish national-democratic association with legal standing is the Camp of Great Poland. The association was established on March 28, 2003, as a response

of the National Party (Stronnictwo Narodowe; SN) Youth Section to the deletion of the party from the national registry.[17] In February 17, 2012 the OWP was

registered in the National Registrar of Companies and Legal Entities (Krajowy Rejestr Sądowy; KRS),[18] gaining legal personality.

Zygmunt Balicki

Ignacy Chrzanowski

Roman Dmowski

Adam Doboszyński

Jędrzej Giertych

Stanisław Grabski

Władysław Grabski

Józef Haller

Feliks Koneczny

Władysław Konopczyński

Wojciech Korfanty

Stanisław Kozicki

Leon Mirecki

Jan Mosdorf

Jan Ludwik Popławski

Roman Rybarski

Marian Seyda

Józef Świeżyński

Zygmunt Wasilewski

Maurycy Zamoyski

Notables

See also

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Camp of Great Poland

Camp of Great Poland (association)

National Radical Camp (1934)

Conservative-Monarchist Club

1. Michlic, Joanna Beata (2006). "Poland's Threatening Other: The Image of the Jew from 1880 to the Present". University of Nebraska Press: 602. Beyrau, Dietrich (1993). "Anti-Semitism and Jews in Poland, 1918-1939". Hostages of Modernization: Studies on Modern Antisemitism 1870-1933/39 -

Austria, Hungary, Poland, Russia. de Gruyter: 10873. Naimark, Norman M. (2010). The Killing Fields of the "East": Three Hundred Years of Mass Killing in the Borderlands of Russia and Poland. Nation,

Nationalitäten und Nationalismus im östlichen Europa. University of Vienna, Lit Verlag. p. 185.4. Michlic, Joanna Beata (2006). "Poland's Threatening Other: The Image of the Jew from 1880 to the Present". University of Nebraska Press: 1, 765. Stachura, Peter D. (2004). "Poland, 1918-1945: An Interpretive and Documentary History of the Second Republic". Routledge: viii6. Chodakiewicz, Marek Jan (2004). "Between Nazis and Soviets: Occupation Politics in Poland, 1939-1947". Lexington Books: 417. Michał Szukała interview with Aleksander Hall (2014-08-05). "Dziedzictwo Narodowej Demokracji. W 150. rocznicę urodzin Romana Dmowskiego – rozmowa

z Aleksandrem Hallem" (http://www.muzhp.pl/artykuly/1368/dziedzictwo-narodowej-demokracji-w-150-rocznice-urodzin-romana-dmowskiego--rozmowa-z-aleksandrem-hallem) (in Polish). 2013 © Muzeum Historii Polski (Museum of Poland's History). Retrieved 15 August 2014. "Podzielam pogląd WiesławaChrzanowskiego, który był moim zdaniem najwybitniejszym kontynuatorem endecji, który uważał, że Narodowa Demokracja należy do przeszłości, ponieważwypełniła z powodzeniem swoje najważniejsze zadanie polegające na stworzeniu nowoczesnego narodu obejmującego wszystkie warstwy społeczne.Podobnie jak swoje misje wypełniły kształtujące się w tej samej epoce ruch ludowy, czy patriotyczny nurt PPS nadający świadomość narodową warstwierobotniczej. — Aleksander Hall, dissident under communism, minister during Solidarity years, member of Parliament Sejm, recipient of the Order of the WhiteEagle (Poland)."

8. Davies 2005, 40.9. Jerzy Lukowski; W. H. Zawadzki (2001). A Concise History of Poland: Jerzy Lukowski and Hubert Zawadzki (https://books.google.com/books?id=NpMxTvBuW

HYC). Cambridge University Press. pp. 173–174. ISBN 978-0-521-55917-1. Retrieved 22 December 2012. "Hardly surprisingly, anti-Semitism became a keyelement in the ND ideology"

10. Kawalec, Krzysztof (1989). Narodowa Demokracja wobec faszyzmu 1922-1939: Ze studiów nad dziejami myśli politycznej obozu narodowego. Warszawa:Państwowy Instytut Wydawniczy. p. 115. ISBN 83-06-01728-5.

11. Terej, Jerzy Janusz (1979). Rzeczywistość i polityka: Ze studiów nad dziejami najnowszymi Narodowej Demokracji (2nd ed.). Warszawa: Książka i Wiedza.p. 18. OCLC 7972621 (https://www.worldcat.org/oclc/7972621).

12. Terej, Jerzy Janusz (1979). Rzeczywistość i polityka: Ze studiów nad dziejami najnowszymi Narodowej Demokracji (2nd ed.). Warszawa: Książka i Wiedza.p. 28. OCLC 7972621 (https://www.worldcat.org/oclc/7972621).

13. André Gerrits, Dirk Jan Wolffram (2005). Political Democracy and Ethnic Diversity in Modern European History (https://books.google.com/books?id=UFY_iWZAj7kC&pg=PA41&dq=endecja+emigration). Stanford University Press. ISBN 978-0-8047-4976-3.

Notes

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Davies, Norman (2005). God's Playground: A History of Poland in two Volumes, vol. II (2nd ed.). Oxford: Oxford University Press. ISBN 0-19-925340-4.

Friszke, Andrzej (1989). O kształt niepodległej. Warszawa: Biblioteka "Więzi". ISBN 83-7006-014-5.

Grott, Bogumił (1993). Religia, kościół, etyka w ideach i koncepcjach prawicy polskiej: Narodowa Demokracja. Kraków: Nomos. OCLC 35198390 (https://www.worldcat.org/oclc/35198390).

Holzer, Jerzy (July 1977). "The Political Right in Poland, 1918-39". Journal of Contemporary History. 12 (3): 395–412. doi:10.1177/002200947701200301 (https://doi.org/10.1177%2F002200947701200301).

Kawalec, Krzysztof (1989). Narodowa Demokracja wobec faszyzmu 1922-1939: Ze studiów nad dziejami myśli politycznej obozu narodowego. Warszawa:Państwowy Instytut Wydawniczy. ISBN 83-06-01728-5.

Maj, Ewa (2000). Związek Ludowo-Narodowy 1919-1928: Studium z dziejów myśli politycznej. Lublin: Wydawnictwo Uniwersytetu Marii Curie-Skłodowskiej.ISBN 83-227-1585-4.

Michlic, Joanna Beata (2006). Poland's Threatening Other - The Image of the Jew from 1880 to the Present. Lincoln and London: University of NebraskaPress. p. 386. ISBN 978-0-8032-2079-9.

Porter, Brian A. (Winter 1992). "Who is a Pole and Where is Poland? Territory and Nation in the Rhetoric of Polish National Democracy before 1905". Slavic

Review. Slavic Review, Vol. 51, No. 4. 51 (4): 639–53. doi:10.2307/2500129 (https://doi.org/10.2307%2F2500129). JSTOR 2500129 (https://www.jstor.org/stable/2500129).

Rudnicki, Szymon (1985). Obóz Narodowo-Radykalny: Geneza i działalność. Warszawa: Czytelnik. ISBN 83-07-01221-X.

14. Jerzy Lukowski; W. H. Zawadzki (2001). A Concise History of Poland: Jerzy Lukowski and Hubert Zawadzki (https://books.google.com/books?id=NpMxTvBuWHYC). Cambridge University Press. pp. 217–18. ISBN 978-0-521-55917-1. Retrieved 22 December 2012. "The appeal of fascism and of anti-Semitism wasmost pronounced among young radical NDs, who in 1934 formed the National Radical Camp (ONR), from which emerged the distinctly totalitarian ONR-Falanga under Bolesław Piasecki."

15. [1] (https://books.google.com/books?id=oU6WielZ_VoC&pg=PA190&lpg=PA190&dq=edward+kemnitz+righteous&source=bl&ots=FGJtUCLWvc&sig=bDD6KzvhN6fC3T8Ul7985PiUP9I&hl=pl&sa=X&ei=cFbhUJn0IcrMhAeP1YHwBA&ved=0CFAQ6AEwBg#v=onepage&q=edward%20kemnitz%20righteous&f=false)

16. [2] (http://www1.yadvashem.org/yv/en/righteous/pdf/virtial_wall/poland.pdf)17. [3] (http://www.polishclub.org/2011/03/25/wywiad-z-przewodniczacym-obozu-wielkiej-polski-dawidem-berezickim) Polish Club Online – Wywiad z

Przewodniczącym Obozu Wielkiej Polski – Dawidem Berezicki18. [4] (http://rejestrkrs.pl/STOWARZYSZENIE-OBOZ-WIELKIEJ-POLSKI,411411,1.html) Official KRS Website

References

Further reading

1/14/2018 National Democracy - Wikipedia

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Terej, Jerzy Janusz (1979). Rzeczywistość i polityka: Ze studiów nad dziejami najnowszymi Narodowej Demokracji (2nd ed.). Warszawa: Książka i Wiedza.OCLC 7972621 (https://www.worldcat.org/oclc/7972621).

Wapiński, Roman (1980). Narodowa Demokracja 1893-1939. Wrocław: Zakład Narodowy Imienia Ossolińskich. ISBN 83-04-00008-3.

Wapiński, Roman (1989). Roman Dmowski (2nd ed.). Lublin: Wydawnictwo Lubelskie. ISBN 83-222-0480-9.

Wapiński, Roman (1991). Pokolenia Drugiej Rzeczypospolitej. Wrocław: Zakład Narodowy Imienia Ossolińskich. ISBN 83-04-03711-4.

Wizerunek endeka ratującego Żydów był komunistom nie na rękę (http://www.endecja.pl/wydarzenia/pokaz/641)

Retrieved from "https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=National_Democracy&oldid=801629766"

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National League for Democracy အမျးသား ဒမကရေစ အဖချပ

Abbreviation NLDPatron Tin OoChairperson (ဥကကဋဌ) Aung San Suu KyiFounder Aung Shwe, Tin

Oo, Kyi Maung,Aung San Suu Kyi,Aung Gyi

Founded 27 September 1988Headquarters 97B West Shwe

Gon Daing Road,Bahan Township,Yangon,Myanmar[1]

Ideology Social democracy[2] Populism Liberal democracy

Political position Centre-leftRegional affiliation Council of Asian

Liberals andDemocrats(observer)

Colours RedSeats in the House of 135 / 224

National League for DemocracyThe National League for Democracy (Burmese: အမျးသား ဒမကရေစ အဖချပ, IPA: [ʔəmjóðá

dìmòkəɹèsì ʔəpʰwḛdʑoʊʔ]; abbreviated NLD) is a social-democratic and liberal democratic

political party in Myanmar (Burma), currently serving as the governing party. Founded on 27

September 1988, it has become one of the most influential parties in Myanmar's pro-democracy

movement. Special Honorary President of the Socialist International[3][4] and Nobel Peace Prize

laureate Aung San Suu Kyi serves as its President and she is currently serving as State Counsellor

of Myanmar. The party won a substantial parliamentary majority in the 1990 Burmese general

election. However, the ruling military junta refused to recognise the result. On 6 May 2010, the

party was declared illegal and ordered to be disbanded by the junta after refusing to register for

the elections slated for November 2010.[5] In November 2011, the NLD announced its intention to

register as a political party to contend future elections and on 13 December 2011, Burma's Union

Election Commission approved their application for registration.[6]

In the 2012 by-elections, the NLD contested 44 of the 45 available seats; winning 43, and losing

only one seat to the SNDP.[7] Party leader Aung San Suu Kyi won the seat of Kawhmu.[8]

In the 2015 general election, the NLD won a supermajority in both houses of the Assembly, paving

the way for the country's first non-military president in 54 years.

History

Party platform

Party symbols

Election results

House of Nationalities (Amyotha Hluttaw)

House of Representatives (Pyithu Hluttaw)

Contents

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Nationalities

Seats in the House of

Representatives

255 / 440

Seats in the State and

Regional Hluttaws

476 / 850

Ethnic Affairs Ministers 21 / 29

Party flag

Politics of MyanmarPolitical parties

Elections

State and Regional Hluttaws

Bibliography

References

External links

See also

The NLD was formed in the aftermath of the 8888 Uprising, a series of protests in favour of

democracy which took place in 1988 and was ended when the military again took control of the

country in a coup. It formed under the leadership of Aung San Suu Kyi, daughter of Aung San, a

pivotal figure in the Burmese independence movement of the 1940s. She was recruited by

concerned democracy advocates.

In the 1990 parliamentary elections, the party took 59% of the vote and won 392 out of 492

contested seats, compared to 10 seats won by the governing National Unity Party.[9] However, the

ruling military junta (formerly SLORC, later known as the State Peace and Development Council

or SPDC) did not let the party form a government.[10] Soon after the election, the party was

repressed and in 1989 Suu Kyi was placed under house arrest. This was her status for 16 of the following 21 years until her release on 13 November 2010. A number

of senior NLD members escaped arrest, however, and formed the National Coalition Government of the Union of Burma (NCGUB).

In 2001, the government permitted NLD office branches to re-open throughout Burma and freed some imprisoned members.[11] In May 2002, NLD's general

secretary, Aung San Suu Kyi was again released from house arrest. She and other NLD members made numerous trips throughout the country and received

support from the public. However, on their trip to Depayin township in May 2003, dozens of NLD members were shot and killed in a military sponsored massacre.

Its general secretary, Aung San Suu Kyi and Party's Vice President, U Tin Oo were again arrested.[12]

From 2004, the government prohibited the activities of the party. In 2006, many members resigned from NLD, citing harassment and pressure from the

Tatmadaw (Armed Forces) and the Union Solidarity and Development Association. In October 2008, following the crackdown on the aftermath of the Saffron

Revolution a bomb exploded in the Htan Chauk Pin quarter of the Shwepyitha Township of Yangon, near the office of the military junta-backed Union Solidarity

and Development Association killing one.[13] The victim was identified as Thet Oo Win, a former Buddhist monk who participated in the Saffron Revolution, was

killed while improvising the bomb at his own residence.[14] The junta blamed the National League for Democracy party of planting that bomb, but experts believed

at the time that the opposition was not in a position to carry out such acts amidst the tightly controlled security environment.[14] The junta detained several

members of the party in connection with the bombings that year.[15]

History

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The NLD boycotted the general election held in November 2010 because many of its most prominent members were barred from standing. The laws were written

in such a way that the party would have had to expel these members to be allowed to run. This decision, taken in May, led to the party being officially banned.[5] Asplinter group named the National Democratic Force broke away from the NLD to contest the elections,[16] but secured less than 3% of the vote. The election was

won in a landslide by the military-backed USDP and was described by Barack Obama as "stolen".[17]

Discussions were held between Suu Kyi and the Burmese government during 2011, which led to a number of official gestures to meet her demands. In October,

around a tenth of Burma's political prisoners were freed in an amnesty and trade unions were legalised.[18][19]

On 18 November 2011, following a meeting of its leaders, the NLD announced its intention to re-register as a political party in order contend 48 by-elections

necessitated by the promotion of parliamentarians to ministerial rank.[20] Following the decision, Suu Kyi held a telephone conference with Barack Obama, in

which it was agreed that Secretary of State Hillary Clinton would make a visit to Burma, a move received with caution by Burma's ally China.[21] The visit took

place on 30 November.[22] European Union vice-president Catherine Ashton welcomed the possibility of "fair and transparent" elections in Burma, and said that

the EU would be reviewing its foreign policy towards the country.[23]

The party was criticised for discouraging Muslim candidates during preparations for the 2015 elections, a step seen as related to its desire to keep good relations

with hardline Buddhist monks such as the Ma Ba Tha association.[24] Ko Ni, a legal advisor to the party and a Muslim, was assassinated in January 2017.

The party advocates a non-violent movement towards multi-party democracy in Burma, under military rule from 1962

to 2011.[25] The party also supports human rights (including broad-based freedom of speech), the rule of law, and

national reconciliation.[26]

In a speech of 13 March 2012, Suu Kyi demanded, in addition to the above, independence of the judiciary, full freedom

for the media, and increasing social benefits to include legal aid.

She also claimed amendments to the constitution of 2008, drafted with the input of the armed forces. She stated that

its mandatory granting of 25 per cent of seats in parliament to appointed military representatives is undemocratic.[27]

The party flag features the peacock, a prominent symbol of Burma. The dancing peacock (the peacock in courtship or

in display of its feathers) was frequently featured in Burmese monarchic flags as well as other nationalist symbols in

the country.[28] The fighting peacock is associated with the decades-long democratic struggle against military dictatorship in the country. The latter closely

resembles a green peafowl, as it has a tufted crest. The NLD party symbol is adopted from the Myanmar (Burmese) Student Union flag. This student union

organised since the uprising against British colonial rule in Burma, years before the independence of Burma in 1948, had played a major political role in Burma

and Daw Aung San Suu Kyi's late father Bogyoke Aung San (General Aung San) was one of the former presidents of the Rangoon University Student Union.

Party platform

National League for Democracy'sheadquarters in Yangon (beforereconstruction)

Party symbols

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The party emblem is a traditional bamboo hat (ခမောက).[29]

Election Total seats won Total votes Share of votes Outcome of election Note Election leader

20100 / 224 — — — Boycotted Aung San Suu Kyi

20124 / 224 — — 4 Opposition Aung San Suu Kyi

2015135 / 224 — — 131 Majority government Aung San Suu Kyi

Election Total seats won Total votes Share of votes Outcome of election Note Election leader

1990392 / 492 7,930,841 52.5% 392 Not recognised Aung San Suu Kyi

20100 / 440 — — — Boycotted Aung San Suu Kyi

201237 / 440 — — 37 Opposition Aung San Suu Kyi

2015255 / 440 12,794,561 57.1% 218 Majority government Aung San Suu Kyi

Election results

House of Nationalities (Amyotha Hluttaw)

House of Representatives (Pyithu Hluttaw)

State and Regional Hluttaws

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Election Total seats won Total votes Share of votes Outcome of election Note Election leader

2015476 / 850 — — 474 Aung San Suu Kyi

Houtman, Gustaaf. Daigaku, Tōkyō Gaikokugo. Kenkyūjo, Ajia Afurika Gengo Bunka. Mental culture in Burmese crisis politics: Aung San Suu Kyi and the

National League for Democracy. ILCAA, 1999. ISBN 978-4-87297-748-6.

1. Frangos, Alex; Patrick Barta (30 March 2012). "Once-Shunned Quarters Becomes Tourist Mecca" (http://professional.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052702304177104577311330962815886.html?lpe=WSJ_PRO&mg=com-wsj#articleTabs%3Darticle). Wall Street Journal. Retrieved 2 April 2012.

2. "Leftist Parties of Myanmar" (http://www.broadleft.org/mm.htm).3. "Socialist International - Progressive Politics For A Fairer World" (http://www.socialistinternational.org/viewArticle.cfm?ArticleID=1951).4. http://library.fes.de/pdf-files/iez/06070.pdf5. "National League for Democracy disbanded in Myanmar" (http://www.haitinews.net/story/630891). Haiti News. 4 May 2010. Retrieved 11 November 2010.6. Suu Kyi's Myanmar opposition party wins legal status (http://ph.news.yahoo.com/suu-kyis-myanmar-opposition-wins-legal-recognition-034032823.html), The

Associated Press, 13 December 20117. "It is the victory of the people: Aung San Suu Kyi on Myanmar – World News – IBNLive" (http://ibnlive.in.com/news/it-is-the-victory-of-people-aung-san-suu-

kyi/245176-2.html). Ibnlive.in.com. 10 May 2011. Retrieved 5 April 2012.8. "Myanmar election commission announces NLD wins overwhelmingly in by-elections" (http://news.xinhuanet.com/english/world/2012-04/02/c_131504585.ht

m). Xinhua. 2 April 2012. Retrieved 30 January 2017.9. Houtman, Daigaku & Kenkyūjo, 1999, p. 1

10. Junta must free Burma's leading lady (http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/story/0,25197,25503318-16741,00.html), The Australian, 19 May 200911. Burma's Confidence Building and Political Prisoners (http://www.aappb.org/report7_confidence_building_pp.pdf), Assistance Association for Political Prisoners12. "The Depayin Massacre: Two years on, Justice denied" (https://web.archive.org/web/20070614185341/http://www.aseanmp.org/resources/Depayin%20Mas

sacre.pdf) (PDF). Asean Inter-parliamentary Myanmar caucus. 30 May 2005. Archived from the original (http://www.aseanmp.org/resources/Depayin%20Massacre.pdf) (PDF) on 14 June 2007. Retrieved 20 November 2011.

13. "One Dead in Burma Blasts" (http://www.rfa.org/english/news/myanmar/bombs-10202008121201.html). Radio Free Asia. AFP. 20 October 2008. Retrieved3 December 2016.

14. "Increasing bomb blasts worry Rangoon residents – Zarni & Mungpi" (http://www.burmanet.org/news/2008/10/21/mizzima-news-increasing-bomb-blasts-worry-rangoon-residents-zarni-mungpi/) (1). BurmaNet News. Mizzima News. 21 October 2008. Retrieved 3 December 2016.

15. "Agence France Presse: Myanmar blast victim was ex-monk turned bombmaker: state media" (http://www.burmanet.org/news/2008/10/21/agence-france-presse-myanmar-blast-victim-was-ex-monk-turned-bombmaker-state-media/). BurmaNet News. AFP. 21 October 2008. Retrieved 3 December 2016.

Bibliography

References

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Official website of National League for Democracy Party (http://www.nldofficial.org/)

Official website of Daw Aung San Su Kyi (http://www.nldchairperson.org/)

National League for Democracy (Liberated Area) (https://web.archive.org/web/20120119101513/http://www.nldla.net/) (Archived from the original (http://w

ww.nldla.net/) on 19 January 2012)

National League for Democracy (Burma) (https://web.archive.org/web/20130618045918/http://www.nldburma.org/) (Archived from the original (http://ww

w.nldburma.org/) on 18 June 2013)

16. "New Burmese opposition party to contest election" (https://www.theguardian.com/world/2010/may/07/new-democratic-party-burma-elections). London:The Guardian. 7 May 2010. Retrieved 7 May 2010.

17. "15,000 flee Burma in post-election violence" (http://www.cbc.ca/news/world/story/2010/11/08/burma-election.html). CBC News. 8 November 2010.Retrieved 19 November 2011.

18. "Burma frees dozens of political prisoners" (http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-pacific-15269259). BBC News. 12 October 2011. Retrieved 19 November2011.

19. "Burma law to allow labour unions and strikes" (http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-pacific-15303968). BBC News. 14 October 2011. Retrieved19 November 2011.

20. "Suu Kyi's NLD democracy party to rejoin Burma politics" (http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-15787605). BBC News. 18 November 2011. Retrieved19 November 2011.

21. Whitlock, Craig (19 November 2011). "U.S. sees Burma reforms as strategic opening to support democracy" (https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/national-security/us-sees-burma-reforms-as-strategic-opening-to-support-democracy/2011/11/18/gIQA22gwZN_story_1.html). Washington Post. Retrieved19 November 2011.

22. " 'Hopeful' Hillary Clinton starts Burma visit" (http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-15956664). BBC News. 30 November 2011. Retrieved 1 December 2011.23. "EU hails Myanmar moves, reviewing policy" (https://www.reuters.com/article/2011/11/18/us-eu-myanmar-idUSTRE7AH1ER20111118). Reuters. 18

November 2011. Retrieved 19 November 2011.24. News, Jonah Fisher BBC. "Aung San Suu Kyi's party excludes Muslim candidates" (http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-34182489). BBC News. Retrieved

2016-01-03.25. "Aung San Suu Kyi released" (http://www.cbc.ca/world/story/2010/11/13/suu-kyi-burma.html#ixzz15HYGPl00). CBC News. 13 November 2010.26. "Suu Kyi calls for talks with junta leader" (http://www.cbc.ca/world/story/2010/11/14/suu-kyi-burma.html#ixzz15IEwNbqH). CBC News. 14 November 2010.27. [1] (http://www.demdigest.net/blog/2012/03/burma-must-repeal-repressive-laws-suu-kyi-says-in-leaked-broadcast/)28. "Burma flag and emblems" (https://web.archive.org/web/20120406101349/http://www.myanmars.net/myanmar/myanmar-flag-emblem.htm).

Myanmars.net. Archived from the original (http://www.myanmars.net/myanmar/myanmar-flag-emblem.htm) on 6 April 2012. Retrieved 5 April 2012.29. Hla Tun, Aung (3 July 2010). "Burmese democrats fall out over bamboo hat symbol" (https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/asia/burmese-democrats-f

all-out-over-bamboo-hat-symbol-2017261.html). The Independent. London. Retrieved 19 November 2011.

External links

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Daw Aung San Suu Kyi's pages (http://dassk.org) (Inactive website. No new activity since July 2014.)

The National Coalition Government of the Union of Burma Website (http://www.ncgub.net/)

List of political parties in Burma

Politics of Burma

Retrieved from "https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=National_League_for_Democracy&oldid=819928321"

This page was last edited on 12 January 2018, at 02:45.

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See also

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Democracy and the Military

Prev Introduction: Democracy and the Military in comparative

perspective Next

Democracy and the Military

Huntington (1957), in a study based primarily on the history of the military in Western societies), elaboratedwhat was widely accepted as the liberal democratic model of civil-military interaction. ‘[T]he principalresponsibility of the military officer’, Huntington said, ‘is to the state’:[10]

Politics is beyond the scope of military competence, and the participation of military officers inpolitics undermines their professionalism … The military officer must remain neutral politically …The area of military science is subordinate to, and yet independent of, the area of politics … Themilitary profession exists to serve the state … The superior political wisdom of the statesman mustbe accepted as a fact (Huntington 1957:16, 71, 73, 76).

The idea of the subservience of the military to civilian authority, as Grundy (1968) has pointed out, follows atradition going back to Plato.[11] Huntington, however, challenged the simple identification of civilian controlwith democratic government, and military control with absolute or totalitarian government: the military mayundermine civilian control in a democracy, he argued, acquiring power by legitimate processes,[12] andwithin a totalitarian system the power of the military may be reduced by such means as creating competingmilitary or paramilitary units or by infiltrating it with ‘political commissars’. ‘Subjective civilian control’, he

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concluded, ‘thus is not the monopoly of any particular constitutional system’ (ibid.:82). Huntington went onto distinguish five patterns of civil-military relations, based on differing relative degrees of military/anti-military ideology, military power, and military professionalism (see ibid.: chapter 4), but as evidenced in hislater study (Huntington 1968), for Huntington military ‘intervention’ represented an essential breakdown ofthe liberal democratic political order.

While Huntington’s concept of military professionalism has remained influential, the spate of post-independence military coups in the new states of Africa and Asia from the late 1950s prompted a morecritical examination of the relation between civilian government and the military. Some commentators,indeed, suggested that the presumed neutrality and separation of the military from politics was at best aWestern concept, if not a complete fiction (see, for example Perlmutter 1980:119; Valenzuela 1985:142;Ashkenazy 1994:178). Not only did military intervention sometimes occur in response to the effectivebreakdown of democratic civil regimes – with the ostensible aim of restoring democracy, and often withsubstantial popular support – but in some new states, notably the communist ‘people’s republics’ and the‘guided democracy’ of Indonesia’s President Soekarno, an alternative model of ‘democracy’ was espoused, inwhich the military was seen as an integral part of the political system rather than, as in Huntington’sformulation, an agency outside the political realm.[13]

That a variety of political regimes, in which the pattern of relations between civilian politicians and themilitary covers a broad spectrum, should claim to be ‘democratic’ is testimony to the popularity of the termin international political discourse. Such popularity reflects the extent to which the term acts as an agent ofpolitical legitimation in a world where democracy is accepted, at least rhetorically, as a universal ‘good’. Butcan military regimes ever be described as democratic? Or, indeed, are they necessarily anti-democratic?

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Gallie’s (1956) formulation of democracy as an ‘essentially contested concept’ lends support to a relativistposition, the extension of which is that democracy can mean all things to all people. As Hewison, Robisonand Rodan (1993:5) point out, this effectively denies the possibility that any universal understandings can bereached and serves to ‘indemnify the most scurrilous of dictatorships and to undermine the legitimacy ofdemocratic and reformist oppositions’. On the other hand, too narrow a definition, especially with respect toinstitutional forms, is unrealistic.

One way of dealing with this definitional problem is to acknowledge that regimes measure up differentlyagainst various criteria of democracy, and that the idea of a continuum from more democratic to lessdemocratic is the most useful and meaningful approach to the problem of analysing and comparing regimes.Diamond, Linz and Lipset (1990:6-7), for example, define democracy in terms of three essential andgenerally accepted conditions: meaningful competition for government office; a high level of politicalparticipation; and a level of civil and political liberties sufficient to ensure competition and participation. Theyrecognise, at the same time, that ‘countries that broadly satisfy these criteria, nevertheless do so to differentdegrees’ and that the ‘boundary between democratic and undemocratic is sometimes blurred and imperfect’(ibid.:7; see also Dahl 1989:112; Hadenius 1992; Sørensen 1993; Lawson 1993).

For military rulers, however, the widespread association of democracy with civilian supremacy has created aparticular crisis of legitimacy. A central pillar of modern democratic theory is the doctrine of constitutionalismwhich, in its simplest form, refers to limited government, a system in which any body of rulers is as muchsubject to the rule of law as the body of citizens. An important corollary to the democratic doctrine ofconstitutionalism is civilian supremacy (though this in itself is not a sufficient condition for democracy since,as Huntington pointed out, many non-democratic governments maintain civilian control over their military

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and police organisations). Democracy requires, therefore, not only that armed forces be subject to civiliancontrol, but that ‘those civilians who control the military and police must themselves be subject to thedemocratic process’ (Dahl 1989:245). A fundamental principle of the democratic model of civilian supremacyin civil-military relations resides in the important distinction between the state and the legitimategovernment. It is to the latter that the military owes its primary allegiance, and any implicit distinction thatthe military might be tempted to draw between the goals of the government and those of the state mustprovoke a serious legitimacy problem (Harries-Jenkins and van Doorn 1976); this is so because thedemocracy model insists that the military’s power is legitimate only in so far as it has been endorsed bysociety as a whole and that its practical objectives are those set for it by the government of the day. VanGils (1971:274) states this succinctly:

Under the conditions of pluralistic democracy, the relations between the armed forces and civiliansare, at least theoretically, quite straightforward. Soldiers are public officials. They are not theembodiment of any particular set of values. They are not the chosen defenders of any specificsocial or political institution. They hold public office on the assumption that they will provide societywith a specific set of services whenever society considers itself in the need of having such servicesperformed.

This reflects the deeply embedded assumption of modern democratic theory, that it is the popularly electedgovernment, and no other body or person, that is wholly responsible for deciding what policies are to bepursued in the name of the people. In so doing, the government is constrained by the limits to action set outunder the law of the constitution, and is ultimately held accountable for its activities and decisions when itfaces the judgement of the people at the polls.

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But what if a constitutionally and popularly elected civilian government once in office abrogates theconstitution and rejects the democratic values embodied in it (including genuinely competitive elections)? Insuch circumstances – which have been not uncommon in post-colonial states – the military may be the onlyentity within the country capable of reversing such a development and reinstating democratic government.

While contemporary democratic theory appears to be entirely at odds with the notion that the military hasany role in unilaterally acting to ‘safeguard the national interest’, the most common justification for militaryintervention is just this. Such appeals to the national interest have frequently been coupled with referencesto some perceived crisis or threat involving the security of the state or serious economic or social problems.As Goodman (1990:xiii) observes for Latin America:

The frequent military ascension to power has often been motivated by a perceived need to savetheir nations from weak, corrupt, and undisciplined civilian leadership.

Numerous commentators on the role of the military in politics have observed the tendency of armed forcesto justify their intervention in terms of the national interest, and thereby to identify themselves with thedesiderata of nationhood. Most have been sceptical. Lissak (1976:20), for example, notes that the militarycan acquire a self image as guarantor of the fundamental and permanent interests of the nation, therebyarrogating to itself the requisite legitimacy to assume the right to rule. Similarly, Nordlinger (1970:1137-8)highlights the manner in which the military’s corporate interests can be defined, legitimised, and rationalisedby a close identification with the interests of the nation, while at the same time portraying oppositionalprotests to their actions as ‘expressions of partial and selfish interests’.

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Nevertheless, authoritarian rule is not exclusive to military regimes and, as the case studies in this volumeillustrate, armed forces have played a role in pro-democracy regime transitions (see also Chazan et al. 1988;Goodman 1990; Rial 1990a). The critical factor for most commentators on civil-military relations concernsthe intention of military rulers to return to the barracks.

To legitimise their intervention, military regimes commonly contend that their rule is only a preparatory ortransitory (but entirely necessary) stage along the road to a fully democratic political system, and promisean early return to civilian rule, thereby recognising, Dahl (1989:2) argues, that ‘an indispensable ingredientfor their legitimacy is a dash or two of the language of democracy’. In some cases, military rule has beenjustified ‘as necessary for the regeneration of the polity to allow for stable and effective rule’; militaryregimes have even portrayed their role as that of ‘democratic tutor’ (Huntington 1968; Nordlinger 1977:204-5). Yet once out of the barracks military rulers have seldom been anxious to relinquish power and evenwhere there have been transitions back to civilian rule the armed forces have typically retained aninvolvement in politics and have been more likely to intervene again if dissatisfied with the performance ofcivilian governments.

Observing processes of transition from authoritarian military rule to democracy in Latin America, Goodman(1990:xiv) comments that, ‘successful transitions have utilised a process of incremental rather thanimmediate civilian control’; he goes on to suggest:

For democracy to take root in Latin America, both military men and civilian leaders must take onnew roles…. Recognition that the military is one of the strongest formal institutions in societies thatare in dire need of political and social coherence poses challenges to Latin American civilian leaders

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that are very different from those confronted by their developed-nation counterparts (ibid.:xiv; seealso Stepan 1988; Rial 1990a, b and Varas 1990).

Goodman, however, is not explicit on the nature of these ‘new roles’, and other contributors to the samevolume suggest that recently democratised regimes in Latin America remain vulnerable to ‘the rapid rebirthof military authoritarianism’ (Rial 1990b:289).

In Asia and the Pacific armed forces have played a role in both democratising and anti-democratictransitions, and though, as elsewhere, their tendency as rulers has been towards authoritarianism, patternsof civil-military relations and degrees of authoritarianism/democracy in governance have varied widely. Anyattempt at understanding this variety must begin with an appreciation of the particular historical and culturalcircumstances under which military involvement in politics has developed in different countries.

[10] In context, Huntington appears to equate ‘state’ with ‘government’; the significance of distinguishing‘state’ from ‘government’ is discussed below.

[11] Also note von Clausewitz (1832/1968:405): ‘… subordination of the military point of view to the politicalis … the only thing which is possible’.

[12] For a recent statement of this theme, drawing primarily on US experience, see Johansen (1992).

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[13] See, for example, Albright’s (1980) critique of Huntington’s ‘conceptual framework’ on the basis of theexperiences of sixteen communist states. On civil-military relations in communist states, also see Perlmutter(1982) and Herspring and Volgyes (1978).

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Definition Government for the people, by the people, of

the people

A government type by military chiefs.

Oxford Dictionary A system of government that is formed by

whole population/eligible members, through

elected representatives.

A type of government by the armed forces.

Cambridge Dictionary The belief in freedom and equality between

people, or a system of government based on

this belief, in which power is either held by

elected representatives or directly by the

people themselves:

A political system or organization based on

military power.

Merriam-Webster Dictionary The type of government in which people

choose their leaders by voting is called as

Democracy.

When military is the basis of a type of

government it is called as Stratocracy.

Etymology

Greek Root dēmokratia stratos

Word Origin Period 16th century AD 17th century AD

Similar Government Types Consensus Democracy

Consociational Democracy

Cosmopolitan Democracy

Representative Democracy

Totalitarian democracy

Autocracy

Chiefdom

Kleptocracy

Kratocracy

Totalitarian

Characteristics

Government Class Democracy Oligarchy

Differences Democracy ▼ Stratocracy ▼

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Advantages Majority rule, People's rights, Power of

voting, Prevents monopoly of authority,

Promote change, Protect interest of citizens

Faster process, More discipline, Stronger

Military

Disadvantages Favours rich, May involve immoral practice

during election, Misuse of public funds, Take

longer time to take decision

No individual freedom, Few people in power,

No fixed laws, No political freedom, People's

right is limited

Structure

Majority Rule ✔ ✘

Power Resides in Parliament Military chiefs

Voting ✔ ✘

Succession Elective Neither Heritance nor Elective

Parliament Present Sometimes present

Constitution Present Sometimes present

Legislature Size Large Small

Political Stability Stable Unstable

Economic Stability Stable Unstable

Countries

Asian Bangladesh, Bhutan, Georgia, India,

Indonesia, Isreal, Japan, Mauritius,

Mongolia, Nepal, Pakistan, Philippines, South

Korea, Sri Lanka, Taiwan

Not present

European Australia, Austria, Belgium, Bulgaria,

Denmark, England, Finland, France, Georgia,

Russia, Ukraine

📊

📊

📊

📊

📊

📊

📊

📊

📊

📊

📊

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Germany, Great Britain, Greece, Hungary,

Iceland, Ireland, Italy, Latvia, Lithuania,

Luxemborg, Netherlands, New Zealand,

Norway, Poland, Portugal, Romania,

Scotland, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland,

United Kingdom

African Benin, Botswana, Cape Verde, Ghana,

Kenya, Madagascar, Niger, Nigeria, Senegal,

Sierra Leone, South Africa, Tanzania, Tunisia,

Zambia

Egypt, Libya

North American Belize, Canada, Costa Rica, El Salvador,

Guatemala, Jamaica, Mexico, Panama,

United States of America

Not present

South American Argentina, Bolivia, Brazil, Chile, Colombia,

Ecuador, Paraguay, Peru, Uruguay

Argentina, Chile

Others Australia, New Zealand, Papua New Guinea Not present

Ancient Regime

Asia Ancient India Ukraine

Europe Ancient Greece, Ancient Rome Ancient Greece, Ancient Sparta

History A type of government of 5th Century BC

origin

A government type by military chiefs which

originated in the 17th century

Origin

Place of Origin Athens, Greece Russia

Period of Origin 5th century BC 17th century AD

Origin Era B.C. A.D. 📊

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Modern

Early Modern 1628: Petition of right passed in England,

1679: Habeas Corpus Act passed in England,

1689- Bill of rights in England

Late Roman Republic is also an example of

Stratocracy.

18th and 19th Century 1707: The English parliament merged with

Parliament of Scotland to form the First

Parliament of Great Britain. 1787: Adoption

of United States Constitution. 1789:

Declaration os the rights of man and citizens

adopted by Revolutionary France

Not Present

20th and 21st Century 1965: Voting Rights Act by United States

Congress. 1980's:Many dictatorships and

communist countries started applying

democratization. 2010: International

Democracy Day declared by the UN

1981: Rise of Stratocracy in Russia 2010:

Military's control was implemented in

Government of Burma.

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https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stratocracy 1/3

StratocracyA stratocracy (from στρατός, stratos, "army" and κράτος, kratos, "dominion", "power") is a form of government headed by military chiefs.[1] It is not the same as

a military dictatorship or military junta where the military's political power is not enforced or even supported by other laws. Rather, stratocracy is a form of

military government in which the state and the military are traditionally or constitutionally the same entity, and government positions are always occupied by

commissioned officers and military leaders. Citizens with mandatory or voluntary military service, or who have been honorably discharged, have the right to elect

or govern. The military's political power is supported by law, the constitution, and the society. A stratocracy can therefore be considered a meritocracy and does not

necessarily need to be autocratic by nature in order to preserve its right to rule.

Notable examples of stratocracies

Modern stratocracies

Historical stratocracies

Fictional stratocracies

See also

References

The closest modern equivalent to a stratocracy, the State Peace and Development Council of Myanmar (Burma), which ruled from 1997 to 2011, arguably differed

from most other military dictatorships in that it completely abolished the civilian constitution and legislature. A new constitution that came into effect in 2010

cemented the military's hold on power through mechanisms such as reserving 25% of the seats in the legislature for military personnel.[2]

The United Kingdom overseas territory, the Sovereign Base Areas of Akrotiri and Dhekelia on the island of Cyprus, provides another example of a stratocracy:

British Forces Cyprus governs the territory, with Major-General James Illingworth OBE serving as administrator from February 2017.

Contents

Notable examples of stratocracies

Modern stratocracies

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Cossacks were predominantly East Slavic people who became known as members of democratic, semi-military and semi-naval communities,[3] predominantly

located in Ukraine and in Southern Russia. They inhabited sparsely populated areas and islands in the lower Dnieper,[4] Don, Terek, and Ural river basins, and

played an important role in the historical and cultural development of both Russia and Ukraine.[5]

From a young age, male Spartans were trained for battle and put through grueling challenges intended to craft them into fearless warriors. In battle, they had the

reputation of being the best soldiers in Greece, and the strength of Sparta's hoplite forces let the city become the dominant state in Greece throughout much of the

Classical period. No other city-state would dare to attack Sparta even though it could only muster a force of about 8,000 during the zenith of its dominance.[6]

The Cardassian Union of the Star Trek universe can be described as a stratocracy, with a constitutionally and socially sanctioned, as well as politically dominant,

military that nonetheless has strong meritocratic characteristics.

In Robert A. Heinlein's Starship Troopers, the Terran Federation was set up by a group of military veterans in Aberdeen, Scotland when governments collapsed

following a global war. The Federation allows only those who complete a period of Federal Service to vote. While Federal Service is not exclusively military service,

that appears to be the dominant form. It is believed that only those willing to sacrifice their life on the state's behalf are fit to govern. While the government is a

representative democracy, it appears to be dominated by active and former members of the military due to this law.

Military rule (disambiguation)

Militarism

1. Bouvier, John; Gleason, Daniel A. (1999). Institutes of American law. The Lawbook Exchange, Ltd. p. 7. ISBN 978-1-886363-80-9.2. Burma 'approves new constitution' (http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/asia-pacific/7402105.stm). BBC News. May 15, 2008.3. Cossacks lived along major rivers -- Dnieper, Don, Volga, Terek, Ural, Amur -- and had excellent naval capabilities and skills-- they were excellent fishermen

and sea merchants in peaceful times and executed expert naval service in war times. Cossacks combined features of US cowboys, US cavalry, and the USNavy.

4. R.P. Magocsi, A History of Ukraine, pp. 179–1815. Count Leo Tolstoy, a noted author, wrote "that all Russian history has been made by Cossacks. No wonder Europeans call all of us that...Our people as a

whole wishes to be Cossacks."6. Harley, T. Rutherford. The Public School of Sparta, Greece & Rome, Vol. 3, No. 9 (May 1934) pp. 129-139.

Historical stratocracies

Fictional stratocracies

See also

References

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Sociology Index

Stratocracy

Dictatorship, Fascism, Military Dictatorship, Communist State, Totalitarianism

In a stratocracy there is no difference between the state and the military and government positions areoccupied by military leaders. The military chiefs head the government in stratocracy. Stratocracy is not amilitary dictatorship where the military's political power is not enforced or even supported by other laws.The military's political power in stratocracy is supported by law and the society.

Stratocracy need not be autocratic in order to preserve its right to rule. In military dictatorship politicalpower resides with the military. Similar to a Stratocracy, a state ruled directly by the military. Militarydictatorships are a result of a coup d'état. Military dictatorship may be official or unofficial and may notqualify as stratocratic. Military dictatorships is contrasted with Communist State. In Communist states, thecenter of power rests among civilian party officials.

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Dictatorship is government that has the power to govern without consent of those being governed.Dictatorship is a contrast to democracy.

In military dictatorship political power resides with the military. Similar to a stratocracy, a state ruleddirectly by the military. Military dictatorships are a result of a coup d'état. Military dictatorship may beofficial or unofficial and may not qualify as stratocratic.

Military dictatorships is contrasted with Communist State. In Communist states, the center of power restsamong civilian party officials.

Fascism is a political doctrine opposed to democracy and demanding submission to political leadership andauthority. A key principle of fascism is the belief that the whole society has a shared destiny and purposewhich can only be achieved by iron discipline, obedience to leadership and an all-powerful state.

1

Copyright © 1997 National Endowment for Democracy and the Johns Hopkins University Press. All rights reserved. Journal of Democracy 8.4 (1997) 140-153

How Democracies Control the Military

Richard H. Kohn

Among the oldest problems of human governance has been that of securing the subordination of military forces to political authority. In the twentieth century alone, civilian control of the military has been a concern of democracies like the United States and France, of communist tyrannies such as the Soviet Union and China, of fascist dictatorships in Germany and Italy, and since 1945, of many smaller states in Africa, Asia, and Latin America. Whether--and how--a society controls those who possess the ultimate power of physical coercion, and ensures their loyalty both to the particular government in power and to the regime in general, is basic to democratic governance.

Civilian control has special significance today. Throughout the postcommunist world, societies are struggling to build democratic institutions. The North Atlantic Treaty Organization has declared civilian control a prerequisite for membership. In encouraging democratization, the United States and other Western powers use civilian control as a measure of progress toward democracy. While democracy is spreading in South and Central America, and in Europe, Asia, and Africa, there exists no set of standards by which to evaluate whether civilian control exists, how well it functions, and what the prognosis is for its continued success.

Control by civilians presents two challenges. For mature democracies, where civilian control has historically been strong and military establishments have focused on external defense, the test is whether civilians can exercise supremacy in military policy and decision making--that is, frame the alternatives and define the discussion, as well as make the final choice. When the military enjoys great prestige, possesses advanced bureaucratic skills, believes that its ability to fulfill its mission may be at risk, or comes to doubt the civilian leadership, civilians can face great obstacles in exercising their authority.

Fledgling democracies, with scant experience in combining popular government and civilian control, face a tougher challenge. They must ensure that the military will not attempt a coup d'état, or otherwise defy civilian authority. In many former autocracies, the military has concentrated on internal order or been

2

deeply involved in politics, sometimes preying on society rather than protecting it. There the chief requirement is to establish a tradition of civilian control, to make the military establishment politically neutral, and to prevent or preclude any possibility of military intervention in political life. The task will still remain to establish civilian control over national security policy and decision making. But in the new democracies, civilian efforts to gain supremacy over military affairs risk provoking military defiance, or, if public opinion does not support the civilians, perhaps even military intervention.

What are the common characteristics or experiences that have, historically, fostered civilian control under democracy? While this essay is based mostly on Western and particularly Anglo-American experience, the analysis applies to any society that practices, or is making the transition to practicing, government based upon the sovereignty and will of the people.

For democracy, civilian control--that is, control of the military by civilian officials elected by the people--is fundamental. Civilian control allows a nation to base its values, institutions, and practices on the popular will rather than on the choices of military leaders, whose outlook by definition focuses on the need for internal order and external security. The military is, by necessity, among the least democratic institutions in human experience; martial customs and procedures clash by nature with individual freedom and civil liberty, the highest values in democratic societies.

Because their basic purpose is to wage armed conflict, military institutions are designed for violence and coercion, and over the centuries have developed the organizational structure, operating procedures, and individual values needed to succeed in war. Authority in the military emphasizes hierarchy so that individuals and units act according to the intentions of commanders, and can succeed under the very worst of physical circumstances and mental stresses.

While many of the military's professional values--courage, honesty, sacrifice, integrity, loyalty, service--are among the most respected in human experience, the norms and processes intrinsic to military institutions diverge so far from the premises of democratic society that the relationship is inherently adversarial and sometimes unstable. Military behaviors are functional imperatives. If society were to be governed by the personal ideals or institutional perspectives of the military, developed over centuries to support service to the state and sacrifice in war, then each individual citizen (and the national purpose) would become subservient to national security--to the exclusion, or at least the devaluation, of other needs and concerns.

The point of civilian control is to make security subordinate to the larger purposes of a nation, rather than the other way around. The purpose of the military is to defend society, not to define it. While a country may have civilian control of the military without democracy, it cannot have democracy without

3

civilian control.

Defining Civilian Control

In theory, civilian control is simple: All decisions of government, including national security, are to be made or approved by officials outside the professional armed forces, in democracy, by popularly elected officeholders or their appointees. In principle, civilian control is absolute and all-encompassing: No decision or responsibility falls to the military unless expressly or implicitly delegated to it by civilian leaders. Even the decisions of command--the selection of strategy, of what operations to mount and when, what tactics to employ, the internal management of the military--derive from civilian authority. They are delegated to uniformed personnel only for reasons of convenience, tradition, effectiveness, or military experience and expertise. Civilians make all the rules, and they can change them at any time. 1

The reality is quite different. For a variety of reasons, military establishments have gained significant power and achieved considerable autonomy, even in those democracies that have long practiced civilian control. In some countries, the military has by custom kept control over much of military life; in others, governments have never managed to develop the tools, the procedures, the influence with elites, or the prestige with the public needed to establish supremacy over their armed forces. For the most part, however, a degree of military autonomy has grown out of the need to professionalize the management of war. In the last two centuries, war has become too complex--the preparations too elaborate, the weapons too sophisticated, command too arduous, operations too intricate--to leave the waging of combat to amateurs or part-time practitioners. As a result, the influence of the professional military has grown, and it has sometimes used democratic processes to further its own professional and institutional independence.

Forty years ago, the great theorist of civilian control Samuel P. Huntington argued in The Soldier and the State that the way to optimize civilian supremacy was to recognize such "autonomous military professionalism." In arguing for what he called "objective civilian control," Huntington asserted that the state should encourage "an independent military sphere" so that "multifarious civilian groups" would not "maximize their power in military affairs" by involving the military in political activity. Such interference, he believed, not only diminished the effectiveness of military forces and thus a nation's security, but actually invited the military to involve itself in governance beyond national security affairs. An officer corps focused on its own profession--and granted sufficient independence to organize itself and practice the art of war without interference in those areas requiring technical expertise--would be politically neutral and less likely to intervene in politics. 2 The paradox of Huntington's formulation is that while "objective" civilian control might minimize military involvement in

4

politics, it also decreases civilian control over military affairs.

The critical issue is where, and how, to distinguish between military and civilian responsibility. With war increasingly dangerous, civilians want more control to ensure congruence with political purpose; with weapons and operations becoming ever more technical and complex, military officers want more independence to achieve success with the least cost in blood and treasure. Where to divide authority and responsibility has become increasingly situational, and uncertain.

The truth of the matter is that, fundamentally, civilian control is not a fact but a process. It exists along a continuum, running from the extreme of countries that are ruled by military establishments or experience frequent direct or indirect military intervention in politics, to those that do not even possess standing military forces. The best way to understand civilian control, to measure its existence and evaluate its effectiveness, is to weigh the relative influence of military officers and civilian officials in decisions of state concerning war, internal security, external defense, and military policy (that is, the shape, size, and operating procedures of the military establishment).

Sometimes, where civilian control is weak or nonexistent, military influence laps over into other areas of public policy and social life. Even in mature democracies that have long practiced civilian control, the balance between military and civilian varies with time and place, with the personalities involved, with the personal or political ambitions of senior military officers and leading politicians, and with the circumstances that give the military prestige and weight in public opinion. Even in those democracies with rich traditions of unbroken civilian dominance, war and security can (and have) become so important in national life and so central to the definition of the state that the military, particularly during or after a crisis or war, can use its expertise or public standing to limit civilian influence in military affairs. But even beyond such circumstances, civilian control depends frequently on the individuals involved: how each side views its role and function; the public respect or popularity possessed by a particular politician or political institution or military officer or armed force; the bureaucratic or political skill of the various officials.

If civilian control of the military is a process defined by the relative influence of civilian and military officials, then the central issue confronting scholars and policy makers today is how to judge the extent to which civilian control exists, how well it functions, and whether it is sufficient for democratic governance. Ultimately, civilian control rests upon a set of ideas, institutions, and behaviors that has developed over time in democratic societies. Together, these practices check the likelihood that the military will interfere in political life; they form a system that provides civilian officials with both the authority and the machinery to exercise supremacy in military affairs. Civilian control contains inherent tensions and still suffers periodic strains and lapses, but the system can be

5

introduced and made to function in almost any country where democracy begins to take root.

The Foundations for Civilian Control

The first requirement for civilian control in democracy is democratic governance itself: the rule of law, civil liberty, a stable method for peaceful succession in power, workable practices for electing officials, and a government and governing process (perhaps spelled out in a written constitution) that are legitimate in the eyes of both key elites and the general public. Civilian control can reinforce democracy, but civilian control is only one aspect--necessary but not sufficient--of democratic rule. Without a stable and legitimate governmental system and process, the military may interfere in order to protect society from chaos, internal challenge, or external attack--even when intervention may itself perpetuate instability and destroy legitimacy in government. The tradition of legitimacy in government acts on the one hand to deter military interference in politics, and on the other to counteract intervention should it threaten or occur.

Furthermore, the state must, as a matter of standing national policy, clearly specify the role of the military. Certainly uniformed leaders can and should be consulted in this process as the mission of the military changes to suit new conditions. But the military cannot define its own function or purpose. Additionally, every effort must be made to limit the military to external defense so that it functions as a representative of the whole society, acting in the best interest of the entire nation. Only in the direst of emergencies should military forces be used to secure internal order; they must see themselves, and be seen, as the guardians and not the oppressors of the people. The courts, the police, the militia, or border guards should keep order and execute the laws. Tasking the military with everyday law enforcement, as opposed to maintaining order as a last resort, pits the military against the people, with a loss of trust and confidence, eventual alienation on both sides, and a diminishing of civilian control.

A second foundation for civilian control lies in the operating mechanisms of government--the methods by which civilian authority rules military forces. If they are to function as an expression of the whole society's will, their subordination must be to the entire governmental structure, not simply to the incumbent president or prime minister. Divided control does contain dangers. The military can become adept at boosting its own influence by playing civilian authorities against one another. But separation of authority reduces the possibility that the executive could use the army to overturn the constitution or coerce the legislature. Accountability to the legislature implies accountability to the people, forcing public discussion and scrutiny of defense policy, budgets, and cases of military mistakes or malfeasance. Active parliamentary oversight makes military affairs more transparent, and should actually strengthen national defense by reinforcing military identification with the people and popular

6

identification with the military. The judiciary plays a supporting but indispensable role, holding members of the military personally accountable to law.

A third element that fosters civilian control is countervailing power. The military can be blocked from even considering interference in two ways. The first is through force brought to bear by other armed bodies in society (such as the militia, the police, or an armed populace). The second is by the knowledge that illegal acts will lead to personal disgrace, retirement, relief, fine, arrest, trial, conviction, prison--whatever legal punishment fits the crime and can be made to stick. The more likely it is that violations of civilian control will be resisted and punished, the less likely they are to occur. Historically a most effective counterweight has been a reliance on citizen-soldiers as opposed to full-time professionals. Knowledge that revolt would lead to crisis and be opposed by an armed populace, or that citizen forces might not heed illegal orders, has been an effective deterrent. Standing forces should also be kept as small as security permits: so that the populace will consent to provide the resources, the military will be devoted solely to external defense, and civil-military friction will be reduced.

Finally, a critical underpinning of civilian control must be the military itself. The essential assumption behind civilian supremacy is the abstinence by the military from intervention in political life. While coups have diminished worldwide over the last decade, in many places the threat lingers. In still others, the military has the power to make or break governments, or to impose or block policies wholly outside the realm of national security. Civilian control is, by its very nature, weak or nonexistent if the armed forces can use force or influence to turn a government out of power, or to dictate the character of a government or policy. Even the hint of such extortion, if unpunished, inhibits civilian officials from exercising their authority, particularly in military affairs. Thus civilian control requires a military establishment dedicated to political neutrality: one that shuns under all circumstances any interference with the constitutional functioning or legitimate process of government, that identifies itself as the embodiment of the people and the nation (and not a particular party, agenda, or ideology), and that counts unhesitating loyalty to lawful authorities and the system of government as crucial aspects of its professionalism.

In mature democracies, where military intervention in politics is no longer an ongoing concern, the same professional ethos is crucial if civilian control is to function properly. The military must possess a sophisticated understanding of civilian control and actively promote it, for in the process of policy and decision making, senior officers must abstain from insinuating their own preferred policy outcomes or outmaneuvering civilian authority even when they can get away with it. Because of their expertise and role as the nation's guardians, military leaders in democracies can possess great public credibility, and can use it to limit or undermine civilian control, particularly during and after successful wars.

7

The difficulty is to define their proper role and to confine their activity within proper (even if often indistinct) bounds. The Israeli scholar of civil-military relations Yehuda Ben Meir contends that the military should advise civilians and represent the needs of the military inside the government, but should not advocate military interests or perspectives publicly in such a way as to undermine or circumscribe civilian authority. And the military must never become an advocate, public or private, for a particular policy or decisions that extends beyond its professional sphere. 3

Helpful to this ethos is an officer corps that is, in every respect possible, representative of the larger society. While some countries have enjoyed civilian control with officers drawn only from particular races, religions, classes, or ethnic backgrounds, it seems wiser to build an officer corps that equates itself with the national population and identifies its first loyalty as being owed to the country rather than to the profession of arms. To draw officers from a single segment is to risk creating a group that sees itself as separate from and superior to society. If they see their own values as being at variance with those of the population and their loyalties to their group of origin and to the military as primary, they may delude themselves into thinking that their purpose is to preserve or reform society's values and norms, rather than safeguard the nation's physical security.

Nor should serving military personnel participate in any fashion in politics, not as members of parties, in elected office, or even in appointive office as members of a political administration at the local or national level. If officers belong to a political party, run for office, represent a particular group or constituency, publicly express their views (or even say how they voted), attack or defend the executive leadership--in short, behave like politicians--they cannot be trusted by voters or by other politicians to be neutral servants of the state and guardians of society. Even personal identification with a political program or party can compromise an officer in the performance of his or her duty.

In theory, nothing prevents armies from interfering in politics or even attempting to overturn their government. But where civilian control has succeeded over a long period, military professionals have internalized civilian control to an extraordinary degree. In those countries, the people and civilian leaders expect, because of law or tradition, military subordination to civil authority. The organs of public opinion, in the press and among elites, accept the principle, and in times of stress in civil-military relations declare it as an axiom of government. Some countervailing power to the military force may exist, but military personnel understand that any step toward insubordination would immediately provoke a crisis that by consensus they would lose, with the possibility of legal sanctions against them personally.

Yet ultimately, it is the military's own professionalism and restraint that on a daily basis maintains civilian control. Whether or not they would face dismissal

8

or prison, they choose to submit, to define their duty as advice to civilian bosses rather than advocacy, and to carry out all lawful orders effectively and without complaint. But because civilians frequently lack knowledge and understanding of military affairs, and the apportioning of military and civilian responsibility depends so often on circumstances, the relationship even in the most stable governments has been messy, uncertain, and periodically tense. And thus, historically, the degree of civilian control, that is, the relative weight of the civilian and the military, has depended on the people and the issues involved.

Civilian Control Day-to-Day

Because civilian control is a process, it depends heavily on the organization and functioning of a government. The military cannot perform its duty, nor can civilians exercise their authority, unless the machinery of government allows military and civilian perspectives to mix in the formulation of policy, enabling the two sides to understand each other and work together. Military establishments tend naturally to try to maximize their autonomy in order to gain the resources that they believe necessary to organize, arm, and recruit most effectively for their tasks. Armed forces in democracies instinctively strive to accomplish their tasks with the fewest casualties and the smallest risk of failure. So strong are those impulses that commanders and staffs sometimes try to control the definition of the mission or to stipulate the rules of engagement, to the point of circumventing or evading the direction of their civilian superiors. The challenge in democratic government is to exercise civilian authority while satisfying the legitimate needs of the military in its pursuit of national security.

The first and most important feature of organization is a clear chain of command under all conceivable circumstances, with the head of the government atop that chain. Even before democracy developed, command defined civilian control--all the way back into biblical times when kings and tribal leaders directed battles personally. If the executive power in government cannot always control where, when, and how military forces are used, then civilian control cannot be said to exist. And because of the nature of military command, this power must reside in a single individual; there must be no opportunity for confusion, which could excuse disobedience. In governments that have both a president and a prime minister, final authority and operational control must reside in one office or the other. Furthermore, any disobedience must be treated as mutiny or revolt, with the attendant harsh penalties.

The second critical need is to ensure that the decision to begin or end warfare lies in civilian hands, and that in the transition from peace to war, even when indistinct, the military can respond unhesitatingly to proper orders. Such decisions often determine the fate of whole societies. Democracy cannot function if people other than the elected leadership decide issues of such magnitude; war causes the military to expand, the power and importance of government to grow, and its intrusions into people's lives to increase--including

9

more taxes, limits on freedoms, and perhaps compulsory military service.

The third critical area is military policy, meaning broadly all decisions affecting the size, shape, organization, character, weaponry, and internal operating procedures of the military establishment. Other than strategy and operations in wartime, peacetime military policy excites the most friction between civilian and military officials, and offers the greatest opportunities for the military to exercise its influence. If in peacetime military officers instead of elected officials make such choices--particularly regarding who can and cannot serve and how much money goes into defense--then the military controls the shape and character of a society.

These three broad but basic areas where civilians must rule cover nearly every conceivable aspect of national security. Theoretically every detail lies in the hands of civilians. Yet the reality, once again, is quite different. While civilians may possess the legal authority and may have the opportunity to exercise their influence even to the point of irresponsibility, there are definite practical limits to the exercise of these powers. In all three categories, civilians would be quite unwise and very much open to criticism if they made decisions without consulting the professionals who study war and defense full-time, possess actual experience, and carry considerable prestige with elites and the public. Military advice and cooperation are crucial to the quality and effectiveness of policy, and uniformed opposition, whether public or mounted behind the scenes, can, given the right circumstances, destroy the policy and devastate civilians' standing, and even their careers. The public expects that "the experts" will be involved and that their judgment, depending on the situation and personalities, will receive proper weight. Political opponents of the party in power will use military opinions, especially those that vary with a decision or policy, in the give-and-take of public debate. Thus in the process of civilian control, both civilian officialdom and the military are bound within limits and enmeshed in a reciprocal relationship; how each behaves depends upon a complex mix of factors, some unique to the situation and some the products of the broader institutions, practices, and traditions of civilian control. Critical to both process and outcome are the ways in which a government makes military policy and administers the military establishment.

Checks and Balances

In the waging of war and the management of military forces, civilian control operates most effectively when exercised by the executive branch of government or the ministry. But broader decisions regarding the size and character of the forces must come from the legislature, the body of government representing the people as a whole, which must possess its own machinery for investigation and review. The two branches must cooperate if the military is to function. Such divided but shared rule--the system of checks and balances--benefits civilians and the military alike. Civilian control grows stronger because no civilian can

10

alone use the military to abuse power, and the military possesses both the efficiency of unitary command and the legitimacy of sanction by the people's representatives.

Historically, the executive, in addition to commanding the forces and conducting war, proposes military policy, including the budget and initiatives relating to the very existence and functioning of the armed forces. The executive commissions officers, recruits and trains troops, promotes and assigns individuals, formulates (or at least oversees) strategy and operations, buys weapons, issues orders, and makes decisions about virtually every aspect of military life. Every chief executive relies on a ministry or department of defense; civilian control requires a civilian minister or secretary, supported by a civilian bureaucracy of sufficient experience and technical expertise to gain the confidence of politicians and voters on the one hand, and of the military on the other. This can be a tense relationship in democracies, one marked by continual bargaining, negotiation, and conflict as well as cooperation. Neither side wholly trusts the other, nor can it. Some problems--for example, strategy, the rules of engagement for forces at risk, the operational authority of commanders, the types of weapons, the roles and missions of the services, and the size of the defense budget--are continually at issue or regularly renegotiated. But it is imperative that the president and prime minister be advised and served by civilians; the bonds of trust and loyalty, the self-identification, and the shared experiences and perspectives of the professional military are so strong that politicians cannot afford to rely exclusively upon military officers, whether serving or retired. At a minimum, a "second opinion" from outside (as in medicine), is necessary.

Especially in nations new to democracy, where the military carries the burden of loyalty to previously autocratic governments, the public should insist that a civilian serve as defense minister. This official, in turn, will require an expert staff from outside of the military to gather information and provide independent advice. Judgments about the size and character of the risks a nation faces, whether to institute or practice conscription, what weapons to purchase, and a variety of other choices invariably possess social, economic, and political implications that go beyond narrow security considerations. Nearly every society faces conflict between domestic needs and defense, choices which in the end are political in the purest sense of that word. In a democracy, by definition, elected rather than uniformed leaders must make those choices.

The role of the legislature is to approve the existence of the military (usually by appropriating money), make policy on the size and character of the armed forces, oversee their activities (including formal investigation of any issue or incident), and approve actions taken by the executive. Crucial to this process are hearings to air publicly all matters that can be discussed without breaching military secrecy. It is critically important to civilian control that the parliament exercise these powers independently of the executive (though the two branches may sometimes share authority). In testimony under oath before the legislative

11

branch, the military is held publicly accountable, and officers can be required to express their personal as well as professional views if asked. Thus the legislature can get the military expertise it needs in order to exercise intelligent oversight.

Because civilian control rests ultimately on the behavior of individuals, armed forces personnel policy is critical. Typically, the executive and legislature share authority here. Civilians must decide who serves and whether or not there is to be compulsory military service, the ultimate intrusion of government into the private lives of individuals in democratic societies. The decision must be the result of some consensus in society, and not be imposed by the military. Equally important are the policies relating to the commissioning, education, promotion, assignment, and retirement of officers. It is the officer corps that historically has defined military establishments. Officers provide not only the leadership in war and in peace, but continuity over time to the military profession. Like every profession, the military strives to limit outside jurisdiction over its domain, to define its own requirements for membership, its own standards of behavior, the scope of its expertise, the principles for advancement and assignments, the character of its relationship with clients and society generally, and virtually every other aspect of its professional world, including the limits on membership and power within the group. Because of the unique responsibilities of battle, the military must possess a large measure of autonomy. Civilians recognize the legitimacy of much of this self-definition, to the point even of permitting a separate system of justice, with different categories of crimes and punishments for members of the armed forces. Civilians recognize that both civilian control and military effectiveness require that the officer corps be insulated from partisan politics, particularly from the promotion and assignment of officers on the basis of partisan affiliation. But civilian authority must restrict autonomy to what is necessary and functional.

To the extent that the military is a self-defining and self-perpetuating elite, it is less subordinate to the rest of society. The executive and legislature must control officer promotions; there must be mandatory retirements so that no one person can come to control the military forces indefinitely. In countries where civilian control is weak, support for military subordination to civilian authority should be an essential criterion for promotion and assignment. But the partisan leanings of an officer, if they exist, should never enter the equation, or the officer corps will be politicized and corrupted.

The exercise of civilian control by parliament occurs through legislation, much of which must rely on open hearings and a process of oversight that holds the military and the civilian defense bureaucracy accountable. Lawmakers must have access to, yet safeguard, the information necessary for policy making and for investigating malfeasance and failure. Information must be demanded and provided, which in turn puts parliament under the obligation to ask only for that classified information that is necessary for oversight, legislation, and policy, and never to release classified information. The legislative branch must be able to

12

compel testimony from officials, punish false statements, and require military officers to express their professional opinions independent of policy on all matters before, during, and after decisions are made. The process is inherently contentious. For the military, it is especially awkward, for it frequently squeezes them between two bosses. It can also be politically explosive. Parliament must hold the ministry accountable or legislative power will cease to have effect. Parliament's most potent weapon is financial; by withholding money or directing its uses (hence the importance of limited-term budgets), parliament wields a mighty club over the rest of government. But budgets are also a clumsy weapon. By approving officer promotions and assignments, especially at the senior levels, parliaments can negotiate compliance to policy and demand obedience from individual military leaders.

Finally must come arrangements to ensure that, as a matter of course, individual members of the military are held accountable to the law for their actions. While most countries recognize the necessity for a separate legal system for the military to ensure obedience in battle and enforce discipline, the system must function under the jurisdiction, even if rarely exercised, of the civilian judiciary. Military personnel must be held accountable to society for their individual behavior, although not necessarily in exactly the same ways as civilian officials. Military service imposes a harsher, more demanding set of requirements and responsibilities. Yet the soldier's essential citizenship, with all of its obligations, cannot be abolished or suspended, because in a democracy no one can be above the law or beyond the reach of its sanctions.

A Difficult Transition

The widespread practice of democracy has emerged only in the last two centuries. In formerly communist countries, and in others where military dictatorship or intervention has occurred, the transition to civilian control is likely to be difficult. To devise wise and workable procedures and policies will require not only patience, but courage on the part of civilians, acquiescence on the part of the military, and public support that will encourage both sides to reach a stable relationship characterized by cooperation and mutual respect.

If civilian control is a process, and its measure is the relative influence of the military over policy, then civilians and military personnel have to work together day after day, week after week, year after year. Competent, effective, and courageous civilian officials are indispensable to civilian control: men and women who understand the military ethos, treat those who wear the uniform with courtesy, contest them when necessary, and protect their professionalism when others in the political arena attempt to gain partisan advantage by using or abusing the military leadership. Senior officers fear being stuck with the blame for policies or operations that fail not because of military mistakes, but because of decisions by politicians. Some degree of confidence must be built up on both sides; that, too, is highly situational, and rests in the hands of individual officials

13

and officers when they begin their working relationships. Military leaders need direct access to the highest authority in the land; they need to be respected and their counsel must be sought. Civilian leaders, whatever their background, must come to know enough about military affairs to gain sympathy for the military's professional needs, obligations, requirements, and perspectives. But they must be tough enough to oppose military judgments when necessary and make their authority felt in spite of the political risk. They will need the backing of the voters. Civilian control must be accepted as axiomatic by the military, the political leadership, and the populace. Military subordination to civilian authority must be supported actively and vocally by the organs of opinion: the media, the universities, political parties, commercial and professional associations, and others. Without a vigilant press and a widespread public understanding of the nature and importance of civilian control, it can appear to be functioning properly but in actuality be quite weak.

As the next millennium approaches, newly emerging democracies, with long-established armed forces accustomed to a large degree of autonomy, face the challenge of reaching the point where they can say with confidence that they have civilian control over their military. Military establishments unaccustomed to having their judgment or authority questioned, especially by the cacophony of groups and individuals (many of whom conspicuously do not subscribe to the values and behaviors traditional to military groups) typical of democratic governance, will experience an equally uncomfortable challenge. How that transition is managed will be crucial in determining the fate of democracy around the world.

Richard H. Kohn is professor of history and chairman of the Curriculum in Peace, War, and Defense at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. An expanded version of this essay appears as "The Forgotten Fundamentals of Civilian Control of the Military in Democratic Government," Working Paper 11 in the Project on Post-Cold War Civil-Military Relations, John M. Olin Institute for Strategic Studies, Harvard University, and will be published in a volume of essays on civilian control in small democracies sponsored by the Arias Center for Peace and Reconciliation, San José, Costa Rica.

Notes 1. It could be argued that in constitutional systems, the "rules" are fixed in the written charter. Constitutions can be amended, however, and in democratic societies civilian courts interpret the laws and apply the constitution to specific cases and general situations. Constitutional practice changes over time.

2. Samuel P. Huntington, The Soldier and the State: The Theory and Politics of Civil-Military Relations (Cambridge: Belknap Press of Harvard University Press, 1957).

14

3. Yehuda Ben Meir, Civil-Military Relations in Israel (New York: Columbia University Press, 1995), 25.

.

Article

What is Controlled byCivilian Control ofthe Military? Control ofthe Military vs. Controlof Militarization

Yagil Levy1

AbstractThis article addresses a gap in the scholarly literature. Students of militarism do notlink the propensity to use force to the broader issue of what type of civilian controlmay restrain the use of force. Similarly, even students of civilian control whoacknowledge that civilian control and military restraint do not necessarily go hand inhand have not questioned the extent to which we should decouple the two differentprocesses as different modes of control rather than different effects of control. Arevised conceptualization of civilian control is therefore offered that distinguishesbetween two modes of civilian control over military affairs: control of the military,which concerns itself primarily with the military organization, and control of militar-ization, which draws on the political discourse in which the citizenry plays an activeand autonomous role aimed at subjecting the decision to use force to a deliberativeprocess that addresses its legitimacy.

Keywordscivilian control, deliberative decision making, militarization

1 Department of Sociology, Political Science & Communication, The Open University of Israel,

Ra’anana, Israel

Corresponding Author:

Yagil Levy, Department of Sociology, Political Science & Communication, The Open University of Israel,

P.O. Box 808, Ra’anana 43107, Israel.

Email: yagil.levy@gmail.com

Armed Forces & Society2016, Vol. 42(1) 75-98ª The Author(s) 2014

Reprints and permission:sagepub.com/journalsPermissions.nav

DOI: 10.1177/0095327X14567918afs.sagepub.com

Introduction

What is controlled by civilian control of the military? One might think that effective

civilian control restrains the use of force. However, that is not always the case. On

the contrary, a glance at developments in civil–military relations during the post–

Cold War period shows that while civilian control has been tightened in many

democracies, militarization also increased. Militarism is defined as an approach that

regards war and the preparation for war as a normal and desirable social activity.1

Militarization is therefore a process through which militarism increases while demi-

litarization signifies a decline in this propensity.

As an illustration, in the United States, as the campaigns in Iraq and Afghani-

stan indicate, militarization with an increased propensity to use force2 thrived in an

era of increased political scrutiny of the military.3 In Israel, civilian control has

been enhanced since the 1970s, leading to an overly subordinate military whose

professional autonomy has been impaired,4 while the government has enjoyed

more legitimacy to launch offensive campaigns in Lebanon and the Gaza Strip.5

In Russia, during Putin’s rule, the military’s subversive behavior toward elected

politicians has been moderated and its freedom of action restricted,6 however,

militarization in terms of patriotic education,7 and the inflation of external threats8

has flourished.

Thus, increased civilian control of the military may be coupled with militariza-

tion, although not necessarily. This case raises the need for two scholarly investiga-

tions. The first, which I will leave unexplored, is the extent to which there is a causal

link between civilian control and militarization. The second, and the focus of this

article, is the extent to which control of the military should be distinguished from

the mechanisms controlling the use of force, an underdeveloped aspect in the study

of civil–military relations, as I explain in greater detail subsequently.

I argue that a distinction should be made between two modes of civilian control

over military affairs: control of the military and control of militarization. Control of

the military, the main focus of students of civilian control, concerns itself primarily

with the military organization, particularly the operational aspects of the military’s

performance (doctrine, deployment, resources, etc.) and their expected political

implications. In contrast, the control of militarization deals with controlling the

mechanisms that legitimize the use of force, first and foremost military force. It

draws on political discourse, seeking to guarantee that the use of force follows a

thorough, open, and deliberative process of decision making in which the citizenry

plays an active and autonomous role in addressing the legitimacy to use. The

encounter between the modes of control yields several possible results.

It follows that this article is an analytically motivated study rather an empirically

motivated one. My aim is to develop a theory that distinguishes between the control

of the military and the control of militarization and propositions regarding the

encounter between the two modes of control. These propositions can be viewed as

hypotheses that set the stage for future empirical inquiry.9

76 Armed Forces & Society 42(1)

The first section presents the gap in the literature, leading, in the second section,

to a revised conceptualization of civilian control. In the third section, I analyze the

relationship between the modes of control.

The Theoretical Gap

Scholars disagree whether civilian control of the armed forces is positively corre-

lated with the reduction in the use of force. Lasswell argued for such a positive cor-

relation. In his classic ‘‘garrison state’’ theme, he expressed concern that the

empowerment of the military establishment in reaction to an external threat would

undermine civil–military relations by letting the officers, as ‘‘specialists in vio-

lence,’’ run the state and impose their warlike inclinations on politics.10 Choi and

James validated this concern statistically by concluding that as the influence of the

military increases, the likelihood that the state will be involved in a military dis-

pute becomes greater.11 Similarly, Snyder echoed the Lasswellian view by claim-

ing that the offensive bias is exacerbated when civilian control is weak, and this

bias grows more extreme when the military leverages the operational doctrine to

improve its position in civil–military disputes.12 Sechser linked civilian control

with the use of force by suggesting that the cautious nature of military officers may

be a consequence of strong civilian control.13 Officers are concerned that a strong

civilian leadership will punish them for botched military adventures. Mills went

even further by arguing that there is no prospect for peace without a monopolistic

control of violence, an approach that strongly links control with the restraint of

force.14

In a different manner, students of militarism such as Bacevich,15 Mann,16 and

Shaw17 implicitly recognized that the restraint of the military may take place within

a militaristic mind-set. At the extreme, as Mann asserted with regard to the post–

Cold War expansionist trends of the United States, ‘‘the notion of civilian control

of the military became meaningless, since civilians were the leading militarists’’.18

It follows that civilian control may not reduce the proclivity to use force.

Recognizing that militaristic pressures can come from civilian origins, other

scholars even assume that officers may be less war-prone than politicians. Hunting-

ton famously contended that the military is more conservative than civilians regard-

ing the propensity to use force, largely due to organizational cautiousness.19

Similarly, Betts concluded that military leaders rarely recommend the use of force,

and their advice is more influential when counseling against military intervention.20

Along these lines, Feaver and Gelpi showed that militarily inexperienced leaders in

the United States, more than militarily experienced ones, extended the use of force to

deal with interstate conflicts that did not present a substantial threat to national secu-

rity.21 Desch acknowledged that, ‘‘the most prevalent civil-military relations prob-

lem of the post-Vietnam era has not been keeping the dogs of war on the leash,

but rather getting them off of it’’.22 In other words, civilians may be more war-

prone than the military.23

Levy 77

It follows that civilian control may even promote the use of force when war-prone

civilians successfully mobilize the society for war and even push the reluctant mil-

itary to battle.24 Therefore, effective civilian control can rein in the military but not

the use of force.

Here, therefore, is the gap in the literature. Students of militarism do not link the

propensity to use force to the broader issue of what type of civilian control may

restrain the use of force, aside from the cultural process of demilitarization. Further-

more, students of militarism have not extended the theme of civilian control from

controlling the military to controlling the civilian institutions that legitimize the use

of force. Similarly, even students of civilian control who acknowledge that civilian

control and military restraint do not necessarily go hand in hand have not questioned

the extent to which we should decouple the two different processes as different

modes of control rather than different effects of control. In other words, they have

not scrutinized the mechanisms legitimizing the use of force decoupled from the

mechanisms monitoring the armed forces. Given this gap in the literature, in the fol-

lowing section I present a revised conceptualization of civilian control by introdu-

cing the distinction between control of the military and control of militarization.

Two Modes of Control

Control of the Military

A distinction should be made between control of the military and control of militar-

ization. Control of the military refers to the extent to which the citizenry, through

civilian state institutions, sets limits on the freedom of action of the military in the

areas of activity that have political implications, such as military doctrine and pol-

icies, operational plans, weapons systems, organization, recruitment, and promotion

of officers. Such limits correspond with political objectives and the resources

required to attain those goals that civilians (in a democracy, popularly elected civi-

lians) shape autonomously. These goals are regarded as expressing the will of soci-

ety as a whole. The military, in turn, abides by these civilian directives.25 To a large

extent, relations of exchange are formed, in which the military subordinates itself to

civilian rulers in exchange for the resources (material and symbolic) that the state

possesses and provides to the military.26

It follows that control of the military should be broadly conceptualized and

should not be limited to the relations between elected civilians and generals. Viewed

in this vein, although authoritarian regimes effectively control their militaries (Nazi

Germany and Fascist Italy are good examples), control of the military is deficient

without the engagement of the citizenry.

Control over the military operates mainly through institutional mechanisms that

have an effect on the manner in which policy makers activate the military. In addi-

tion to the monitoring of the military by elected civilians, collective actors working

outside the formal institutions, mainly social movements and interest groups, often

78 Armed Forces & Society 42(1)

affect institutional policy making through lobbying, protests, court appeals, and the

media. Ultimately, what is important is not whether the troops are deployed to fight

or remain in their barracks but the political process that leads to the decision about

the deployment, pertaining to the broader political implication of military activity as

presented earlier.

As a highly developed theme, control of the military is not the focus of this article

but control of militarization and its relationship with the control of the military is.

Control of Militarization

While the control of the military is aimed at controlling the organization and its

supervisors, the control of militarization is concerned with controlling the mechan-

isms for legitimizing the use of force. Drawing on Burk’s ‘‘way of war,’’27 John-

ston’s ‘‘strategic culture,’’28 Mann’s ‘‘militarism,’’29 and Beetham’s ‘‘political

legitimacy,’’30 the legitimacy to use force relates to the extent to which the state’s

legal mode of using armed force against an external adversary is socially accepted

as a normal, pervasive, and enduring strategic preference. Such legitimacy encom-

passes social beliefs about the role of war in human affairs, the nature of the adver-

sary and the threat it poses, and the efficacy of the use of force.

Legitimacy can be evaluated along a spectrum whose most extreme pole at one

end is pacifism. Pacifism opposes the use of force to resolve international disputes.

In the middle of the spectrum, the use of force is legitimized when it is instrumental

in defending what is perceived as the nation’s security. The other extreme pole is

militarism, meaning that the legitimacy for using force is unquestionable or barely

questionable. Militarism ranges from regarding the use of force and the preparation

for war as a normal and desirable social activity,31 an approach that typifies many

industrialized democracies (and therefore is the definition used in this article), to

an irrational value system that espouses war as a goal in itself.32 The degree of this

legitimacy can be determined by monitoring public opinion and political debates.

However, public and elite opinion and rhetoric can be more deeply analyzed as a

multilayered structure, which reflects deeper cultural constructs that are less easily

detectable.

Focusing on the level of legitimacy for using force moves beyond the narrow

focus on the military’s institutions, influence, and resources, and the attitude toward

the use of force to address militarized political cultures that are often generated out-

side of the military. Assuming that militarism is a socially and politically driven phe-

nomenon, the military is not necessarily the most salient part of the political culture

nurturing militarism. When it is more restrained than warmongering politicians, the

influence of the military does not result in militarization. Hence, an exclusive focus

on the military may be misleading.

The control of militarization involves the political discourse in which the citi-

zenry plays an active and autonomous role. This discourse aimed at subjecting the

elected civilians’ use of force to a deliberative process that takes place within the

Levy 79

public and political arenas and addresses the legitimacy to use force. Several condi-

tions promote this deliberative process:

1. Relative slowness in decision making to guarantee that decisions are made

through argumentation in which everyone’s opinion is in principle equally

valuable and equally fallible. As Huysmans held, such deliberation takes

time and can always be questioned again. Thus, speedy decision making in

response to a perceived threat thwarts this principle, strengthens the execu-

tive branch of government, and suppresses dissent.33

2. Debates should not be confined to the operational aspects of military policies

but should extend to the broader logic behind and rightness of such policies.

In other words, the debates should focus on the very legitimacy for using

force and its utility in promoting the public good.34 Thus, the focus is on

affecting the political cultures legitimizing the use of force, rather than taking

this legitimacy for granted. Therefore, during the debates there should be a

thorough consideration of nonlethal or less belligerent policy alternatives.

3. Access to information is not obstructed by manipulation, such as threat

inflation.35

4. Relatedly, debates should be conducted through an open discourse in which the

dominant discourse does not hinder the political opposition from challenging

decision makers.36 Such a dominant discourse often takes the form of asserting

the need for unity in times of crisis, thereby muting dissenting voices.37 By

extension, challenging the decision makers should also challenge the power

relations in society that affect the legitimacy of using force and may create bar-

riers to deliberation. In general, deliberation alone does not necessarily ensure a

more democratic outcome unless actors have other power resources as well,

such as the ability to mobilize to overcome entrenched interests.38 This is why

free and fair elections, along with constitutional mechanisms such as checks on

the power of each branch of government, equality under the law and impartial

courts, are preconditions for the deliberative process.39

However, unless these four conditions are met in the electoral debates, free and

fair elections alone are not sufficient for sustaining the conditions for the effective

control of militarization. Democracy is a necessary but not sufficient condition for

the highest level of control of militarization. Many debates pertinent to the use of

force are conducted in democratic societies in a manner that does not meet the

requirements outlined earlier. In contrast, even when authoritarian regimes delegiti-

mize the use of force, the fact that this decision is made unilaterally without a broad-

based, deliberative process indicates a low level of control of militarization.

At the same time, the deliberative process concerning the legitimacy to use force

does not take place entirely within sovereign states. Decisions often require approval

by intergovernmental institutions such as the North Atlantic Treaty Organization

(NATO).40 The need to legitimate military moves in intergovernmental institutions

80 Armed Forces & Society 42(1)

may even affect domestic processes of decision making and, as explained later, even

impair deliberation. However, a decision within the demos is, in general, a precon-

dition for a transitional deployment, and hence the focus on the state level is crucial.

If the conceptualization of the control of militarization seems abstract, particularly in

contrast to the readily observable process of asserting civilian control over the military,

the operationalization of this type of control is even more complex. While the former is

tangible and evident through observed organizational conduct, the latter is shrouded in

abstract and even tentative policies. However, the control of militarization operates

through several forms of public debates that affect the political culture and thereby the

degree of legitimacy it awards to the use of force. Following are those debates.

Debates on manpower. Manpower policies affect the power needed to access arms

and consequently vary in the degree to which they constrain leaders from dispatch-

ing troops on military missions,41 or the propensity or ability of the armed forces to

forcefully intervene in domestic politics.42 A high level of control of militarization is

reflected when debates are held about this relationship.43 However, such debates

have not necessarily been the practice in most of the countries that phased out the

draft. There, the debates were dominated by practical, operational, economic, or

moral considerations, thus reflecting a lower degree of control of militarization.

Debates on the essence of the use of force. In general, the more the use of force is

wrapped in symbols, the less likely it is that there will be an open debate in which

everyone can participate actively and openly. As Vagts suggested from his experi-

ence of the collapse of the Weimar Republic, the lowest level of the control of mili-

tarization is created in a highly militarized polity, where the legitimacy for using

force culminates in an irrational value system that espouses war as a goal in itself.44

Political disputes (if any) are confined to issues of performance or resources rather

than the justification for using force. Members of the political community must sur-

mount a high cultural threshold, denying them the opportunity to participate in a sub-

stantial, open discussion of the use of force.

Historically, indeed, the more that war is portrayed as glorious and honorable (as in

the seventeenth century), the less resistance policy makers encounter. However, this

level of resistance increases when war becomes a necessary evil and a last resort and,

hence, more circumscribed.45 Powerful symbols generally set the boundaries of legit-

imate debate within which movements seeking to challenge the policies must make

their claims,46 functioning as ‘‘rhetorical coercion.’’47 Furthermore, they not only con-

strain the issues that can be discussed but also establish a hierarchy of speakers. Those

granted the right to speak may make such claims based on their military contribution

or other criteria. Thus, some speakers are authorized and others excluded.48

Debates on the nature of the threat. Such debates concern the nature of the threat and

the associated national interests and define the conditions under which the country

will go to war. Nevertheless, as the level of militarization rises, the external threat

Levy 81

that the use of force is designed to eliminate is portrayed less in instrumental terms

and more in symbolic and metaphorical terms. Again, such a characterization may

narrow the space for debate over foreign policy and mute potential opponents.

Likewise, securitization, a term that Buzan, Wæver, and de Wilde introduced,49

implies identifying a problem as a security threat and matching the use of extraor-

dinary measures to deal with it. Securitization can be a form of modern, civilian mili-

tarization. Securitization frames the threat as urgent and a national security issue.

Therefore, it cannot be subjected to the normal haggling of politics. In contrast, dese-

curitization entails a deliberative process in which the threat is contested. This pro-

cess also involves a better understanding of the political dynamics of successful

securitization in an attempt to influence its course50 and challenge the institutional

authority and power relations establishing securitization as a ‘‘true’’ discourse.51

Debates on domestic interests. Militarization is not only a state of mind but also serves

the state’s mechanisms of control. As Walter Benjamin maintained, militarism is the

compulsory, universal use of violence as a means to the ends of the state, a law-

preserving function of violence.52 Social arrangements, moreover, can generate or

curb militarization in domains such as gender relations, the structure of the labor

market, and the reward system for those bearing the brunt of war, such as soldiers

and their families. It follows that exposing the interests that lead key social and polit-

ical actors to advance militaristic values is vital to upholding the control of militar-

ization. President Dwight D. Eisenhower’s warning about the dangers of ‘‘the

military–industrial complex’’ in his inspiring farewell speech in 1961 is one example

that highlights the need for such exposure.

Debates on costs. Costs and the political monitoring of the armed forces are strongly

linked in the sense that the higher the cost of protection that the state ‘‘sells’’ to its

citizens, the greater the citizens’ motivation to monitor its performance and acquire

information about the strategies the state pursues, the real costs of protection, and the

level of external threats.53 Thus, heavy costs in terms of lives and money and con-

cerns as to whether the goals have been achieved may encourage collective actors to

question the cause that demands these sacrifices, rather than focusing on the costs

themselves.54 Democracy creates better conditions for considering cost external-

ities,55 such as defense costs, than do nondemocratic regimes.

This is how the control of militarization operates. In short, the broader the scope

of the debates on military affairs in terms of the issues on the agenda, the slow

thoughtfulness with which the debates are conducted, the degree of openness in dis-

cussing all of the issues with limited barriers to influencing decision makers, the

availability of information, and the range of speakers, the greater the control of mili-

tarization. Thus, a heavily monitored military acting on behalf of its political super-

visors but carrying out an unquestionable militarized policy signifies a high level of

civilian control of the military but a low level of control of militarization.

82 Armed Forces & Society 42(1)

As the focal point of these debates is the legitimacy of military policies rather

than technical issues, the agents of control are almost exclusively collective actors,

intellectuals, journalists, and politicians mainly outside the executive branch of gov-

ernment. The judiciary is not involved directly, although court rulings may have an

indirect impact on the control of militarization, mainly by provoking policy debates.

Similar to the argument about the control of the military, what is important is the

deliberative process rather than the nature of the decision made and the military

action itself that results from this decision. The goal is subordinating military poli-

cies to this process rather than to any ideological imperative. Therefore, it is impor-

tant to note that the control of militarization is not a synonym for pacifism or any

other form of refraining from using force. Indeed, a low level of the control of mili-

tarization might result in such restraint, not necessarily the opposite, due to the same

process that leads to militarization.

The debates listed earlier do not constitute a hierarchy of requirements for a high

level of control of militarization, but they do have different impacts. Debates on

manpower may affect the infrastructure for the breadth of other debates because they

determine the stakeholders in war and peace. Debates on the use of force, threats,

and interests initially shape the profile of war preparations. Debates on cost may

affect decision making once preparation for war is in high gear.

In the end, controlling the legitimacy to use force is the core of the democratic

requisite that the citizenry control the violent means of the state. Without such con-

trol, the goals of using force are determined without the citizenry’s active role. Nor-

matively, Clausewitz’s dictum that ‘‘War is a continuation of politics by other

means’’ indicates that war is an act of policy aimed at achieving political goals,

hence, the role of the citizenry in directing their representatives as to how these goals

should be determined. ‘‘Goals’’ do not necessarily mean the visible, often formal,

and operative ones, such as the goal of a specific deployment. Rather, goals in this

context refer to the process described earlier through which the very logic behind the

shaping of operative goals and the means to attain them is debated. It is not about

how to determine the goals of deploying to Iraq and the amount of force needed there

and the fire policy they employ, rather the deliberative process set earlier is crucial in

tackling the very threats and interests motivating the deployment and the alternative

to threat elimination by force. A high level of control of militarization requires that

the cultural infrastructure in which operative decisions, such as the ultimate decision

to go to war or to prepare for it, or to pursue nonlethal solutions, are made be put in

place through the process described here long before the moment of operative deci-

sion making. Such decision making then reflects the cumulative impact of the

debates determining the legitimacy of using force.

To a large extent, it is doubtful that the conditions of deliberative process posited

here could exist anywhere. However, the ‘‘ideal’’ requirements help us measure the

extent to which any specific decision making signifies a high or low level of control

of militarization. It is a matter of degree. Not every deviation from the deliberative

ideal would lead us to classify the exercise of military power as militaristic.

Levy 83

Seemingly, the deliberative process on which the control of militarization is pre-

mised cannot be conducted when a state is attacked and confronting choices about

whether and how to respond. However, a high level of control of militarization may

require that (1) the moves escalating the attack (for which the state is accountable)

are made under a high level of control of militarization; (2) the reaction conforms

with previous decisions and political agreements as much as possible, such as the

definition of the war’s goals; and (3) the immediate reaction is limited to what is

judged necessary for self-defense and subsequent moves are the result of delibera-

tive decision making.

Furthermore, a distinction should be made between situations in which marginal

constabulary or technical duties are carried out and register little in the public con-

sciousness (such as the deployment of a few soldiers for auxiliary missions abroad),

and situations in which the use of force is a significant issue (usually the initiation of

a military attack). While the former may not deserve extensive deliberation, in the

latter case, the lack of public interest is a clear symptom of a low level of the control

of militarization. In other words, the leadership has effectively bypassed society, and

the lack of public interest leads to an absence of active, countervailing pressures.56

Demilitarization, through which traditional symbols and truths are effectively

questioned and challenged, often enhances the control of militarization by encoura-

ging debates over previously entrenched beliefs. The revision of the recruitment

model as Germany did following World War II is a typical response. Nonetheless,

a distinction should be made between political and cultural demilitarization. Thus,

the control of militarization may increase by raising political objections to the use

of force, even if such delegitimization does not target cultural militarism, such as the

glorification of war, entirely.57 Therefore, it is possible for the use of military force

to be regarded as normal and desirable and even a goal in itself, but not necessarily

the first choice in specific circumstances, allowing other instruments of power such

as economic ones to be prioritized. Such an approach implies a certain degree of

demilitarization even if just temporarily.

Comparing the Modes of Control

In both modes, the citizenry controls the manner through which elected civilians

activate the military. This control is more direct and explicit when the focus is on

the military organization, and less so when the focus is on militarization, in other

words, on the legitimacy of using force.

The two modes of control may overlap. We do not always talk about two different

discourses. Instead, we often talk about one discourse that signifies the dual level of

control. For example, the same technical debate over how many troops should be

sent on a mission to achieve a previously unquestioned political goal signifies a high

level of control of the military together with a low level of control of militarization.

In contrast, a value-driven, abstract debate defining national interests promotes the

control of militarization alone.

84 Armed Forces & Society 42(1)

It follows that control of the military deals with concrete, observable behavior

and with decisions (and the avoidance of them) made by the military and its political

supervisors as the agents of control. Such decisions correspond with the first and sec-

ond dimensions of power in Lukes’ well-known argument.58 On the other hand, con-

trol over militarization is largely concerned with the third dimension of power. This

is the manner in which actors can challenge the deeply ingrained ideological percep-

tions, attitudes, and social arrangements that sustain them and that may change the

role of the people as carriers and maintainers of militaristic values in the existing

order. Insofar as social arrangements create militarization, the level of militarization

in society can be affected by raising people’s awareness of it. However, precisely

because the control of militarization is related to this dimension of power, we can

expect the control of militarization to be the outcome of subtle group processes, dif-

ferent from the institutional, visible system of control of the military.

Another useful tool for delineating the difference between the modes of control is

Cox’s distinction between the critical approach and the problem-solving approach.

The critical approach stands apart from the prevailing world order and asks how that

order came about, without taking existing institutions and power relations as given.

It is directed toward the social and political complex as a whole and seeks change

by comparing alternative orders.59 The control of militarization is often located

in the critical approach, challenging the order that established militarism. On

the other hand, control of the military takes this order for granted and, like the

problem-solving approach, focuses on how to improve the politically controlled per-

formance of the armed forces within the existing order.

Table 1 presents the distinction between the modes of control.

Table 1. Comparing the Modes of Control.

Control of the Military Control of Militarization

The focus Focus on military organization:the operational aspects of theorganization’s performance, mainly withregard to expected political implications

Focus on political culture, i.e.,targeting the legitimization of the useof force

The goal Limiting the civilians’ autonomy toactivate the military

Subjecting the elected civilians’ use offorce to a deliberative process thataddresses the legitimacy of using force

How itworks

Institutional mechanisms that affectpolicy making and collective actors whoseek to affect these mechanisms

Public debates affecting the politicalculture and the level of legitimacy itawards to the use of force, promotedby collective actors, the media, andpoliticians

Dimensionof power

Mainly first and second dimensions:the observable dimension ofinstitutional action

The third dimension, politicaldiscourse that questions and shapesthe social power relations affectingthe legitimacy of using force

Levy 85

The Relationship between the Modes of Control

As the following matrix illustrates, the encounter between the modes of control

yields four results, as an interaction of two mutually reinforcing variables. Note that

these results should be read as a process through which the modes of control increase

or decrease, rather than as final outcomes.

Cell A is the most interesting situation: a high level of civilian control of the mil-

itary is coupled with a low level of control of militarization. It is a common situation

in industrial democracies, especially in the post–Cold War period when militaries

became more monitored politically but were still prepared and even deployed to use

force. Here, an increase in civilian control is coupled with a decrease in the control

over militarization.

To a large extent, this combination is inherent in the nature of civilian control in

industrialized democracies. As Huntington asserted, the military person should accept

the superior political wisdom of the statesman as a fact. Obedience to the political

leaders is a professional duty, and political engagement is beyond the scope of military

competence. The participation of officers in politics undermines their professional-

ism.60 Moreover, one of the imperatives of the control of the military in democracies

is that the military ‘‘functions as a representative of the whole society, acting in the

best interest of the entire nation [and hence its subordination] must be to the entire

governmental structure, not simply to the incumbent president or prime minister.’’61

Thus, the institutional arrangements of control cement the universal image of the

armed forces and the legitimacy of the government deploying it as serving the best

interests of the entire nation, rather than the regime’s interests in retaining its power.

Amilitarized democracy

Bdemilitariza�on-cum-

democra�za�on

Cauthoritarian regime, weak

state, garrison state

Dunstable democra�za�on

LowCont

rol o

f the

mili

tary

Low HighControl of militariza�on

High

Figure 1. Matrix of control.

86 Armed Forces & Society 42(1)

In turn, the more the military is portrayed as a universal entity, the greater its abil-

ity to influence decision making. While acceptance of the principle of civilian

authority is the supreme professional norm regulating civil–military relations, other

norms prescribe the officers’ professional responsibility to provide expert advice to

civilians. At the same time, the challenge is to limit participation in politics to the

military advisory role.62 Nevertheless, even when this limit is reached, and military

thought is then depicted as professional advice devoid of political bias, it can be used

politically. As Mills explained, politicians use the advice of the military to back their

support for or opposition to specific policies, or even to shirk their duty to scrutinize

the administration’s decisions. Politicians use professional advice to legitimate pol-

icies. Making careful use of it often makes it possible to lift policies ‘‘above poli-

tics,’’ which is to say, above political debate.63 In this way, the military

profession gains ascendancy. Mills implied that such ascendancy might signify a low

level of control of militarization, especially when the military’s stance is utilized to

legitimize the use of force.

Civilian control thus shapes the standing of the military in society, allowing the

military to claim neutrality and depoliticization. That is why formal, and hence also

visible, rules of control matter. Constrained by this structure, politicians and officers

who are frustrated by formal routines tend to utilize informal channels of dialog and

influence rather than engaging in rule-breaking behaviors.64 Ultimately, there are

more impediments to the resistance to militarization, meaning, there is a lower level

of civilian control of militarization.

In contrast, when the military fails to blur its partisan identity, its professional

opinion is more suspect. An example is the military’s argument with President Bill

Clinton over policies such as intervening in the Balkans, which was interpreted as

arising from the military’s bias toward the Republican Party.65 Likewise, the obser-

vable politicization of the military in democratized Russia (before Putin) has been

accompanied by the broadening of public debates over military policies, opposition

to the war in Chechnya and cultural demilitarization.66

Civilian control and militarization are linked within the democratic order in

another manner as well. To the extent that the state builds up its military power

through the direct wresting of military means from its own subject population, the

state subordinates the military to civilian control. Under such conditions, a military

buildup increases the military’s dependence on civilian institutions for the extraction

of the resources the military needs. In turn, this extraction of resources also increases

the bargaining between the state and its citizens over the extracted resources. To

extract these resources, the state allocates rights in exchange for collecting taxes

or recruiting manpower. Historically, this process extended the public’s right to

monitor the military, thereby subjecting the military to the popular will.67 In turn,

the more the popular will governs military policies, the greater the state rulers’

efforts to legitimize the mobilization for war, either by justifying it or by bypassing

the popular will. Paradoxically, the same structural conditions that subordinate the

military to civilian control also promote militarization. Only militarization can

Levy 87

legitimize the rising levels of sacrifice for war in monetary and human terms by con-

textualizing and leveraging the level of the threat (even exaggerating it if need be)

and demonstrating the determination to remove it by force.68

In post–Cold War industrialized democracies, the reluctance to make military

sacrifices, human, and material, increased. This increased reluctance was translated

into enhanced civilian control by expanding citizens’ involvement in monitoring the

military’s human and material resources. For example, casualty sensitivity, a clear

reflection of this reluctance, means more attempts by the public to influence the

deployment of troops and more attention on the part of politicians to the public’s

grievances. Collective antiwar actions and the political responses to them illustrate

this point quite well. Consequently, militarization has become a crucial tool for legit-

imizing sacrifice.

A typical form of militarization is the setting of ambitious war goals. Framing the

threat more in apocalyptic and less in instrumental terms has become ‘‘the most

effective at generating and legitimating massive society-wide sacrifice and are today

the only narrative form that can sustain war as culturally acceptable.’’69 Less ambi-

tious goals are less appealing and may provoke political defiance. Part of this pro-

cess involves dehumanizing the enemy. This phenomenon became more blatant in

the twentieth century as a means of justifying inflicting casualties on the opponent

as the combatants moved increasingly further away from the battlefield. The process

is also necessary in order to overcome ingrained values inculcated through long-term

socialization that cherish human life and view all human beings of equal moral

worth.70 For democratic leaders, then, the effort to dehumanize an opponent suffi-

ciently is essential to overcome the normative and social prohibitions against killing.

Even when there is no direct danger to one’s society, dehumanization often resonates

widely.71 Therefore, domestic political challengers have a clear political motive for

disrupting this effort when it is feasible.72

It follows that when control of the military involves more monitoring by the

public and this monitoring is conducted in a skeptical climate, the level of militar-

ization grows to balance out the impact of civilian control. Ironically, less involve-

ment by the public may reduce militarization. Thus, militarization as legitimation is

not a symptom of the failure to control militarization but actually its cause. Barriers

are thereby created to deliberative decision making. The more ambitious the war

goals to remove a perceived existential threat, and the more dehumanized the enemy,

the fewer the debates that can be conducted through an open discourse challenging

the dominant frames. Unity of opinion is portrayed as critical, and speedy decision

making is deemed to be crucial. Finally, militarization and civilian control may be

exchangeable, as when the political elite indulges the military by allowing its

autonomy and militaristic spirit to go unchecked in return for distancing it from

domestic politics.73

Cell A is typical of democracies. Although authoritarian regimes also effectively

control their military and concurrently experience militarization, the role of a high

level of control of the military in reducing the control of militarization applies

88 Armed Forces & Society 42(1)

mainly to democracies. In nondemocracies, with the limited influence of antiwar

opposition, the control of the military is not a major component of the effort to legit-

imize the use of force.

High levels of both modes of control (Cell B) represent the combination of demi-

litarization and the enhancement of civilian control, usually as part of democratiza-

tion. Such a process is typical of the situation in which military failures shake the

leadership and even lead to regime transformation, sometimes encouraged by an

external coercion, given that the responsibility for defeat is almost always attributed

to the political and military elites who presided over it.74 Such a transition

encourages a change in the use of force toward a less belligerent approach. At the

same time, democratization inevitably entails more civilian control, which is also

aimed at limiting the misuse of the military to intervene in domestic politics.75

Nevertheless, defeat combined with external coercion alone cannot bring about a

change in political culture. Other conditions are also required such as massive polit-

ical and cultural intervention and monetary aid, as the cases of post–World War II

Japan and Germany attest.76 Even with the enacting of such conditions, democrati-

zation and stabilization may fail. At the same time, even if democratization takes

place following an internal process rather than a military failure, the separation of

the military from politics is enhanced, mainly with the establishment of parliamen-

tary regimes,77 with potentially similar implications for the control of militarization.

Modes of control may also be mutually reinforcing, Thus, control of militariza-

tion in the form of the debates over the conditions under which the country will

go to war leads to formal arrangements that limit future troop deployments by recon-

structing a decision making hierarchy (control of the military). Such arrangements

lay the foundations for cementing the requirement for public debate to shape the

popular will prior to the use of force, hence enhancing control of militarization.

An example of this process is the passage of the War Powers Act in 1973 in the

United States following the debate over the Vietnam War, a debate signifying demi-

litarization. This act sought to limit the President’s freedom to commit troops to

combat zones in the absence of a congressional declaration of war.78 In a similar

spirit, in several newly democratized post–Communist states, constitutional provi-

sions frequently introduced tight controls on the government by giving the parlia-

ment veto power over military deployments. However, such powers were later

abolished to ease acceptance into NATO and the European Union.79 Thus, institu-

tional arrangements aimed at controlling the military may partly mitigate an existing

cultural mind-set favoring the use of force.

Low levels of both modes of control are typical of military coups or other situa-

tions in which civilians cannot check the military (Cell C). Lasswell’s garrison state

is located here. In this cell, both modes are simultaneously and temporarily wea-

kened until civilian control is reinstated.

Authoritarian regimes are also located in this cell. Although such regimes check

their military effectively, control of the military is limited for two reasons. First, the

military is being controlled without the engagement of the citizenry, so the areas of

Levy 89

control are limited to what the ruling groups perceive as their best interests.80 Sec-

ond, civilians increase their dependence on the military to ensure their political sur-

vival. Thus, the military’s bargaining power vis-a-vis the politicians increases as

well. At the same time, in authoritarian regimes there is less civilian control over

militarization as well. Given that citizens are denied the opportunity to debate pol-

icies, the opposition to policies may entail a regime transformation and, hence, are

less likely to develop.

Again, the two modes are mutually affecting. The military’s influence without

civilian checks and balances and without the generals’ fears of being punished for

military adventures increases the propensity to use force. If state institutions are

organizationally and financially incapable of waging war, militarization is confined

to the domestic order, as was typical of many Latin American countries during the

1960s to 1980s.81 In turn, the decreasing control of militarization aggrandizes the

military’s status as promoting the nation’s strength.

A similar situation of low scores in both modes of control is evident in the transi-

tion to democracy in many so-called ‘‘weak states,’’ meaning a state that is on the

low end of the spectrum of capabilities.82 Democratization there has often coincided

with instability and insecurity, leading to internal armed conflicts and political vio-

lence. Failure to control the military, not as an organization but as the tool of the

monopolistic control of violence, is the result. Such a failure often encourages the

intervention of international forces, the outsourcing of military missions, the appear-

ance of independent militias, and the involvement of the armed forces in domestic

policing missions. Furthermore, failure to control the military also leads to the cre-

ation of more subtle forms of domestic intervention by the military under civilian

governments that rely on suppressive military tools.83 The proliferation of arms

helps routinize new forms of militarism.84

Even the transition to democracy in more stable states may be imperfect with

regard to civilian control for two reasons. First, when the transfer of power from the

government to the opposition takes place in a gradual and carefully prepared mode,

it is less likely that the military will interfere politically. In contrast, when this trans-

fer of power is followed by a breakdown of the old regime, the military is more likely

to interfere politically. Comparing the situations in Poland and Hungary with those

in Czechoslovakia, Bulgaria, and Romania proves this point.85 Hence, at least poten-

tially, the military’s influence on policy making may vary depending on the situa-

tion. Second, global trends toward parliamentary war powers (as described

earlier) are largely absent in new democracies outside Europe such as Thailand or

Peru. There concerns about a military coup against the democratic government are

more significant than concerns about the misuse of the military by that government

for unauthorized missions.86

Cell D depicts another situation. The military defeat of an authoritarian regime

often leads to regime transformation and cultural demilitarization. However, when

this process is not accompanied by effective rebuilding of the state and foreign aid

aimed at enhancing the capabilities of the state institutions, or when such capabilities

90 Armed Forces & Society 42(1)

are impaired, civilians may fail to regiment the military.87 Then, a transition from

Cell D to Cell C takes place.

This was the case of the Weimar Republic, where the weakness of the Republic

created a dependency on the military’s (Reichswehr) support for ensuring domestic

order, and the middle class even allied with the military to curb Bolshevism.88

As for the Reichswehr, it resented the Republic. Opposition arose directly

from measures taken to limit its freedom of operation and resources. Examples

include the imposition of civil courts’ jurisdiction over the military,89 while

the Republic’s endorsement of the Treaty of Versailles had already guaranteed

military downsizing.

Indirectly, the constitution of the Republic signified an attempt by the new elites

to challenge the militaristic symbols of the imperial regime, which, by extension,

jeopardized the military’s status. Within this framework, the inquiry into the German

guilt for World War I moved from blame directed at the old regime to an indictment

of the Republic for accepting the terms of the Treaty of Versailles, while the military

played a central role in this process.90 By magnifying the flaws of Versailles and

developing a ‘‘ritual of humiliation,’’ conservatives helped mute the repudiation

of Germany’s authoritarian and militarist traditions,91 which hitherto had fed

Germany’s aggression. Remilitarization then helped counter the waves of demilitar-

ization. Soon it became apparent that it was in the military’s interest to defeat the

new regime in order to protect its own interests. Consequently, the civilians failed

to discipline the military, meaning that the control of militarization could be sus-

tained at a high level only temporarily. This result is less likely when demilitariza-

tion is embedded in the society. Such was the case in the very early years of the

Republic, when the demise of the Kapp Putsch (1920) against the Republic (with

partial support of the military) indicated the strength of the coalition of pro-

democratic forces who joined together to thwart the Putsch.92

Turkey provides another example. There, the military played a major role in found-

ing the Republic in 1923 and, with the support of Westernized elites, legally assumed

the role of guardian of the secular state. Against this background, the military inter-

vened several times in politics and staged coups against the elected governments. Most

important for institutionalizing the military’s status as the watchdog of civilian gov-

ernments was the coup of 1960. As Karpat’s account of this coup shows, the military

was adversely affected by the multiparty experiment that took place between 1945 and

1960, involving the mobilization of the masses against the traditional elites. When the

Democratic Party came to power in 1950, the situation became even worse as the gov-

ernment downgraded the military symbols and material resources allocated to the

army and encouraged a materialist culture.93 Demilitarization was in force.

Therefore, when the Democratic Party tried to curtail the freedom of the press and

assembly in 1959–1960 and used the military to impose internal order against urban

communities, the military took advantage of this instability and carried out a coup,

largely pushed from below by field grade officers.94 Once again, the dependence of

civilians on the military impaired the civilian control of the military.

Levy 91

No less important, one of the coup’s achievements was the creation of a

National Security Council to formalize the military’s status in policy making. In

this way, civilian leaders were required to take into consideration the views of gen-

erals. Security was defined as including threats to the domestic order as well as

foreign policy issues, thereby expanding the generals’ latitude in expressing their

views.95 In short, remilitarization took place, decreasing control of militarization,

and was combined with attenuating civilian control. However, given the different

geopolitical environment, the German scenario of translating militarization into

warfare did not happen. As both cases show, moreover, the failure to control the

military leads to a transition from Cell D to Cell C, in which both modes of control

are low, at least temporarily.

Conclusion

In an article published in 2002, James Burk called our attention to the narrow scope

of the study of civilian control. What is studied most, he argued, is the relationship

between the government and the military. This approach ‘‘reflects a normative belief

that civilian political control over the military is preferable to military control of the

state; and so it seems that the central problem in civil-military theory is to explain

how civilian control over the military is established and maintained.’’96

In the spirit of Burk’s call, this article highlighted a gap in the scholarly literature.

Students of militarism have not extended the theme of civilian control from control-

ling the military to controlling the civilian institutions that legitimize the use of

force. Similarly, students of civilian control who acknowledge the lack of match

between civilian control and military restraint have not decoupled the two different

processes as different modes of control rather than different effects of control.

Thus, the contribution of this article is in distinguishing between two modes of

control, that is, control of the military versus control of militarization, and the rela-

tionship between them. While the former focuses mainly on the armed forces as an

institution and how elected civilians supervise them, the latter focuses on the polit-

ical culture that legitimates the use of force. Controlling the mechanisms of legiti-

macy subjects the use of military force to a deliberative process of decision

making in which the citizenry plays an active and autonomous role.

Several venues for future study may be suggested. First, as mentioned, the goal of

this article has been to develop a theory. Thus, the propositions offered in this article,

mainly the interaction between the modes of control, can be seen as hypotheses that

set the stage for future empirical inquiry. Second and most importantly, as Figure 1

illustrates, the encounter between the modes of control yields four results, the most

interesting of which is Cell A, in which a high level of civilian control is coupled

with a low level of control of militarization. Given that this situation has become the

most common in this era, it deserves more attention. This article presents the struc-

tural conditions allowing this encounter. However, we must take the investigation a

step further and identify the conditions under which an increase in the civilian

92 Armed Forces & Society 42(1)

control of the military may lay the foundations for reducing the control of militari-

zation and actually encourage the use of force.

The significance of the proposed concepts goes beyond the purely scholarly

realm. The article should be read as a call to pay more attention to the need to control

militarization and reduce the weight attached in the literature to the relationship

between generals and civilians. Thus, awareness of the distinction offered in this

article between control of the military and control of militarization has political as

well as academic merit.

Acknowledgments

This article was first presented at the Inter-University Seminar on Armed Forces and Society,

Chicago, October 2011. I would like to thank the participants for their valuable comments. For

incisive suggestions at various stages of this project, I am indebted to Jeffrey Isaac, Kobi

Michael, and Ronald Krebs. I would like to thank the journal’s anonymous reviewers for their

constructive comments and especially to Patricia Shields, editor of Armed Forces & Society,

for her guidance.

Declaration of Conflicting Interests

The author declared no potential conflicts of interest with respect to the research, authorship,

and/or publication of this article.

Funding

The author received no financial support for the research, authorship, and/or publication of

this article.

Notes

1. Michael Mann, ‘‘The Roots and Contradictions of Modern Militarism,’’ New Left Review

162 (1987): 35-50.

2. Richard H. Kohn, ‘‘The Danger of Militarization in an Endless ‘War’ on Terrorism,’’ The

Journal of Military History 73, 1 (2009): 193.

3. Andrew J. Bacevich, The New American Militarism: How Americans are Seduced by War

(New York: Oxford University Press, 2005).

4. Stuart A. Cohen, ‘‘Changing Civil–Military Relations in Israel: Towards an

Over-subordinate IDF?’’ Israel Affairs 12, 4 (2006): 769-88.

5. Yagil Levy, ‘‘The Second Lebanon War: Examining the ‘Democratization of War’

Theory,’’ Armed Forces & Society 36, 5 (2010): 786-803.

6. Zoltan Barany, Democratic Breakdown and the Decline of the Russian Military (Princeton,

NJ: Princeton University Press, 2007); Robert Brannon, Russian Civil–Military Relations

(London, UK: Ashgate Publishing, 2013), 165-71.

7. Elisabeth Sieca-Kozlowski, ‘‘From Controlling Military Information to Controlling Soci-

ety: The Political Interests Involved in the Transformation of the Military Media under

Putin,’’ Small Wars & Insurgencies 20, 2 (2009): 300-18.

Levy 93

8. Stephen J. Blank, ‘‘Civil–Military Relations and Russian Security,’’ in Civil–Military

Relations in Medvedev’s Russia, ed. Stephen J. Blank (Carlisle, PA: Strategic Studies

Institute, 2010), 30-42.

9. For a methodological example see Stephen Van Evera, ‘‘Hypotheses on Nationalism and

War,’’ International Security 18, 4 (1994): 5-39.

10. Harold D. Lasswell, ‘‘The Garrison State,’’ The American Journal of Sociology 46, 4

(1941): 455-68.

11. Seung-Whan Choi and Patrick James, ‘‘Civil–Military Relations in a Neo-Kantian World,

1886-1992,’’ Armed Forces & Society 30, 2 (2004): 227-54.

12. Jack Snyder, ‘‘Civil–Military Relations and the Cult of the Offensive, 1914 and 1984,’’

International Security 9, 1 (1984): 108-46.

13. Todd S. Sechser, ‘‘Are Soldiers Less War-prone than Statesmen?’’ Journal of Conflict

Resolution 48, 5 (2004): 746-74.

14. Charles Wright Mills, The Power Elite (New York: Oxford University Press, 1956), 172.

15. Bacevich, The New American Militarism, 2005.

16. Michael Mann, Incoherent Empire (London, UK: Verso, 2005).

17. Martin Shaw, Theory of the Global State: Globality as Unfinished Revolution

(Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 2000).

18. Mann, Incoherent Empire, 9.

19. Samuel P. Huntington, The Soldier and the State: The Theory and Politics of Civil–Military

Relations (New York: Vintage Books, 1957), 92.

20. Richard K. Betts, Soldiers, Statesmen, and Cold War Crises (New York: Columbia

University Press, 1991).

21. Peter D. Feaver and Christopher Gelpi, Choosing Your Battles (Princeton, NJ: Princeton

University Press, 2003).

22. Michael C. Desch, ‘‘Civil-Militarism: The Origins of the New American Militarism,’’

Orbis 50, 3 (2006): 578.

23. See also Deborah D. Avant, ‘‘Are the Reluctant Warriors out of Control? Why the U.S.

Military is Averse to Responding to Post-cold War Low-level Threats,’’ Security Studies

6, 2 (1996): 51-90.

24. See also Peter D. Feaver, ‘‘The Right to be Right: Civil–Military Relations and the Iraq

Surge Decision,’’ International Security 35, 4 (2011): 87-125.

25. See mainly James Burk, ‘‘Theories of Democratic Civil–Military Relations,’’ Armed

Forces & Society 29, 1 (2002): 7-29; Peter D. Feaver, ‘‘Civil–Military Relations,’’

Annual Review of Political Science 2 (1999): 211-41; Richard H. Kohn, ‘‘How

Democracies Control the Military,’’ Journal of Democracy 8, 4 (1997): 140-53;

Rebecca L. Schiff, The Military and Domestic Politics: A Concordance Theory of

Civil–Military Relations (New York: Routledge, 2009).

26. Yagil Levy, ‘‘A Revised Model of Civilian Control of the Military: The Interaction

between the Republican Exchange and the Control Exchange,’’ Armed Forces & Society

38, 4 (2012): 529-56.

27. James Burk, ‘‘Introduction,’’ in How 9/11 Changed Our Ways of War, ed. James Burk

(Palo Alto, CA: Stanford University Press, 2013), 2-3.

94 Armed Forces & Society 42(1)

28. Alastair Iain Johnston, ‘‘Cultural Realism and Strategy in Maoist China,’’ in The Culture

of National Security: Norms and Identity in World Politics, ed. Peter J. Katzenstein (New

York: Columbia University Press, 1996), 222-23.

29. Mann, ‘‘The Roots and Contradictions,’’ 1987.

30. David Beetham, ‘‘Political Legitimacy,’’ in The Wiley-Blackwell Companion to Political

Sociology, ed. Edwin Amenta, Kate Nash, and Alan Scott (Chichester, UK: John Wiley &

Sons, 2012), 120-29.

31. Mann, ‘‘The Roots and Contradictions,’’ 1987.

32. Alfred Vagts, A History of Militarism: Civilian and Military (New York: Free Press,

1959).

33. Jef Huysmans, ‘‘Minding Exceptions: The Politics of Insecurity and Liberal Democ-

racy,’’ Contemporary Political Theory 3, 3 (2004): 321-41.

34. Cori Dauber, ‘‘The Practice of Argument: Reading the Condition of Civil–Military Rela-

tions,’’ Armed Forces & Society 24, 3 (1998): 435-46.

35. Chaim Kaufmann, ‘‘Threat Inflation and the Failure of the Marketplace of Ideas: The

Selling of the Iraq War,’’ International Security 29, 1 (2004): 5-48.

36. Ronald R. Krebs and Jennifer K. Lobasz, ‘‘Fixing the Meaning of 9/11: Hegemony, Coer-

cion, and the Road to War in Iraq,’’ Security Studies 16, 3 (2007): 409-51.

37. Huysmans, ‘‘Minding Exceptions,’’ 2004.

38. Vivien A. Schmidt, ‘‘Taking Ideas and Discourse Seriously: Explaining Change through

Discursive Institutionalism as the Fourth ‘New Institutionalism,’’’ European Political

Science Review 2, 1 (2010): 17-18.

39. See Fareed Zakaria, ‘‘The Rise of Illiberal Democracy,’’ Foreign Affairs 76, 6 (1997): 22-43.

40. Burk, ‘‘Theories of Democratic Civil–Military Relations,’’ 20-22.

41. See, for example, Seung-Whan Choi and Patrick James, ‘‘No Professional Soldiers, No

Militarized Interstate Disputes? A New Question for Neo-Kantianism,’’ Journal of Con-

flict Resolution 47, 6 (2003): 796-816; Jeffrey Pickering, ‘‘Dangerous Drafts? A Time-

series, Cross-national Analysis of Conscription and the Use of Military Force, 1946–

2001,’’ Armed Forces & Society 37, 1 (2010): 119-40.

42. Elizabeth Kier, Imagining War: French and British Military Doctrine between the Wars

(Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1997).

43. See, for example Kier’s Imagining War on the debates in France and Britain during

the interwar period and on the debate in post–World War II Germany on the value

of conscription, see Stephan Pfaffenzeller, ‘‘Conscription and Democracy: The

Mythology of Civil–Military Relations,’’ Armed Forces & Society 36, 3 (2010):

481-504.

44. Vagts, A History of Militarism, 1959.

45. Martha Finnemore, The Purpose of Intervention: Changing Beliefs About the Use of

Force (Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 2003), 19-20.

46. Rhys H. Williams, ‘‘The Cultural Contexts of Collective Action: Constraints, Opportuni-

ties, and the Symbolic Life of Social Movements,’’ in The Blackwell Companion to Social

Movements, ed. David A. Snow, Sarah A. Soule, and Hanspeter Kriesi (Malden, MA:

Blackwell, 2004), 91-115.

Levy 95

47. Krebs and Lobasz, ‘‘Fixing the Meaning of 9/11,’’ 2007.

48. For the gender aspect of this hierarchy, see Jean Bethke Elshtain, Women and War

(Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1995).

49. Barry Buzan, Ole Wæver, and Jaap deWilde, Security: A New Framework for Analysis

(London, UK: Lynne Rienner, 1998).

50. Mark B. Salter, ‘‘Securitization and Desecuritization: A Dramaturgical Analysis of the

Canadian Air Transport Security Authority,’’ Journal of International Relations and

Development 11, 4 (2008): 321-49.

51. Claudia Aradau, ‘‘Security and the Democratic Scene: Desecuritization and Emancipa-

tion,’’ Journal of International Relations and Development 7, 4 (2004): 388-413.

52. Walter Benjamin, Reflections: Essays, Aphorisms, Autobiographical Writing (New York:

Schocken Books, 1986), 284.

53. David Lake, ‘‘Powerful Pacifists: Democratic States and War,’’ American Political

Science Review 86, 1 (1992): 24-37.

54. See Christopher Gelpi, Peter D. Feaver, and Jason Reifler, Paying the Human Costs of

War: American Public Opinion and Casualties in Military Conflicts (Princeton, NJ:

Princeton University Press, 2009); Krebs and Lobasz, Fixing the Meaning of 9/11, 2007.

55. Patrick Dunleavy, ‘‘Explaining the Privatization Boom: Public Choice Versus Radical

Approaches,’’ Public Administration 64, 1 (1986): 13-34.

56. Pascal Vennesson, ‘‘War without the People,’’ in The Changing Character of War, ed.

Hew Strachan and Sibylle Scheipers (New York: Oxford University Press, 2011), 241-58.

57. Martin Shaw, War and Genocide: Organised Killing in Modern Society (Cambridge,

MA: Polity Press, 2003), 106.

58. Steven Lukes, Power: A Radical View (New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2005).

59. Robert W. Cox, ‘‘Social Forces, States and World Orders: Beyond International Relations

Theory,’’ Millennium 10, 2 (1981): 126-55.

60. Huntington, The Soldier and the State, 71-76.

61. Kohn, ‘‘How Democracies Control the Military,’’ 145.

62. Marybeth Peterson Ulrich, ‘‘A Primer on Civil–Military Relations for Senior Leaders,’’ in

U.S. Army War College Guide to National Security Issues, ed. Boone Bartholomees, Jr.,

vol. 2 (Carlisle, PA: Strategic Studies Institute of the US Army War College, 2010),

305-14.

63. Mills, The Power Elite, 200.

64. David Pion-Berlin, ‘‘Informal Civil–Military Relations in Latin America: Why Politi-

cians and Soldiers Choose Unofficial Venues,’’ Armed Forces & Society 36, 3 (2010):

526-44.

65. Andrew J. Bacevich and Richard H. Kohn, ‘‘Grand Army of the Republicans: Has the

U.S. Military become a Partisan Force?’’ The New Republic 217 (1997): 22-25.

66. Marybeth Peterson Ulrich, Democratizing Communist Militaries: The Cases of the Czech

and Russian Armed Forces (Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 1999), 100-2,

149-52, 252.

67. Charles Tilly, Coercion, Capital, and European States, AD 990-1992 (Cambridge, MA:

Basil Blackwell, 1992).

96 Armed Forces & Society 42(1)

68. Lake, ‘‘Powerful Pacifists,’’ 1992; Tilly, Coercion, Capital, 1992.

69. Philip Daniel Smith, Why War? The Cultural Logic of Iraq, the Gulf War, and Suez

(Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2005), 27.

70. Sinisa Malesevic, The Sociology of War and Violence (New York: Cambridge University

Press, 2010), 48, 142.

71. Malesevic, The Sociology of War, 271.

72. Douglas A. Van Belle, Press Freedom and Global Politics (Westport, CT: Greenwood

Press, 2000), 78-91.

73. Uri Ben-Eliezer, ‘‘Rethinking the Civil–Military Relations Paradigm: The Inverse Rela-

tion between Militarism and Praetorianism Through the Example of Israel,’’ Comparative

Political Studies 30, 3 (1997): 356-74.

74. Mattei Dogan and John Higley, ‘‘Elites, Crises, and Regimes in Comparative Analysis,’’

in Elites, Crises and the Origins of Regimes, ed. Mattei Dogan and John Higley (Lanham,

MD: Rowan and Littlefield, 1998), 8-9.

75. Dirk Peters and Wolfgang Wagner, ‘‘Between Military Efficiency and Democratic

Legitimacy: Mapping Parliamentary War Powers in Contemporary Democracies,

1989–2004,’’ Parliamentary Affairs 64, 1 (2011): 180.

76. Finnemore, The Purpose of Intervention, 147.

77. Zoltan Barany, ‘‘Democratic Consolidation and the Military: The East European Experi-

ence,’’ Comparative Politics 30, 1 (1997): 27-31.

78. Stephen L. Carter, ‘‘The Constitutionality of the War Powers Resolution,’’ Virginia Law

Review 70, 1 (1984): 101-34.

79. Peters and Wagner, ‘‘Between Military Efficiency and Democratic Legitimacy,’’ 180,

185-86.

80. Kohn, ‘‘How Democracies Control the Military,’’ 1997.

81. Miguel Angel Centeno, Blood and Debt: War and the Nation-state in Latin America

(University Park: Pennsylvania State University Press, 2002), 26.

82. Joel S. Migdal, Strong Societies and Weak States: State-society Relations and State

Capabi1ities in the Third World (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1988).

83. Robin Luckham, ‘‘Democratic Strategies for Security in Transition and Conflict,’’ in

Governing Insecurity: Democratic Control of Military and Security Establishments in

Transitional Democracies, ed. Gavin Cawthra and Robin Luckham (London, UK: Zed

Books, 2003), 3-28; Herbert Wulf, Internationalizing and Privatizing War and Peace:

The Bumpy Ride to Peace Building (New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2005), 11.

84. Jacklyn Cock, Rethinking Militarism in Post-apartheid South Africa (Working Paper No.

43) (London, UK: Crisis States Research Centre, London School of Economics, 2004).

85. Barany, Democratic Breakdown, 25-26.

86. Peters and Wagner, ‘‘Between Military Efficiency and Democratic Legitimacy,’’ 180-81.

87. See Finnemore, The Purpose of Intervention, 2003.

88. F. L. Carsten, The Reichswehr and Politics 1918-1933 (Berkeley: University of

California Press, 1973).

89. Samuel E. Finer, The Man on Horseback: The Role of the Military in Politics (New

Brunswick, NJ: Transaction Publishers, 2002), 48-50.

Levy 97

90. Hans Mommsen, The Rise and Fall of Weimar Germany (Chapel Hill: University of

North Carolina Press, 1996), 75-77.

91. Catherine Lu, ‘‘Shame, Guilt and Reconciliation after War,’’ European Journal of Social

Theory 11, 3 (2008): 11-12.

92. Mommsen, The Rise and Fall of Weimar Germany, 82-84.

93. Kemal H. Karpat, ‘‘The Military and Politics in Turkey, 1960-64: A Socio-cultural Anal-

ysis of a Revolution,’’ The American Historical Review 75, 6 (1970): 1654-83.

94. George S. Harris, ‘‘Military Coups and Turkish Democracy, 1960–1980,’’ Turkish Stud-

ies 12, 2 (2011): 203-4.

95. Harris, ‘‘Military Coups,’’ 204-5.

96. Burk, ‘‘Theories of Democratic Civil–Military Relations,’’ 7.

Author Biography

Yagil Levy is a professor of political science and public policy at the Open University

of Israel, where he heads the MA program in democracy studies. His main research

interest is in the theoretical and empirical aspects of civil–military relations. He has pub-

lished six books, the most recent one is Israel’s Death Hierarchy: Casualty Aversion in

a Modern Militarized Democracy (New York University Press, 2012).

98 Armed Forces & Society 42(1)

1/14/2018 Military government - Wikipedia

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Military_government 1/1

Military governmentA military government is generally any government that is administrated by military forces, whether this government is legal or not under the laws of the

jurisdiction at issue, and whether this government is formed by natives or by an occupying power. It is usually carried out by military workers.

Types of military government include:

Military occupation of acquired foreign territory and the administration thereof

Martial law, temporary military rule of domestic territory

Military dictatorship, an authoritarian government controlled by a military and its political designees, called a military junta when done extralegally

Stratocracy, a government traditionally or constitutionally run by a military.

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1/14/2018 Role of Myanmar Military Hangs Over Forum on Democratic Transition

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ASIA

Role of Myanmar Military Hangs OverForum on Democratic TransitionAugust 11, 2017 7:47 AM Joe Freeman

NAYPYITAW, MYANMAR — The path to democracy is "not a bed of roses,"Myanmar's de facto leader Aung San Suu Kyi said Friday at the start of a forum inwhich the role of the military in the transition to civilian rule looms large.

Speaking in the capital Naypyitaw to open the three-day "Forum on MyanmarDemocratic Transition," the Nobel laureate and State Counselor delivered heropening remarks more than 15 months after her party formally took power and amidwidespread criticism over her administration's performance.

"When we are trying to change, it is never easy," she said, according to asimultaneous translation. She added that Myanmar can learn from the experiences ofother countries that have undergone similar transformations. "To be behind also hassome advantages."

Myanmar was ruled by military governments for almost five decades until allies ofthe former junta launched wide-ranging reforms in 2011, leading to elections in 2015that Suu Kyi and her National League for Democracy (NLD) won by a landslide.

Hanging over the whole process, however, is the still-powerful military, whichcontinues to clash with armed ethnic groups. Aung San Suu Kyi has eschewed

Role of Myanmar Military Hangs Over Forum on Democratic Transition 

1/14/2018 Role of Myanmar Military Hangs Over Forum on Democratic Transition

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criticism while stressing national reconciliation. She returned to the theme in herremarks on Friday, saying that learning lessons from the past is better than dwellingin it.

The military, known as the Tatmadaw in Burmese, retains significant power due tothe 2008 constitution that it drafted. The document guarantees it 25 percent ofparliamentary seats and three ministries.

While a portion of the sessions on Friday were devoted to the transition from amilitary to civilian government, and many of the questions from the audience latchedonto the issue, very few members of the armed forces were scheduled to speak.

Real-time events highlighted the tension, as local reports pointed to a possible troopbuild-up in Rakhine State, where the armed forces have carried out a crackdown onRohingya Muslim militants since deadly attacks on a police outpost last year. Theoperations have resulted in numerous claims of human rights abuses.

Historians, politicians, professors and ambassadors, among others, were allscheduled to speak at the forum. Experts who participated in the opening sessionsdiscussed examples of other countries that emerged from outright military orauthoritarian rule, including Indonesia, South Korea and, further afield, Spain.

Some of the comments likely will disappoint organizations still seeking redress foryears of su�ering and hardship under the former Burmese junta, which imprisonedactivists and crushed dissent.

Aurel Croissant, a professor of political science at Heidelberg University, said in a talkthat e�orts in di�erent societies to punish military regimes for past crimes did not

1/14/2018 Role of Myanmar Military Hangs Over Forum on Democratic Transition

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end well.

"There isn't a single historical case where this attempt did not lead to disaster," hesaid. "My advice would be, concluding from the historical evidence, that newdemocracies may be well advised not to engage under these circumstances inapproaches or projects with retributive justice."

Soeren Keil, an Associate Professor at Canterbury Christ Church University who isscheduled to give a talk on Sunday, said in an interview that Myanmar has madesubstantial progress in recent years, pointing to elections, an increasingly e�ectiveparliament, mostly civilian cabinet members, the peace process and media freedoms.

But he said there are still unanswered questions.

"We know where the peace process is supposed to go toward," he said. "But when welook at democratization, I think the whole agenda becomes much more problematic.Because there I can't see a clear goal of saying, this is where we are moving tocomplete civilian control."

Myanmar is scheduled to again hold elections in 2020, and Keil wondered whetherthe same constitutional elements keeping the military in power would still be inplace.

"That's kind of a date where I think also the NLD itself has to think about what kindof legacy it wants to have for the first five years of power," he said. "And I think thatdiscussion needs to happen."

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Myanmar National Security Adviser Thaung Tun, who spoke at the forum, said in aninterview on the sidelines that while "there has been a lot of cynicism expressed"regarding the military's role in the transition, "we are working together because weare partners on the same journey."

One of the few members of the military who took part, Col. Aung Myint Oo, the headof the National and International A�airs Department at the National Defense Collegeof the Myanmar Armed Forces, said in a panel discussion that a civilian governmentmay not be able to protect the country against what he described as various threatsand problems.

"The military should be a part of one of the organs of the government, and after thatwe have to negotiate," he said.

1/14/2018 Reassessing the Role of Myanmar’s Powerful Military

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Commentary

Reassessing the Role of Myanmar’sPowerful Military

1/14/2018 Reassessing the Role of Myanmar’s Powerful Military

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By KYAW ZWA MOE 20 October 2017

Without the military’s collaboration, the democratic transition in Myanmar will go

nowhere. Like it or not, it’s the realpolitik of the country and no one can discard that

reality.

Unlike most countries in the world, the military here is unavoidably at the epicenter of

the country’s politics constitutionally, traditionally and historically.

That’s a fact. Thus, not only domestic leaders but also international leaders must deal

with its leadership to achieve their respective missions in the fragile state of Myanmar.

Myanmar Army chief Snr-Gen Min Aung Hlaing (center) with President U Htin Kyaw, State Counselor Daw Aung San Suu Kyi, vice presidents and house speakers

on Oct. 15, the day marking the second anniversary of the signing of Nationwide Ceasefire Agreement. / Snr-Gen Min Aung Hlaing / Facebook

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Many people of Myanmar loathed the military dictatorship that oppressed them for

decades. The international community punished the military with sanctions for its abuse

of power against its own people; its grip on power that went against international

norms.

The Tatmadaw, however, is resilient in the political arena though it has faced

continuous resistance throughout its rule. Sanctions from the West for 20 years didn’t

make the military weak.

To date, political transformation has not evolved beyond a framework designed by the

ex-military regime.

The past one and a half years since the first elected government led by the National

League for Democracy took office has proven again that the military is still the most

important stakeholder in the political arena.

Twenty-nine years after a nationwide uprising stormed against the military dictatorship

in 1988, the popular pro-democracy camp has failed in achieving its goal: to remove the

military from the political arena after making it return to the barracks.

And the mainstream opposition groups comprising Daw Aung San Suu Kyi’s NLD,

dozens of other political parties, ethnic parties and political activist groups couldn’t

make their own strategies beyond a political roadmap planned by the military regime.

During that time, however, the military managed to have a constitution which

guarantees it an important leadership role in the political arena.

Today, as a result, the military is still at the epicenter of politics although it isn’t running

the government.

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Constitutionally, the military’s commander-in-chief Snr-Gen Min Aung Hlaing is perhaps

the most important power holder.

He chooses the 25 percent of military appointees in all parliaments nationally and

regionally. He nominates a vice president and three key ministerial positions—defense,

home and border affairs.

In addition, the military chief is the supreme commander in chief of all armed forces,

from the military to the police to paramilitary groups. In other countries, this position is

supposed to be for the president.

Traditionally, the military had ruled the country for many decades from 1958 to 1960 as

a caretaker government and from 1962 to 2011 as a military government. Besides, from

2011 to early 2016, the military-proxy party, known as the Union Solidarity and

Development Party, ruled the country through a quasi-civilian government. Thus, the

military and its political party had ruled the country for fifty-six out of the sixty-nine

years since it gained independence from British colonial rule in 1948.

Historically, the military was formed as the Burma Independence Army (BIA) in 1941 to

fight for independence from the British. BIA was formed by patriotic politicians led by

independence leader Gen. Aung San, father of Daw Aung San Suu Kyi. So, the

consecutive military leaders hold a belief that the Myanmar military, known as the

Tatmadaw, is patriotic with “a crucial duty to protect the State from internal and external

threats and destructive elements which endanger its sovereignty.”

With such roles in history and politics, the military has strengthened itself throughout

history. It has become one of the strongest armed forces in Southeast Asia, with more

than 450,000 troops.

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All of its leaders, especially after its takeover of the country in 1988, have never swayed

from three causes of their motto: “The non-disintegration of the Union, non-

disintegration of national solidarity and perpetuation of sovereignty.”

The current leader of the military, Snr-Gen Min Aung Hlaing, is no different.

Last Sunday, we could see once more the military’s power and its steadfast political

stand when Snr-Gen Min Aung Hlaing made a speech at the ceremony of the 2nd

anniversary of the Nationwide Ceasefire Agreement in Naypyitaw.

The military chief was one of three leaders to make speeches together with the de

facto leader Daw Aung San Suu Kyi representing the government and Saw Mutu Sae

Poe, chairman of Karen National Union, representing a bloc of ethnic armed groups

which have signed the Nationwide Ceasefire Agreement.

The military chief is always among key leaders to make such a speech in important

political ceremonies and also a key host to all foreign dignitaries, who request to meet

the military chief when they want to discuss military or security matters.

The head of the state and other cabinet ministers are not legitimately placed to answer

such specific questions.

Snr-Gen Min Aung Hlaing’s speech on Sunday was different from the other two leaders’

speeches.

The State Counselor emphasized leaving a good legacy of peace for the next

generation and appealed for collaboration from everyone for the peace process.

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The Karen leader called for autonomy and integrity for ethnic people in accordance

with the Panglong agreement signed in 1947 between the then Prime Minister Aung

San and ethnic leaders, making crucial suggestions for the current peace process.

In contrast, the military chief not only touched on the peace process and the country’s

stability but also about the multiparty system, the military’s tasks in laying out the

foundation for the multiparty system, the definitions of democracy, different views on

the rule of law, differences between revolution and building the country, and the

military’s historic role in fighting for independence.

Some critics might even have considered his speech a “political lecture” to the

audience, from the head of the state to ethnic leaders to heads of foreign missions.

It would be very unusual in other countries, but in Myanmar, the exclusive audience had

to listen to his 15-minutes speech. And the commander-in-chief delivered the speech

with the confidence and conviction needed when speaking to such an audience.

The military chief said the military government carried out political, economic and social

development undertakings from 1988 till 2010 by building the road for a multiparty

system. He said, “Every person and every organization needs to understand the

multiparty system. The military is carrying out to continue to walk on the policy of the

multiparty system with steadfast and caution.”

“As democracy is seen as a system, it can be assumed that it is as a task or ethic to

achieve success if it is followed and respected by everyone.”

The senior general said while legal scholars focus on stability to determine the rule of

law, there are two factors of “accountability” and “no one above the law” according to

political point of view.

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The military chief said more than one time in his speech, “No one is above the law.” He

also added, “Any person or organization must respect the existing laws in carrying out

any type of their duties. The law cannot be abused as a tool.”

He was not referring to any specific person. Some people might ask whether he was

referring to Daw Aung San Suu Kyi, who was sitting in the front row. Because right after

the NLD government took office at the end of March 2016, the NLD-dominated

Parliament proposed the “State Counsellor” bill, which the President U Htin Kyaw

signed into law in early April.

The military lawmakers said the bill was unconstitutional and all of them boycotted the

proceedings by refusing to cast a ballot during the session.

As for the NLD, the position was created out of political necessity: though Daw Aung

San Suu Kyi’s party won the landslide in the election, she is barred from the presidency

in the military-drafted Constitution. The military leadership might have seen that it was

above the law as Daw Aung San Suu Kyi created a position “above the president.”

Over the past one and half years in office, the NLD-government has found it difficult to

rule the country as it planned to in important areas such as the peace process,

amending some laws, planning to change the undemocratic Constitution and other

issues, including tackling the urgent Rakhine conflict. For those sectors, the military is at

the center among all key stakeholders.

The military and the government are not going at the same pace in tackling all the

issues. In all security measures, the military calls the shots—especially in fighting with

ethnic armed groups and waging military operations against militant group the Arakan

Rohingya Salvation Army, which launched orchestrated attacks on government security

outposts in late August.

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It’s sheer unrealistic for someone to imagine that the country’s current political

transition will advance without the role of the military or the military will leave the

political arena to return to its barracks in the near future.

In 2012, the then defence minister Lt-Gen Hla Min said at the security forum of the

Shangri-La Dialogue in Singapore that the Tatmadaw “may play a lesser role in politics

once the country is more developed and that when the time is appropriate, there would

be changes and the 25 percent participation in the national legislature could be

reduced.” Five years after, the military hasn’t changed that standing at all.

Certainly, Myanmar’s politics and its democratic transition need the military’s

collaboration.

If the military fully collaborates, the transition will be swift. If the military hesitates, the

transition will be sluggish. If the military has no collaboration at all, it will stall

completely.

Topics: Myanmar Army, National League for Democracy, Politics

Kyaw Zwa Moe

The Irrawaddy

Kyaw Zwa Moe is the Editor of the English edition of The Irrawaddy.

Specials

TIMELINE: China-Myanmar Relations

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By THE IRRAWADDY 25 November 2017

In 1949, Mao Zedong established the Peoples’ Republic of China, which was formally

recognized by the freshly independent Myanmar government. Here is a chronology of

the diplomatic relations in the 58 years that followed.

2017

Myanmar State Counsellor Aung San Suu Kyi (L) shakes hands with Chinese President Xi Jinping during the welcome ceremony for the Belt and Road Forum, at

the International Conference Center in Yanqi Lake, north of Beijing, May 15, 2017. / Reuters

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Jan 28: The Yangon government organizes Chinese New Year Celebrations, said to be

the grandest Chinese New Year celebrations in more than five decades. Yangon Region

chief minister U Phyo Min Thein and National League for Democracy (NLD) Patron U Tin

Oo both attend.

April 6-11: Myanmar ‘s President U Htin Kyaw makes his first goodwill visit to China and

holds talks with Chinese President Xi Jinping and other Chinese leaders. The

Kyaukphyu-Kunming oil pipeline agreement is signed.

April 21: Myanmar’s State Counselor Daw Aung San Suu Kyi meets with Chang

Zhenming, the chairman of the China International Trust and Investment Company

(CITIC) Group in Naypyitaw to discuss the group’s involvement in the deep-water

Seaport project in Kyaukphyu SEZ and transportation and infrastructure development in

Myanmar. The meeting is joined by Myanmar cabinet members from the Ministry of

Commerce, Foreign Affairs, Electricity and Energy along with Hong Liang, the Chinese

Ambassador to Myanmar, and a CITC delegation.

April 25: China offers to help tackle a diplomatic row between Bangladesh and

Myanmar over the flight of Rohingya Muslims from Myanmar.

April 26: Top Chinese legislator Zhang Dejiang meets Chairman of the Legal Affairs and

Special Cases Assessment Commission U Shwe Mann in Beijing. The two vow to push

forward China-Myanmar ties. During the trip the chairman also has a meeting with the

Chinese Deputy Foreign Minsiter Liu Zhenmin.

May 14-17: State Counselor Daw Aung San Suu Kyi attends the Belt and Road Forum for

International Cooperation at the China National Convention Centre in Beijing, where

The Chinese President Xi

Jinping and his Myanmar

counterpart U Htin Kyaw

review the honor guard in

Beijing on Apr 10. (Photo:

Myanmar President Office /

Facebook)

Group photo with CITIC

Group. (Photo: Myanmar

State Counselor’s Office /

Facebook)

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she holds separate talks with Chinese President Xi Jingping and Premier Li Keqiang.

At the meetings, the leaders stress the importance of advancing “Comprehensive

Cooperative Strategic Partnership Relations” based on the Five Principles of Peaceful

Co-existence and existing “Pauk-Phaw” friendship, maintaining peace and stability and

development of the border areas, continued support of China for the success of

Myanmar’s reconciliation and peace process, promoting diverse cooperation between

the two countries, particularly for the benefit of the two peoples through high-level

communications and exchange of visits. Five Memoranda of Understanding are signed

including an MoU on Cooperation within the Framework of the Silk Road Economic Belt

and 21st Century Maritime Silk Road Initiative.

May 18: Two ships from the People’s Liberation Army Navy carrying over 550 military

personnel pay a goodwill visit to Myanmar.

May 26: People’s Liberation Army presents locomotives and coaches to Myanmar

Tatmadaw.

Jun. 1: State Counselor Daw Aung San Suu Kyi receives General Fang Fenghui, member

of China’s Central Military Commission (CMC) and chief of the Joint Staff Department

under the CMC, in Naypyitaw to discuss promotion of bilateral cooperation.

Aug. 4: State Counselor Daw Aung San Suu Kyi holds talks with Director of the

International Department of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of China

(CPC) Song Tao on cooperation between two countries.

Aug. 5: The groundbreaking ceremony of a China-funded renovation project of the

Bahan Women’s Hospital, formerly named after Daw Khin Kyi, Myanmar State

Counsellor Aung San Suu Kyi’s late mother, takes place in Yangon. The hospital whose

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renovation is scheduled to be completed by next September will become the first

China-Myanmar Friendship Hospital.

Aug. 30: After a close-door meeting in New York, Britain requests a U.N. Security

Council (UNSC) meeting on situation in Myanmar, but China resists stronger

involvement by the U.N. in addressing the crisis.

Sep. 4: Sun Guoxiang, a special envoy of Asian affairs of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs

of China, calls on Vice-President 1 U Myint Swe in Naypyitaw, with the former saying

that the Chinese government condemns insurgent attacks in northern Rakhine State.

Sep. 5: Myanmar Army Chief Snr-Gen Min Aung Hlaing receives Special Envoy Sun in

Naypyitaw. The Chinese envoy says the Chinese government completely has full

confidence the Myanmar government and Tatmadaw will be able to solve Rakhine

issue.

Sep. 8: The Chinese embassy formally opens its interim liaison office in the capital of

Naypyitaw to further facilitate transactions between China and union-level agencies in

Myanmar. The liaison office is the first foreign office permitted to open in Myanmar’s

administrative capital.

Sep. 18: Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi tells U.N. Secretary-General António

Guterres that China supports efforts by the Myanmar government to protect its national

security and opposes recent violent attacks in Rakhine State.

Sep. 22: Chinese media travel to Rakhine to cover the situation there in the wake of

militant attacks in Maungdaw.

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Sep. 22: Gou Yezhou, deputy director of the International Department of the Central

Committee of the Communist Party of China (CPC), in an interview with Reuters, speaks

out against international intervention in Myanmar’s Rakhine issue.

Nov. 19: Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi holds separate talks with Myanmar President

U Htin Kyaw, Daw Aung San Suu Kyi and Snr-Gen Min Aung Hlaing, focusing mainly on

the peace process with the armed ethnic groups and the Rakhine issue.

Nov. 22-24: Snr-Gen Min Aung Hlaing pays a goodwill visit to China at the invitation of a

member of the CMC and Chief of the Joint Staff Department of the PLA Gen. Li

Zuocheng. During the visit, he meets Chinese President Xi Jinping and expresses

thanks to China for its support of Myanmar over the Rakhine State issue. The Chinese

president calls the army chief’s visit “successful.”  

2016

April 5: Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi pays a goodwill visit to Myanmar at the

invitation of Myanmar’s de facto leader Daw Aung San Suu Kyi. He is the first foreign

minister to visit Myanmar since the government of the National League for Democracy

(NLD) assumed office in March. The two discuss the strengthening of China-Myanmar

ties and promoting the interests of citizens of the two countries.

July, 26: China’s Special Envoy on Asian Affairs Sun Guoxiang addresses the summit of

ethnic armed organizations in Kachin State’s Mai Ja Yang.

August 12: President U Htin Kyaw forms a 20-member commission to assess proposed

hydropower projects on the Irrawaddy River. The commission is tasked with assessing

Myanmar Military Chief Snr-

Gen Min Aung Hliang and

Chinese President Xi

Jinping meet in Beijing on

Nov 24.(Photo: Snr-Gen. Min

Aung Hlaing / Facebook)

Chinese Foreign Minister

Wang Yi and Daw Aung San

Suu Kyi during his visit in

April 2016. (Photo: Myanmar

State Counselor’s Office /

Facebook)

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the potential environmental and social effects of any proposed project along the

Irrawaddy River, as well as the possible impact on foreign investment and the wider

economy.

August 17-21: At the invitation of Chinese Premier Li Keqiang, Myanmar’s State

Counselor Daw Aung San Suu Kyi visits China. In the trip, Myanmar and Chinese

governments sign economic and technical cooperation agreement and Memorandum

of Understanding (MoU) on a feasibility study for proposed Kunlong Bridge project

which would be built with China’s assistance.

November 25: The first high-level meeting of foreign and defense ministries of

Myanmar and China is held. Discussions focus on border stability and China’s role in

Myanmar’s peace process.

2015

April 22: President U Thein Sein meets Chinese President Xi Jinping on the sidelines of

the Asian-African Summit also known as the Bandung Conference in Indonesia’s

Jakarta.

April 26: Myanmar’s Speaker of the Lower House meets vice chairman of the Chinese

People’s Political Consultative Conference and director of the International Liaison

Department of the Communist Party of China at Diaoyutai State Guesthouse in Beijing.

June 10-14: At the invitation of the Communist Party of China, Daw Aung San Suu Kyi

visits China for the first time in her capacity as the chairwoman of the NLD and meets

Chinese President Xi Jinping.

China’s President Xi Jinping

and Myanmar’s pro-

democracy leader Daw

Aung San Suu Kyi pose for

pictures during their

meeting at the Great Hall of

the People in Beijing, China,

June 11, 2015. REUTERS

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July 30: Over 150 Chinese citizens who were handed life sentences by a Myanmar

court for illegal logging in Myanmar are released with presidential amnesty after they

spent eight days behind the bars.

Oct 3: President U Thein Sein attends the 70th Anniversary of Victory of the World Anti-

Fascist War at Tiananmen Square in Beijing.

Dec 4: Special Envoy of the Chinese Government and Vice Foreign Minister Liu

Zhenmin pays a call on President U Thein Sein in Naypyitaw.

2014

Feb 19: Vice-President U Nyan Tun receives Chinese Ambassador to Myanmar Yang

Houlan in Naypyitaw.

April 7: A parliamentary delegation led by Lower House Speaker Thura U Shwe Mann

visits China and meets Chinese President Xi Jinping in Beijing.

May 19: Snr-Gen Min Aung Hlaing receives General Chang Wanquan, Minister of

Defense and State Councilor of China in Naypyitaw. The Chinese general pays a call on

President U Thein Sein the following day.

June 23: Chairman of the Union Election Commission U Tin Aye receives Chinese

Ambassador to Myanmar Yang Houlan at the commission in Naypyitaw.

June 28-29: President U Thein Sein attends activities marking the 60th anniversary of

the Five Principles of Peaceful Coexistence also known as Bandung Principles with

Chinese President Xi Jinping, Premier Li Keqiang and Indian Vice-President Mohammad

Hamid Ansari.

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Nov 14: Chinese Premier Li Keqiang pays a state visit to Myanmar.

Dec 16: President U Thein Sein receives a Chinese goodwill delegation led by Chinese

Vice-President Li Yuanchao in Naypyitaw.

Dec 22: Police Force and locals clash after China’s Wanbao Co fenced in the farmlands

of farmers who have refused to take compensation for their confiscated farmlands in

Letpadaung Copper Mine. Daw Khin Win, a 56-year-old local, is killed by a stray bullet

in the clash.

2013

Jan 1: Vice President Dr Sai Mauk Kham receives personnel of China Three Gorges

Corporation (CTGC) and International Group of Entrepreneurs Company (IGOEC), which

are implementing Mong Ton Hydropower Project.

Jan 15: A Chinese delegation led by deputy commerce minister Chen Jian meets NLD

chairperson Daw Aung San Suu Kyi at the Parliament building in Naypyitaw and

discusses investment between the two countries.

Jan 19: President U Thein Sein receives a Chinese special delegation led by deputy

foreign minister Fu Ying at the Yangon Region government office.

April 5-7: President U Thein Sein meets Chinese President Xi Jinping in China. He gives

an interview to journalist Li Xiaokun of the China Daily on April 6 and addresses the

opening of Boao for the 2013 Asia Annual Conference.

The funeral for Daw Khin

Win was held on Dec. 25,

2014. / The Irrawaddy

China’s President Xi Jinping

(R) and Myanmar’s President

Thein Sein attend an official

welcoming ceremony as

President Thein Sein arrives

for the Boao Forum, in

Sanya, Hainan province,

April 5, 2013. (Photo:

Reuters)

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April 10: Myanmar Army Chief Snr-Gen Min Aung Hlaing receives Chinese Ambassador

to Myanmar Yang Houlan.

June 23: State Councillor Yang Jiechi visits Myanmar.

July 23: President U Thein Sein receives Vice Chairman of Central Military Commission

General Fan Changlong in Naypyitaw.

September 2: President U Thein Sein attends 10th China-Asean Expo in Nanning and

meets Chinese Premier Li Keqiang.

October 16: Myanmar Army Chief Snr-Gen Min Aung Hlaing visits China and meets

President Xi Jinping who is also the chairman of Central Military Commission of

Communist Party of China.

2012

March 26: President U Thein Sein receives Governor of Yunnan Province Li Ji Heng in

Naypyitaw.

July 10: President U Thein Sein receives State Councillor and Minister of Public Security

of China Meng Jianzhu in Naypyitaw.

September 11: Vice-President Dr Sai Mauk Kham receives Chinese Ambassador to

Myanmar Li Junhua.

September 22: President U Thein Sein attends the 9th China-Asean Expo in Nanning,

capital of south China’s Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region.

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2011

March 13: A Chinese delegation led by Lt-Gen Jia Tingan, deputy director of General

Political Department of People’s Liberation of Army of China, calls on Myanmar Army

Chief Snr-Gen Min Aung Hlaing and senior military officers in Naypyitaw.

April 4: President U Thein Sein receives Member of the Chinese Communist Party

Central Committee Politburo and Chairman of the 11th National Committee of Chinese

People’s Political Consultative Conference Jia Qinglin in Naypyitaw.

April 27: VicenPresident Thiha Thura Tin Aung Myint Oo attends the signing of a MoU

between the Ministry of Transport and China Railways Engineering Corporation on the

Muse-Kyaukphyu railroad project.

May 12: Myanmar Army Chief Snr-Gen Min Aung Hlaing receives Vice Chairman of the

Central Military Commission General Xu Caihou in Naypyitaw and signs an agreement

on cooperation between the two armed forces. President U Thein Sein also receives

the Chinese general the next day.

May 27: President U Thein Sein makes his first state visit to China since assuming

presidency in March where he meets Chinese President Hu Jintao, Premier Wan Jiabao

and other leaders. The two countries promote their relationship on a strategic level,

and nine economic agreements and memoranda of understanding are signed.

Oct 16: Vice President Thiha Thura Tin Aung Myint Oo receives chairman of the China

Railway Engineering Corporation (CREC) in Naypyitaw and discuses cooperation in the

railroad sector.

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Oct 19: Vice President Thiha Thura Tin Aung Myint Oo holds talks with the chairman of

the Industrial and Commercial Bank of China Yang Kaisheng on bilateral cooperation in

the financial and banking sectors.

Nov 6: President U Thein Sein and his wife pay obeisance to the Tooth Relic of Buddha

which is conveyed from China to Myanmar for a few days for public worship.

2010

Feb 25: The Ministry of Electric Power and two Chinese companies Hanergy Holding

Group Limited and Goldwater Resources Limited (GRL) signed a Memorandum of

Understanding on the implementation of Upper Thanlwin also known as the Kunlong

Hydropower Project.

April 24: The Ministry of Electric Power and China’s Sino Hydro Corporation Limited,

Electricity Generating Authority of Thailand (EGAT), and International Group of

Entrepreneurs (IGE) sign an agreement on the implementation of the Hatgyi

Hydropower Project.

May 27: The Ministry of Electric Power, local company Tun Thwin Mining Co Ltd and

China’s Guodian Corporation sign memoranda of understanding on the Mawlaik

Hydropower Project the and Kalewa Coal-fired Power Plant Project.

June 2-3: A Chinese delegation led by Chinese Premier Wan Jiabao visits Myanmar and

meets Snr-Gen Than Shwe in Naypyitaw.

June 16: Myanmar Petroleum and Chemical Enterprise of the Ministry of Energy and

China’s North Petro-Chem Corporation Limited sign a profit-sharing contract on the

production of oil and gas from Block F of onshore territory.

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Nov 9: Spokesperson of the China Ministry of Foreign Affairs Hong Lei congratulates

Myanmar on the successful holding of a multi-party democratic election, reports Xinhua

News Agency.

2009

Jan 23: Myanmar Army Deputy Chief Vice Senior General Maung Aye receives military

attaches of China in Naypyitaw.

March 18: Snr-Gen Than Shwe receives a Chinese goodwill delegation led by Chief of

the General Staff of the People’s Liberation Army of China General Chen Bingde.

March 26: Li Changchun, member of the Standing Committee of the Central Political

Bureau of the Communist Party of China, pays a call on Snr-Gen Than Shwe in

Naypyitaw.

March 28: Secretary-1 of the State Peace and Development Council (SPDC) General

Thiha Thura Tin Aung Myint Oo receives the chairman of the China National Petroleum

Corporation Jiang Jiemin.

June 16: Vice Senior General Maung Aye and wife Daw Mya Mya San, at the invitation

of Chinese Vice President Xi Jinping, visit China. The Vice Senior General also meets

Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao.

Nov 4: Media report about China National Petroleum Corporation (CNP)’s establishment

of an oil and gas pipeline linking Myanmar ’s deep-water port of Kyaukphyu (Sittwe) in

the Bay of Bengal with Kunming in Yunnan Province.

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Dec 20: Snr-Gen Than Shwe receives a Chinese delegation led by Chinese Vice-

President Xi Jinping in Naypyitaw. Xi Jinping also meets Vice Senior General Maung

Aye and signs agreements on cooperation in trade, transportation infrastructure,

financial sector, hydropower generation, energy, and oil and gas pipeline.

2008

May 10: Military Attaché of the Chinese Embassy in YangonSenior Colonel Fan Lianfeng

observes people voting in a national referendum to ratify the 2008 Constitution.

May 30: Chinese medical teams provide medical services for Cyclone Nargis victims

from May 19 to May 30 in Yangon and Irrawaddy regions.

August 8: Prime Minister General Thein Sein attends the opening ceremony of the

Beijing Olympic Games and meets Chinese President Hu Jintao and Premier Wan

Jiabao.

Oct 28: Member of the State Peace and Development Council General Thura Shwe

Mann receives a Chinese goodwill delegation led by General Zhang Li of People’s

Liberation Army.

2007

Jan 13: China and Russia veto a draft resolution regarding Myanmar , submitted by the

United States to the United Nations Security Council.

Jan 23: Senior General Than Shwe receives Li Tieying, Vice-Chairman of the Chinese

National People’s Congress (NPC) Standing Committee, in Naypyitaw.

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June 6: Secretary-1 of the State Peace and Development Council (SPDC) Lt-Gen Thein

Sein visits Beijing at the invitation of the Standing Committee of the National People’s

Congress of China.

June 29: SPDC member General Thura Shwe Mann receives deputy commander of the

Yunnan Military Region Maj-Gen Lin Tinggui of China at the Ministry of Defense in

Naypyitaw.

Nov 18: Prime Minister General Thein Sein attends the 13th Asean Summit and related

meetings in Singapore. At the summit, Chinese Premier Wan Jiabao says imposing

sanctions and putting pressures on Myanmar would contribute nothing to its national

reconciliation process.

2006

August 8: Myanmar Prime Minister General Soe Win receives Chairman of the Chinese

Development Bank Chen Yuan in Naypyitaw.

Sept 19: The Chinese government presents locomotives and coaches to Myanma

Railways (MR) in a ceremony at the Central Railway Station in Rangoon.

Oct 22: Chief of the General Staff of the China People’s Liberation Army Liang Guanglie

pays a call on Snr-Gen Than Shwe at the Ministry of Defense in Naypyitaw.

2005

June 7: Senior General Than Shwe sends a message of congratulations on the 55th

anniversary of the establishment of diplomatic ties between Myanmar and China.

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Oct 17-20: Myanmar Prime Minister General Soe Win attends the second China-Asean

Expo in China’s Nanning and the China-Asean Economic and Investment Summit.

Nov 16: Senior General Than Swe receives member of the Chinese Communist Party

Central Committee Politburo and Vice-Chairman of the Standing Committee of the

National People’s Congress Wang Zhaoguo.

2004

Feb 23: Snr-Gen Than Shwe receives vice-chairman of the People’s Political

Consultative Conference Luo Haocai in Rangoon.

April 23: Deputy Commander-in-Chief of Defense Services Commander-in-Chief (Army)

Vice Senior General Maung Aye receives outgoing military attaché Senior Colonel Xu

Shulai and incoming Senior Colonel Ma Shoudoing in Rangoon.

Dec 2: – Deputy Chief of the General Staff of the People’s Liberation Army of the

People’s Republic of China General Ge Zhenfeng and party pay a goodwill visit to

Myanmar .

Dec 16: Vice Senior General Maung Aye receives a Chinese military delegation led by

Lt-Gen Sun Zhiqing of the People’s Liberation Army of China.

2003

Jan 6-11: At the invitation of Chinese President Jiang Zemin, Snr-Gen Than Shwe and

wife Daw Kyaing Kyaing visit China.

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November 14: Secretary of Yunnan Province Communist Province of China Bai Enpei

pays a courtesy call on Snr-Gen Than Shwe in Rangoon.

December 1: Deputy Chief of General Staff General Wu Quanxu pays a courtesy call on

Snr-Gen Than Shwe in Rangoon.

2002

Jan 20: At the invitation of Lt-Gen Khin Nyunt, Secretary-1 of the State Peace and

Development Council (SPDC), a Chinese goodwill delegation led by the secretary-

general of the State Council of China Wang Zhongyu visits Myanmar . Snr-Gen Than

Swe receives the delegation.

May 7: The committee to implement Myanmar -China bilateral agreements meets in

Rangoon, addressed by Lt-Gen Khin Nyunt.

Sept 30: Lt-Gen Khin Nyunt attends a ceremony to mark China National Day at the

Chinese Embassy in Rangoon.

2001

January 17: Chinese Minister of Public Security Jia Chunwang meets with Sec-1 Lt Gen

Khin Nyunt.

April 25: General Fu Quangyou, Chief of General Staff Headquarters for China People’s

Liberation Army meets with Prime Minister Than Shwe and Army Chief Gen Maung Aye.

May 7: Maj-Gen Nyunt Tin, Minister for Agriculture and Irrigation, observes the Chinese

agriculture industry and factories that produce machinery for water distribution.

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December 12-16 Jiang Zemin visits Myanmar and signs economic and border

agreements.

2000

May 2-5: Engineers from China’s armed forces meet with Myanmar military officers at a

naval base in Taninthayi Region according to a Radio Free Asia report. The meetings

focus on the construction of two bases in the area with assistance from the Chinese

Navy and Air Forces.

May 31: Chinese State Councillor Ismail Amat meets with Prime Minister Than Shwe and

Sec-1 Lt Gen Khin Nyunt.

June 5: Gen Maung Aye meets with Chinese president Jiang Zemin and Premier Zhu

Rongji on separate occasions in Hong Kong and China, and holds talks with Vice-

President Hu Jintao. The sides sign a joint statement on the framework of future

bilateral relations and cooperation.

July 16: Vice President Hu Jintao and Deputy Foreign Minister Wang Guangya, meet

with PM Than Shwe, Gen Maung Aye, Lt Gen Khin Nyunt, and Lt Gen Tin Oo in

Myanmar .

August 6: Chinese Deputy of Foreign Affairs meets with Sec-1 Lt Gen Khin Nyunt,

Minister of Foreign Affairs Win Aung and Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs Khin Maung

Win.

September: A new special trade zone intended to open an outlet to Southeast Asia is

established on the border between Myanmar and Yunnan, China. Meanwhile, the Bank

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of China approves a US$120 million loan to the Myanmar Electric Power Enterprise to

build a massive hydroelectric generator.

October 25: Sec-3 Lt Gen Win Myint pays a goodwill visit to the Chinese Association for

International Understanding.

November 24: Fang Zuqi Political Commissar of Nanjing Military Command of the

People’s Liberation Army meets with Army Chief Gen Maung Aye.

1999

June: Myanmar -China bilateral trade, including border trade, reaches US$78.21 million

in the first two months of the year, a sharp increase of 123.7% over the $34.95 million

figure registered in the same period the prior year, according to Myanmar ’s Central

Statistical Organization.

June: Lt-Gen Khin Nyunt visits China.

December: Foreign Minister Win Aung visits China.

1998

Myanmar and China sign a US$250 million loan deal under which Beijing agrees to

provide funds for a 280 megawatt hydroelectric power plant near Pyinmana.

The Myanmar government allows the publication of two local Chinese language

newspapers “Mian Dien Huo Bao (The Myanmar Morning Post) and Shijie Ribao

(Universal Daily) that target readers both in Myanmar and other countries in the region.

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May: Junta blasts George Fernandes, Indian Defense Minister, for accusing Yangonof

allowing China to set up military installations within its territory.

1997

March: Chairman Li Ruihuan visits Myanmar .

October: Vice-Premier Wu Bangguo visits Myanmar .

December 14-16: Senior Gen Than Shwe meets with Jiang Zemin in Kuala Lumpur,

Malaysia at the second Asean informal summit.

1996

January 7: Senior Gen Than Shwe makes his first visit to China since taking over as

Chairman of ruling SLORC in 1992.

October: Army Chief Gen Maung Aye visits China.

1995

Defense Minister Chi Haotian visits Myanmar .

1994

August: General Li Jiulong, commander of China’s Chengdu military region visits

Myanmar . Chengdu is the command headquarters and major supply base for Chinese

troops in Tibet.

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August: Myanmar buys two modified Jianghu-class Chinese frigates.

August: Chinese consulate in Mandalay opens.

September: Khin Nyunt visits China.

September 2: Myanmar Air Force chief Lt-Gen Thein Win, goes to Kunming, China to

oversee the delivery of another squadron of military aircraft from China.

September 29: Myanmar signs an agreement with a leading Chinese shipping firm in

Yangonto purchase new ships for Myanmar Five Star Shipping Line.

November: Sec-2 Tin Oo visits China.

December 26-28: Chinese Premier Li Peng visits Myanmar at the invitation of Than

Shwe, the head of the ruling State Law and Order Restoration Council (SLORC).

1993

February: State Councillor and Foreign Minister Qian Qichen visit Myanmar .

September 1: Myanmar opens a consulate in Kunming, China.

1991

January: State Councillor and Sec-Gen of the State Council, Luo Gan visits Myanmar .

Early May: Eleven Chinese-made F7 jet fighters are delivered to Myanmar as part of a

US$1 billion arms deal between Beijing and Yangonwhich also includes naval patrol

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boats, tanks, armoured personnel carriers, light arms, anti- aircraft guns and missiles,

ammunition and other military equipment.

August 21-26: Gen.Saw Maung visits China. He meets Prime Minister Li Peng and

President Yang Shangkun, who promise more political and military aid to Rangoon.

November: Deputy Chief of General Staff He Qizong visits Myanmar .

1990

August 10: The first major shipment of arms and ammunition from China arrives in

Rangoon.

1989

February 20: The CPB’s politburo holds a crisis meeting at Panghsang. It is revealed

that Chinese have approached the CPB and offered the leaders retirement in China.

The CPB leadership reacts angrily to the suggestion, saying: “We have no desire to

become revisionists.”

October 18-29: A 24-member senior Myanmar military delegation, led by Lt-Gen Than

Shwe, visits China.

1988

December: Border trade is officially opened between the two countries.

1980

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July 10: The government announces that the Chinese aid program signed in Beijing on

July 12, 1979 will consist of eight projects: the building of the Rangoon-Syriam Bridge,

40,000 spindle yarn-making machines, three rice mills with 150 ton per day capacity,

the supply of water to Moulmein city, and three million renminbi-yuan for machinery and

tools.

1979

July 12: Yangonannounces a new US$63 million aid agreement with China for

unspecified projects.

November 28: China’s foreign minister, Huang Hua, arrives in Myanmar .

1975

November 11-15: Ne Win visits China for four days, and reaches an agreement that there

will be no “aggressive acts” between the two nations.

1973

December 15-18: Shan State Army (SSA) leaders Hso Hten and Hso Noom appeal for

help from the CPB during a meeting at Panghsang. The first links between the SSA and

the CPB are established. The Shan and Karen rebel delegations to Panghsang are

invited to visit China. They travel to Simao and Kunming.

1971

A new trade agreement is signed giving each country most-favored nation status.

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1968

January 1: Several hundred heavily armed CPB troops, led by Kachin wartime hero Naw

Seng, cross the border from China and capture Mong Ko in northeastern Shan state.

All-out Chinese support for the CPB insurgence begins.

January 5: CPB troops led by Pheung Kya-Shin and Pheung Kya Fu cross the border

from China into Kokang area in northeastern Shan State.

April 6: China protests against “unwarranted arrests” of ethnic Chinese in Myanmar .

1967

January 27: One hundred and thirty-two Naga rebels from northeastern India reach the

Yunnan frontier, having been trekking through northern Myanmar since Oct. 24, 1966.

Led by Thuingaleng Muivah and Thinoselie M.Keyho, they are received by the Chinese,

who provide them with political and military training.

June 19: The Ministry of Education bans the wearing of all “unauthorized badges” by

students. The order is aimed at the wearing of Mao badges primarily by students of

ethnic Chinese origin in Rangoon.

June 26: Two thousand Myanmar gather outside two Chinese schools in Rangoon.

June 28: One thousand three hundred and twenty eight Chinese in Yangonare

detained. The Chinese embassy protests officially against the incident.

June 29: The Chinese embassy in Yangonis attacked by demonstrators. Beijing

announces that its ambassador will not return to Rangoon. Official Myanmar sources

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say over fifty Chinese were killed during the period June 22-29; the Chinese say that

several hundred were killed.

July 7: China’s aid program to Myanmar is suspended.

July 16: A correspondent for the New China News Agency is expelled from Myanmar .

August 11: The Chinese foreign minister delivers protest to the Myanmar embassy in

Beijing, accusing Myanmar aircraft of intruding into Yunnan.

August 21: All Myanmar students studying in China are recalled. Critical Myanmar

sources claim that the anti-Chinese riots were stirred up the government to deflect

attention from acute rice shortages.

August-September: The Kachin rebels send their first delegation to China, led by Brang

Seng. They visit Beijing and Shanghai.

October 6: All Chinese technicians are ordered to leave Myanmar .

1965

July 24-August 1: Ne Win visits China. A joint communique is issued, reaffirming the

1961 treaty and five principles of peaceful coexistence.

Gen Ne Win and Chinese Foreign Minister Zhou En Lai are welcomed by an honor

guard in this undated photo. (Photo: Unknown)1963

September 3: The third group of CPB members, led by Thakin Ba Thein Tin, returns

from China to Yangonto participate in peace talks.

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November: Thakin Ba Thein Tin returns to Beijing from Rangoon. CPB members Khin

Maung Gyi, San Thu and Thein Aung return from Moscow to Beijing where they rejoin

Thakin Ba Thein Tin and the others. Thakin Ba Thein Tin, Khin Maung Gyi, Thakin Than

Myaing, Than Shwe and Tin Yee set up a “leading group of five” in Beijing to prepare

for a China-sponsored push into Myanmar . San Thu begin to survey the Sino-Myanmar

border areas for possible infiltration routes into northeastern Myanmar . Naw Seng’s

Kachins, who have been staying in Guizhou, go to Sichuan for talks with Thakin Ba

Thein Tin and other CPB leaders.

1962

February 24: China issues a protest against US intervention in Vietnam, saying it poses

a “direct threat” to North Vietnam and jeopardizes “the security of China and the peace

in Asia”

August 1: Communist Party of Myanmar  [CPB] exiles in China are allowed to issue their

first public statement, condemning the new military regime.

1961

January 2-9: Zhou Enlai visits Myanmar . The border agreement is ratified. An economic

and technical cooperation agreement is signed on Jan. 9, according to which the

Chinese pledge to give Myanmar  an interest-free loan of US$30 million to be

disbursed during the period Oct. 1, 1961 to Sept. 30.

January 26: A combined force of three divisions (20,000 troops) of regulars from the

Chinese Peoples’ Liberation Army (PLA) and 5,000 Myanmar troops attack KMT bases

north of Kengtung, Shan State. The campaign is codenamed the “Mekong River

Operation”.

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April: A joint US-Taiwan communique says, “the 6,000 KMT soldiers remaining in

Myanmar ’s Shan State are not in any way connected or concerned with the US

government or The Republic of China.

October 10-15: U Nu visits China.

1960

September 4-early October: U Nu visits China and attends China’s National Day

celebrations with a delegation of more than 400 persons.

October: A boundary treaty between China and Myanmar  is signed in Beijing.

1954

The first trade agreement between the two countries is signed.

1953

April: The Democratic Nationalities United Front (DNUF) is formed in the hills near

Papun by Karen, Karenni, Pa-O and Mon rebels. Another Chinese army unit enters the

Wa hills and clashes with the Myanmar Army.

June 28-29: Chinese foreign minister Zhou Enlai visits Rangoon.

July 30: Defense Minister Ba Swe says that Myanmar  is going to the UN to have

Nationalist China declared an aggressor and unseated from the world body.

U Nu and Mao Zedong in

Beijing in 1954. (Photo:

Unknown)

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September: Lt-Gen Ne Win leads a high power military delegation to China. They visit

munitions factories and army training establishments.

November: U Nu (in his capacity as AFPFL President) visits China and meets with Zhou

Enlai. China agrees to withdraw all its forces from disputed border areas in Kachin

State. Anti-Fascist People Freedom League [AFPFL].

November: Thirty Chinese soldiers enter the Wa Hills and clash with the same number

of troops from the Myanmar army.

December 1-16:U Nu visits China. More talks are held about the border question and

the question of nationality of Chinese residents in Myanmar .

1950

January-March: Over 2,000 Kuomintang (KMT) forces from Yunnan cross the border to

set up base in Kengtung, eastern Shan state following the Communist victory in China.

1949

October 1: Mao Zedong proclaims the Peoples’ Republic of China in Beijing.

December 17: Myanmar  recognizes the Peoples’ Republic of China.

 

Topics: Foreign Relations

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The Irrawaddy

...

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N s Desk

Can Myanmar’s New Government Control Its Military?By Jon Emont November 9, 2015

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Aung San Suu Kyi, the leader of Myanmar’s National League for Democracy (N.L.D.), warned supporters anticipating a historic election victory thatresults are not nal and they need to remain cautious.Photograph by Dario Pignatelli / Bloomberg / Getty

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At 6 �.�. on Sunday, ve minutes before sunrise, Burmese voters began lining up at polling stations in Yangon toparticipate in their country’s rst national elections in decades. The two main contenders were the UnionSolidarity and Development Party (U.S.D.P.), the party of the military, and the National League of Democracy

(N.L.D.), which hopes to banish the military from politics. The N.L.D., led by  , the Nobel PeacePrize laureate and the country’s revered symbol of democracy, was expected to win the election, and in fact it won in alandside; although results have not been con rmed, the party claims that it won about seventy per cent of parliamentaryseats, more than enough to select the next President. On Monday, the ruling U.S.D.P. conceded defeat. “We lost. Wehave to nd the reasons why we lost. However, we do accept the result without reservation,” Htay Oo, the party’s actingchairman, said.

This election marks the nal step in democratic reforms begun by Myanmar’s military-backed regime, in 2011. Thatyear, Myanmar’s military junta, whose nearly ve decades of authoritarian rule transformed a lush, resource-rich stateinto one of the most closed-off and impoverished societies on Earth, made an abrupt about-face and announced that itwould begin a transition to “civilian democracy.” The change was intended to stave off a U.N. Commission of Inquiryprobe into the regime’s alleged crimes against humanity as well as to build economic relations with the West after yearsof forced reliance on China. That year, the military regime began  , which included lifting restrictions onthe press, releasing hundreds of political prisoners, and legalizing labor unions and political rallies. The regime alsoformally transitioned from military to civilian rule, handing power to the U.S.D.P., the nominally civilian party thatrepresents military interests in Parliament, and announcing that the rst national elections under civilian rule would beheld in 2015.

At noon on Election Day, Tint Lwin, the N.L.D.’s candidate for Regional Assembly in Pazuntaung Township, Yangon,sat down for a lunch of curry at Osaka Osho, a Japanese chain restaurant. He was with Kyaw Wunna, his energeticcampaign manager, and U Kyaw Maung, a former monk and resistance leader who was helping out the campaign. Theyhad just distributed lunches to their volunteers at six stops around the township and were exhausted. It had turned into aterribly hot afternoon.

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enacting reformsenacting reformsenacting reformsenacting reformsenacting reformsenacting reformsenacting reformsenacting reformsenacting reformsenacting reformsenacting reforms

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The group was tired, but also optimistic. Yangon is an N.L.D. stronghold and, although the nal results wouldn’t bereleased until the next day, they predicted that Tint would win. All three had spent years in military prisons for resistingthe regime. Kyaw, the campaign manager, shared a hundred-square-foot prison cell with two other men for eight years,as punishment for participating in the 1988 student movement against military rule. “Back then prison was the place forpeople who believed in democracy,” he said, laughing. “Now it’s Parliament.” More than fty former political prisonerswere candidates.

But these long-awaited elections came with a major catch. The 2008 constitution, which contains a number of starklyanti-democratic provisions, will remain in place. Politicians whose children or spouses possess foreign citizenship arebarred from the Presidency, so Suu Kyi, whose children have British citizenship, cannot assume the executive office. Themost powerful bureaucracies—Home Affairs, Border Affairs, and Military Affairs—will remain under military control,and their budgets will remain above civilian scrutiny, regardless of which party controls the government.

The constitution is designed to be impossible to change without the military’s buy-in: twenty- ve per cent of seats inparliament are reserved for military officers, while more than seventy- ve per cent of Parliament is needed to approvechanges to the constitution. A vaguely worded clause also empowers the military to re-impose military rule if it judgesthe country to be on the verge of disorder. “It’s a coup mechanism in waiting,” Phil Robertson, the deputy director ofHuman Rights Watch’s Asia division, told me.

N.L.D. candidates are hopeful that their party’s electoral victory will pave the way for civilian supremacy over theBurmese military. In a press conference a few days before the election, Suu Kyi declared, “Constitutions are made bypeople, and they are not eternal. If the support of the people is clear and strong enough, I don’t see why we should notbe able to overcome minor problems like amendments of the constitution.”

But activists and experts argue that the problem is more signi cant than Suu Kyi admits. “On the one hand you havethis wonderful N.L.D. landside, on the other hand when it comes to power [the N.L.D.] won’t be able to deliver thechange the people have voted for. It will be hamstrung by the military constitution,” Mark Farmaner, the director ofBurma Campaign UK, a nongovernmental organization that advocates for human rights in Myanmar, said.

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The day after the vote, I visited Tint and Kyaw’s district campaign office, where we were joined by Myint Lwin, one ofthe N.L.D.’s candidates for Parliament in Pazuntaung Township. Myint had recently learned that he had thrashed hisU.S.D.P. opponent, 19,129 votes to 1,866, and he was beaming. Still, the candidates and advisers agreed that, despite theN.L.D.’s victories that day, democracy was far from realized in Myanmar.

Myint, a lawyer by training, acknowledged that the constitution would make it impossible for elected officials to keepthe military in check. “The military will be more powerful than civilians,” he said. He listed the problems he saw in theconstitution, from the dominant role it gave the military in managing foreign affairs, to the military’s right to waivehabeas corpus for people it declares a threat to national security, to provisions that allow the military to use forced labor.“Hopefully, once we’re in Parliament, we can bargain to change the constitution,” he said.

Kyaw, the campaign manager, said that the civilian government would have to offer the military incentives in order toget it to agree to change the constitution. The rst incentive, he said, could be to promise not to seek revenge against themilitary. A second, he said, would be to persuade the military that it could modernize faster under civilian rule, whenthere would be less corruption.

This would be a very hard sell, Farmaner said. “I think obviously the N.L.D. are going to want to push as hard as theycan to get change, but there is no indication that the military is going to give an inch.”

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