War, Peace and the Military: Sociological Perspectives 3658405201, 9783658405205

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Militär und Sozialwissenschaften The Military and Social Research | 56

Franz Kernic

War, Peace and the Military Sociological Perspectives

Militär und Sozialwissenschaften/The Military and Social Research Volume 56 Series Editors Martin Elbe, ZMSBw, Potsdam, Germany Angelika Dörfler-Dierken, Institut für Kirchen- und Dogmengeschichte, Universität Hamburg, Hamburg, Germany

Diese Reihe ist bis Band 53 (2020) im Nomos-Verlag erschienen und wird im Auftrag des Arbeitskreis Militär und Sozialwissenschaften e. V. (AMS/www.milsoz.de) herausgegeben von Prof. Dr. Martin Elbe (Zentrum für Militärgeschichte und Sozialwissenschaften der Bundeswehr, Potsdam) und Dr. Maren Tomforde (Führungsakademie der Bundeswehr, Hamburg).

Franz Kernic

War, Peace and the Military Sociological Perspectives

Franz Kernic Militärakademie an der ETH Zurich (MILAK) Birmensdorf ZH, Switzerland

ISSN 2731-0817 ISSN 2731-0825 (electronic) Militär und Sozialwissenschaften/The Military and Social Research ISBN 978-3-658-40520-5 ISBN 978-3-658-40521-2 (eBook) https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-658-40521-2 © The Editor(s) (if applicable) and The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Fachmedien Wiesbaden GmbH, part of Springer Nature 2023 This work is subject to copyright. All rights are solely and exclusively licensed by the Publisher, whether the whole or part of the material is concerned, specifically the rights of translation, reprinting, reuse of illustrations, recitation, broadcasting, reproduction on microfilms or in any other physical way, and transmission or information storage and retrieval, electronic adaptation, computer software, or by similar or dissimilar methodology now known or hereafter developed. The use of general descriptive names, registered names, trademarks, service marks, etc. in this publication does not imply, even in the absence of a specific statement, that such names are exempt from the relevant protective laws and regulations and therefore free for general use. The publisher, the authors, and the editors are safe to assume that the advice and information in this book are believed to be true and accurate at the date of publication. Neither the publisher nor the authors or the editors give a warranty, expressed or implied, with respect to the material contained herein or for any errors or omissions that may have been made. The publisher remains neutral with regard to jurisdictional claims in published maps and institutional affiliations. This Springer VS imprint is published by the registered company Springer Fachmedien Wiesbaden GmbH, part of Springer Nature. The registered company address is: Abraham-Lincoln-Str. 46, 65189 Wiesbaden, Germany

Preface

In the twentieth century, the experience of war, armed conflict and acts of violence—in many different forms—turned into an important stimulus for new social science research approaches and perspectives. Not surprisingly, numerous attempts to learn from the experience of modern warfare and armed conflict— with two world wars, the emergence of mass armies and the development of new weapons of mass destruction—led to a wide variety of new theoretical approaches toward the study of all the dimensions of the ‘dynamics of violence’ of the modernization process (Maleševi´c 2010; Lawrence 1997; Shaw 2003; Kaldor 2007; Joas and Knöbl 2013). Both world wars, followed by the period of the Cold War, challenged the existing traditional interpretations profoundly. The dark side of modernization was discovered and the entire political program of modernity was called into question, its ideas and institutions. The barbaric side or potential of the ‘civilizing process’ (Elias 2000) quickly became an issue (Tiryakian 1999). Consequently, at the end of the twentieth century, sociological approaches toward the study of the linkage between modernity and war tended to be rather pessimistic. Modernity was seen as “a double-edged phenomenon” (Giddens 1990: 7), having a bright and dark side, creating both vastly greater opportunities for human beings to enjoy a secure and rewarding existence and moments of destruction and negativity. According to Giddens, “not just the threat of nuclear confrontation, but the actuality of military conflict, form a basic part of the ‘dark side’ of modernity” (ibid. 9). He argued that the number of armed conflicts, military interventions and acts of violence, including terrorism and counter-terrorism, needed to be seen as considerably high. Even in the 1990s, military power—and, as part of it, the control of the means of violence—remained an important institutional dimension of modernity. According to him, it was the ‘industrialization

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of war’, which had radically changed the character of warfare, “ushering in an era of ‘total war’ and later the nuclear age” (ibid. 58). German social theorist Hans Joas (2003) even went a step further: For him, war itself forms a basic component of modernity (ibid. 43). Joas did not believe in myths of progress when it came to the history of war and violence. In addition, he also criticized social scientists for having always paid far greater attention to economic, social and political inequality than to the manifestations of violence (ibid. 29). It appears, therefore, that we face the following dilemma. The Enlightenment, liberalism and also Marxism promise us a world without violence, but also lead us again and again into situations in which we are rudely awakened from our dream and are astounded by the persistence of this apparent lack of civilization. (ibid. 32) […] If we seriously consider the fact of war, an idyllic or completely positive view of modernity as is often contained in versions of modernization theory is not to be expected. (ibid. 43 f.)

Joas’ statement leads us to one of the key questions of this study: Are we trapped in some kind of ‘dilemma of modernity’ in which we only have a choice between a too optimistic and idealistic concept of modernity/peace (the world-view of liberalism), on the one hand, and its pessimistic counter-concept of an inevitable link between modernity and war, violence and barbarism? Joas argued that “in the modernization theory of the postwar period the non-violent resolution of conflict even became the defining feature of modernity. However, this blunt rejection of violence was accompanied by a certain tendency to underestimate its importance in the present” (ibid.). His argument leads us to the following question: Is there an escape route out of such a dilemma? Of course, numerous sociologists tried to find such a way out through developing a new theory of social change (Giddens 1990; Joas 2003; Hüppauf 1997; Knöbl and Schmidt 2000; Beck 1992). Many argued that we stand at the dawn of a new era, that we live in a period of transformation with high uncertainty (Beck 1992). A wide variety of terms was suggested to mark the opening of a new era, ‘post-modernity’ being probably the most prominent (Bauman 1997; Albrow 1997). But this view has not been shared universally. Rather than entering a very different period in human history, numerous voices have argued in favor of a ‘soft evolution’ toward some kind of ‘higher’ or ‘reflexive’ modernity with no clear signs of radical disruptor or discontinuity (Giddens 1990). Finally, recent armed conflicts (such as the War on Terror or more recently the outbreak of new wars in Syria and Ukraine) have radically challenged such assumptions.

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However, twentieth century sociological analysis and modernization theory have clearly failed to produce a universally accepted and satisfactory interpretation of the link between modernity and war. This fact marks the starting point for this investigation and for a review of the theoretical efforts of the social sciences regarding the study of war, peace, the use of force, and military violence in modern and post-modern society. The aim of this book is to present a critical reconstruction and comprehensive analysis of political and social science theory concerning the relationship between modern society, politics and the military. Its focus is upon the relationship of the modern social sciences to military violence and the use of force (Baier 1985; Art and Waltz 2015; Brown 1992; Forsythe 1992; Joas and Steiner 1989; Greenwood 1993). In this respect, the book is a review of various established political science, sociological and economic approaches and theories regarding the phenomena of war and peace, the military institution itself and organized collective application of force. The investigation includes a critical reexamination of the tradition of militarysociological research from the beginning of modern sociology (Comte, Spencer, Weber) to late-twentieth century theoretical approaches regarding the securityfocused and/or war-driven aspects of modern society, particularly of ‘risk society’ and modernity/post-modernity (Beck, Giddens) and the potential for a ‘rational’ security policy. In this endeavor, examining the relationship between the military and modern or post-modern society proves to be an exceedingly multi-faceted and extensive search for new paradigms and patterns of orientation to social science theory building that proceed from completely different points of departure. In this respect, my investigation will show that various traditional starting points in the established social sciences are linked to a concept of ‘disciplinization’ as the real basis of modern rationalism, a cost-benefit analysis as the foundation of modern politics, the presumption of an aggressively violent economy, or a (patriarchal) society with its inherent tendencies towards bellicosity. There are several fundamental questions, which such an analysis must address. Is it possible for modern social sciences to maintain a critical distance to their research object, namely, war and the military? Is it not rather the case that their methods, the ways they formulate their questions and their theories reflect war itself? Is modern military sociology merely a continuation of bellicose thought via the concepts of modern science and technology? What is the nature of the actual contribution of modern social science research to the danger of future wars and the renewed use of military force? Is it to be regarded more as a contribution to enhancing the efficiency of the military and thus as a precondition for the achievement of future military victories (possibly in conjunction with technology

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and natural sciences), or does it, conversely, indeed make an essential contribution to restraining societal violence? Ultimately, this volume’s substantive and paradigm-analytical discussion of the twentieth century’s most important sociological, economic and political science approaches to researching and explaining war and military force cannot avoid the question of the contribution and critical capacity of these theories. In the final analysis, the discussion goes even further. How is it possible to think about war and military force in a scientific way that is itself not predicated on experience of war? Is it indeed possible to think about these matters in a way that has not already taken the side of war and violence before it criticizes them from an allegedly neutral position? This volume constitutes an attempt to search for evidence in this direction. It comprehensively illuminates the traditional social science approaches and theorems, i.e., it enters into a dialogue with established thought, but simultaneously attempts not to exhaust itself in mere reconstruction. In addition to identifying deficits and shortcomings in the established theories, the main aim is, above all, to develop a new ‘phenomenological’ understanding of the relationship between society, politics, economics and war, military violence and the organized collective use of force. In this respect, I will try to complement twentieth century social science theories with a more phenomenological view, which will be based (to a large extent) on thoughts of French philosopher Emmanuel Lévinas. In the final analysis, I will also raise the question of the potential for and conditions of social science theory building beyond war and military force. Franz Kernic

References Albrow, Martin (1997): The Global Age. State and Society Beyond Modernity. Stanford: Stanford University Press. Art, Robert J./Waltz, Kenneth N. (Eds.) (2015): The Use of Force. International Politics and Foreign Policy. 8th edition. Lanham: Rowman & Littlefield Publishers. Baier, Horst (1985): Vom bewaffneten zum ewigen Frieden? Die Zähmung der Gewalt als Thema der Sozialphilosophie und Soziologie. Konstanz: Universitätsverlag Konstanz. Bauman, Zygmunt (1997): Postmodernity and Its Discontents. New York: New York University Press. Beck, Ulrich (1992): Risk Society. Towards a New Modernity. London: Sage. Brown, Seyon (1992): International Relations in a Changing Global System. Toward a Theory of the World Polity. 2nd edition. New York: Routledge.

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Elias, Norbert (2000): The Civilizing Process. Sociogenetic and Psychogenetic Investigations. Rev. edition, edited by Eric Dunning et. al. Malden: Blackwell. Forsythe, David P. (1992): Democracy, War, and Covert Action. In: Journal of Peace Research, vol. 29, no. 4, 385–395. Giddens, Anthony (1990): The Consequences of Modernity. Cambridge: Polity Press. Greenwood, Christopher (1993): Is there a right of Humanitarian Intervention? In: The World Today, vol. 49, no. 2, 34–40. Joas, Hans (2003): War and Modernity. Cambridge: Polity Press. Joas, Hans/Knöbl, Wolfgang (2013): War in Social Thought: Hobbes to the Present. Translated by Alex Skinner. Princton: Princton University Press. Joas, Hans/Steiner, Helmut (Eds.) (1989): Machtpolitischer Realismus und pazifistische Utopie. Krieg und Frieden in der Geschichte der Sozialwissenschaften. Frankfurt/Main: Suhrkamp. Hüppauf, Bernd-Rüdiger (Ed.) (1997): War, Violence and Modern Condition. Berlin: W. de Gruyter. Kaldor, Mary (2007): New and Old Wars: Organised Violence in a Global Era. 2nd edition. Stanford: Stanford University Press. Knöbl, Wolfgang/Schmidt, Gunnar (2000): Die Gegenwart des Krieges: Staatliche Gewalt in der Moderne. Frankfurt am Main: Fischer-Taschenbuch-Verlag. Lawrence, Philip K. (1997): Modernity and War: The Creed of Absolute Violence. Houndsmills-London: Macmillan. Maleševi´c, Siniša (2010): The Sociology of War and Violence. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Shaw, Martin (2003): War and Genocide. Organized Killing in Modern Society. Cambridge: Polity Press. Tiryakian, Edward A. (1999): War: The Covered Side of Modernity. In: International Sociology, vol. 14, no. 4, 473–489.

Acknowledgment

This volume is largely a translation of my book Sozialwissenschaften und Militär: Eine kritische Analyse (Wiesbaden: Deutscher Universitätsverlag, 2003). For the English edition, the original text has been revised, modified and extended. Quotes from English-language literature and from available translations into English were used wherever possible; all other translations of German texts referred to in quotations have been made by me. I would like to thank the following institutions for their support of my research and book project: Swiss Military Academy at ETH Zurich, Center for Military History and Social Sciences of the German Bundeswehr, Arbeitskreis Militär & Sozialwissenschaften, and Swedish Defence University. Zurich May 2022

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Contents

1 Social Sciences and the Military: Preliminary Remarks . . . . . . . . . . . 1.1 Theoretical Aspects . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1.2 Military Sociology and the Study of the Military . . . . . . . . . . . . . References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2 Modern Society and the Military: Early Sociological Approaches . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2.1 Industrialization and Modernity: Changes in the Military Institution and its Role in Modern Society . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2.2 The Classical Social Science Incompatibility Theorem (Comte, Spencer and Tocqueville) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2.3 Max Weber: Military Discipline, Rationality and Domination . . . References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3 Political Economy and Military Organization . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3.1 Class Structure and Military Power: From Marx and Engels to Lenin . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3.2 Capitalism, Militarism, the Nation State and War—Selected Neo-Marxist Explanations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3.3 Economic Theory and Military Thinking . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4 Democracy and the Military—Updating the Incompatibility Theorem . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4.1 The New School of the Incompatibility Theorem . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4.2 Social Science Critique of the New Incompatibility Theorem . . . 4.3 Changing Values and Military Organization . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

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4.4 Political System and Military and Defense Structures . . . . . . . . . . 4.5 Democracy and the Military . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5 The Issue of Acceptance and Legitimacy of Modern Armed Forces . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5.1 Acceptance of the Military and Security Policy . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5.2 The Need for the Military to Justify Itself in Modern Democratic Societies . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5.3 Toward a Renaissance of the Military? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

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6 The Concept of Modern ‘Rational’ Security Policy . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 6.1 The Theory of Deterrence as a Rational Concept of Security Policy? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 6.2 The Rationality of Security Policy as an Antidote to the Irrationality of Violence? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 6.3 The Military and the Paradox of Security . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 6.4 At the End of the Distance to the Other: The Omnipresence and Logic of Military Violence . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

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7 War, Peace and Military Violence: A Phenomenological Inquiry . . . 7.1 Egology, Totality and the Evidence of War . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 7.2 The Phenomenon of War . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 7.3 War and Being . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 7.4 Responsibility and the Foundation of Peace . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

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8 Rethinking Politics and Social Science Beyond the War Paradigm: A Sketch . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

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Social Sciences and the Military: Preliminary Remarks

The central aim of this comprehensive analysis of the various social science approaches to explaining and interpreting war, peace and the military is to trace and reconstruct those basic assumptions constructed and ‘thought processes’ undertaken by modern social sciences in their research and conceptualization of military violence and the use of force. In addition to such reconstruction, the aim is also to enquire into the preconditions of such thought. In this undertaking, a critical distance must be maintained to these sciences to avoid adopting precisely that constructed (neutral) observer position from which modern social and economic sciences (in particular empirical social research, economics and statistics) proceed to capture their subject matter (Warburg 2015). This study therefore eschews the development of an explicit ‘strategy’ (in the sense of a research strategy), but instead is much more concerned with thinking about its subject matter by means of re-thinking and reflecting upon different theoretical approaches and problems. Some authors (Campbell 1992; Buzan and Herring 1998; Der Derian and Shapiro 1989; Calhoun 1994; Campbell and Dillon 1993: 48–72) therefore suggest replacing the ‘explanatory approach’ of the conventional social sciences with an ‘interpretative approach’. According to Campbell, it is ‘interpretivism’, which “acknowledges the improbability of cataloging, calculating, and specifying the real causes, and concerns itself instead with considering the manifest political consequences of adopting one mode of representation over another” (Campbell 1992: 4). During the discussion, it will also be necessary to enquire whether military violence has already been internalized in the structure and methods of modern social sciences before they even proceed—from an allegedly neutral position—to an analysis of their subject, the military institution and the use of military force. Thus, the following key questions will frame the subsequent analysis: Is it permissible to talk about a ‘parallelism’ of military, politics and science, and © The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Fachmedien Wiesbaden GmbH, part of Springer Nature 2023 F. Kernic, War, Peace and the Military, Militär und Sozialwissenschaften/ The Military and Social Research 56, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-658-40521-2_1

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of a representation of the military in society, politics and science? Are not the forms of organization, relational structures and methods originally formed in the military reflected almost identically in the political and scientific spheres? Does military violence perhaps reproduce itself in other social areas that were originally non-military? Should one not instead talk about a complex dynamic process of mutual construction and ‘mimetic reproduction’ (Girard 1996, 2010; Palaver 2013; Fleming 2004) of military violence in the most varied spheres of society?

1.1

Theoretical Aspects

These questions undoubtedly go beyond the scope of a strict separation of subject and object regarding a perception of the military as a subject, upon which modern (natural and social) sciences are based. Starting from a reconstruction (in line with ‘[social] constructivism’, or Setzungsanalyse according to Ernst 1993, 1996) of the scientific process of knowledge, they ultimately lead to a comprehensive ‘critique of science’. In this respect, this study differs decisively from all traditional social science approaches that claim to have discovered the ‘objective truth’ in respect of the military by means of a specific strategy and method (Myrdal 1969; Natter et al. 1995). On the contrary, it allows the structure of these scientific approaches themselves to become the problem. This is the case especially there where modern social sciences take as their point of departure a ‘battle of theories’ (or a ‘contest of the faculties’ in a Kantian view), a competition of the different theoretical and conceptual approaches that would permit (in Karl Popper’s terms) the best and most efficient explanatory models to prevail (Popper 1959; Bunge 1964). Besides the problems of epistemology and scientific theory, another issue is of crucial importance for this investigation. Because of their dominant scientific paradigms and approaches, which ascribe a predominant position to causality (Gordon 1991; Outhwaite 1987), modern social sciences generally tend to see social and political relations as ‘products’ of human activity (i.e., results of human behavior) or perhaps as the specific outcome of ‘autopoietic systems’ (Luhmann 1996). According to Talcott Parson (Parson 1964), for example, all social behavior is basically human behavior and thus must be understood by reference to individual motivation in specific situations. The conditions and structures of political and social reality from which human beings proceed appear to them no longer as the God-given or natural orders (as assumed in primitive thought), but as ‘constructions’ or social ‘systems’ (Luhmann 1996; Kuhn 1974). What exists, thus, depends upon human beings or the system (which is itself co-constructed

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by humans). Political order and military violence thus appear as social realities formed through the social activities of people. This approach emancipates the social reality, in which people find themselves, from a transcendental and universal system of order (in the way that, for example, medieval theology’s notions of ‘representation’ governed scientific thought). However, this in no way means that it automatically leads to an individualism that makes human action autonomous. On the contrary, modern social sciences lend themselves more to the idea of a different form of determination of social reality, namely, as an expression of structure (structuralism) or of the system (system theory). In this way, societal and social action is incorporated into a new totality: that of the system. Institutions and organizations—political and military institutions—in this way become ‘system performances’, i.e., achievements of the system. The use of military force then appears as structurally predetermined or as system immanent. The immediate practical consequence of this modern social science approach is obvious: Achievements of the system cannot be subjected to a radical critique of scientific thought because the latter itself remains within a ‘systemic logic’, i.e., plays the role of a so-called second-order observer. Institutions, organizations, structures, processes and purposes move to the center of scientific observation and analysis, whilst the underlying assumptions and the paradigms underpinning this thought are simultaneously overlooked (Luhmann 1991; in addition, compare: Halliday 1991: 57–72; Skinner 1990). The system itself becomes the natural object of a goal-oriented ‘thought process’, i.e., the new framework of scientific discourse. This combines system theory or structuralism with positivism (Bourdieu 1995: 31–45). In this study, military organization as a structurally determined or systemdetermined given of social reality is predicated neither upon transcendental order nor on a specific form of thought (idea), but solely upon the ‘structure of society’ expressed by the reality of interpersonal relations. This social structure manifests itself in the internal structure of its organizations, be it in politics, the church, science or the military. Whilst these organizations might be regarded as unplanned, they are ultimately always the result of the system’s compelling need (systemic necessity). This reasoning always performs an important legitimating function, i.e., it serves as an important ‘legitimation strategy’, and always provides an explanation for why matters are as they are and not otherwise. In this connection, numerous modern social science disciplines, from the modern anthropology of Max Scheler or Arnold Gehlen to the system theory of Niklas Luhmann, speak of the necessity to reduce or process the superfluous in social reality. Institutions then guarantee this reduction or processing; they become

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‘exoneration’ authorities (Entlastungsinstanzen) of societal practice, capable of compensating for the over-determination on the part of the structures by initiating formal regulative processes and mechanisms and by reducing complexity, which at the same time can provide orientation to the individual. The complexity of the structures is then balanced by the simplicity of the processes and rules by means of which the totality of institutions guides human relations. Interestingly, military logic and military thinking reduce complexity to just one simple dichotomy, i.e., the binary code of us/them or friend/enemy, which is supposed to guide human action in a military/war context. The research activity of modern science must itself be defined as a component part of specific social practice: science thus itself becomes a ‘social system’ (Storer 1966). This then also determines the actual task or function of the scientific system or in other words the societal ‘sub-system’ science (Luhmann 1996). In the long term, the only thing that counts is societal utility. In other words, sciences are also about fulfilling a system-determined function however that might be defined (Krysmanski 1972).

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Military Sociology and the Study of the Military

It is now necessary to take a closer look at the development and self-image of those social science disciplines that have applied themselves to issues regarding the relationship between society and the military, or to the analysis of military force (Caforio 2007; Caforio and Nuciari 2018; Kümmel and Prüfert 2000; Segal et al. 2011; Gareis and Klein 2006). This includes modern military sociology and peace and conflict studies. Immediately obvious is that in post-1945 Western Europe social sciences have clearly abstained from a comprehensive theoretical and empirical analysis of the military (Klein and Lippert 1979; Klein et al. 1997). In his appraisal of the military-related sciences in the Federal Republic of Germany in the mid-1970s, Detlef Bald argued that the narrow technocratic focusing of social sciences on industrial sociological and psychological aspects has led to an almost complete loss of broader theoretical and societal issues in the field of military studies (Bald 1976). However, his observation characterizes not only the development in the German-speaking world, but it is also indeed a fitting description of the situation of all post-war Western military sociology (compare the different country studies in Kümmel and Prüfert 2000; Kümmel et al. 2009). In view of the direct and total exposure to military force during World War II and considering the threat of an East-West military conflict on the continent, the development of European

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military sociology after 1945 must be seen in the context of a relatively strong societal rejection of all things related to the military institution. In contrast to Europe, a flurry of social science research activity developed in the United States with respect to the military (Stouffer et al. 1949a, b; Merton and Lazersfeld 1950; Boene 2000; Ryan 2013; Callaghan and Kernic 2004). Yet, the roots of social science discussion of civil-military relations go back much further. As early as the nineteenth century, there was intense social science reflection upon the military predicated upon comprehensive social theory approaches (Lorenz von Stein, August Comte, Herbert Spencer, Max Weber etc.). The analyses of early sociology also mark an initial radical change of modern scientific perspective regarding society, politics and the military. These explanatory approaches exhibit a break with the tradition of modern political ‘state-philosophy’ (Staatsphilsosophie). The change in how war and the military were addressed during the nineteenth century genesis of modern sociology can be seen as an expression of real social, economic and political processes of transformation related to Europe’s advancing industrialization. As part of this process, the function of the military underwent a significant change in the twentieth century, particularly after World War II, and gradually lost its traditional material justification, i.e., warfare (Kümmel 2005). In conjunction with this, the military of the post-World War II era was assigned a new main task: defense, i.e., primarily the task of preserving the existing political order. In this way, the military was for the first time not an instrument of the state to be used to realize external power and legal claims, but an instrument to preserve the established political and economic order. At the same time, questions regarding strategy began to dominate external relations. Ideas of political stability, balance and hegemony thus acquired importance as the predominant concepts of modern security and defense policy. Since then, greater consideration has been given in defensive matters to crisis prevention strategies (up to and including nuclear deterrence), with technology increasingly gaining importance in the military sphere (Buzan and Herring 1998; Gilpin 1981). Thus, the traditional view was abandoned, according to which the conduct of war constituted the real task of the military, i.e., military force should be conceived primarily as the externally oriented power of the state. Of course, all these developments are reflected in modern social science attempts to define the military. According to Chorley (1943), the military must perform two tasks: guaranteeing freedom and supporting a conservative system. Chorley’s work even shows the virtual exclusion of the war function of the military, which is in a way characteristic of modern social sciences. War itself increasingly becomes merely one of several conflict mechanisms that in principle only differs from other forms

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Social Sciences and the Military: Preliminary Remarks

by virtue of its higher intensity of physical force. Given the general contempt in which war has been held since 1945, the traditional function of military force (conducting wars) becomes an ‘emergency function’, i.e., something limited to extremes of societal constellations (ultima ratio) that should in principle never arise. Since the end of World War II, the concept of ‘defense’ has increasingly replaced that of war. The concepts of security and defense policy have started to replace that of military policy (Buzan et al. 1998; Cha 2000; Croft and Terriff 2012). However, this development is also related to the fact that in times of peace the military is not confronted with its organizational goal, namely the conduct of war. This necessarily leads to an excessive bureaucratization as a ‘displacement activity’, the function of which, as René König (1968) showed, essentially comprises making people forget that in times of peace the military as an organization practically has no function. As a result, peace-time military institutions increasingly tend to emphasize ‘para-functions’ of symbolic nature (ibid. 12). This observation also opens the view that the modern manifestations of military violence and military force are multi-faceted and changing and are no longer focused exclusively on the conduct of war (warfare). In modern societies, military power is undoubtedly institutionalized, i.e., within a societal system it is constituted as an institution, as a social unit. As an institution of this type it formally belongs to politics, which is reflected not only in the traditional concept of military policy, but also in those of security and defense policy. In general terms, it is characterized as a large-scale organized group that is simultaneously an instrument of power and dominance. At the same time, the monopolization of the use of armed force guarantees the positive “chance of a man or a number of men to realize their own will in a social action even against the resistance of others who are participating in the action” (Weber 1980: 28). Modern sociology by no means neglects the social function, which the military has always assumed in respect of societal power relations (Leonhard and Werkner 2005; Bahrdt 1987). It sees the various functions and manifestations of military force to lie in the reciprocal relationship between the political and social structure, i.e., the organizational form and functions of military power are for modern sociology dependent upon the social structure of society and the specific construction of the political system and the power relations within the latter. The traditional main task of conducting war thus appears in a completely different light. Modern social sciences regard the military primarily as a social institution specializing in the organized ‘application of force’ between warring parties (Roghmann and Ziegler 1977: 142). War is merely an organizational goal (Soeters et al. 2010) and as such has often remained an object of research outside

1.2 Military Sociology and the Study of the Military

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the actual discipline of (military) sociology. Early sociology even regarded war as a dying factor of modern societies. By concentrating its sights upon the military as a social institution, military sociology has since the middle of the twentieth century developed into an independent sub-discipline of sociology (Callaghan and Kernic 2004; Shields 2020), which can no longer be regarded only as a new attempt to establish a form of applied ‘military science’ or technology of war. Since then, the horizon of social science theory building regarding the location of military power within a comprehensive societal theory has been framed by two large economic-inspired theoretical approaches. The first is the early bourgeois critique of war and the military (Comte, Spencer and Schumpeter), which formulated the ‘theory of incompatibility’ of industrial society and military force. This theory is also linked to the notion of a ‘pacifist capitalism’, by means of which the peaceful conquest of world markets would be undertaken by means of international trade relations taking precedence over any application of force. The second approach encompasses theories of ‘military capitalism’, which proceed from the notion of a co-existence and inter-relationship between war, military, armaments and highly-developed industrial states. These theories conceive of interplay between war and industry, in which the one profits from the other (Mann 1992). For approximately a century, these two positions have characterized the basic relations between armed forces and modern academia. In some areas (predominantly in the technical and natural science disciplines), it is possible to demonstrate a close cooperation between science and the military, whilst in others (primarily the so-called ‘critical’ disciplines such as modern sociology or political science) there is often a considerable polarization. The often very different value orientations of military personnel and sociologists or political scientists certainly play a significant role in the general pattern of relations between military organization and social sciences. It is above all the consistent criticism of sociologists vis-à-vis existing social structures that confronts strong resentment on the part of the predominantly conservative officers, who are strongly committed to maintaining the existing political order (Elbe 2006; Caforio 2003; Klein et al. 1993). By contrast, there is within the modern social sciences, at least in part, a clear dislike of war and military violence. By some, even the mere sociological research of the military is already regarded (and denounced) as an approval of war and as a contribution to enhancing military efficiency. In another respect, however, the field of military sociology did indeed develop into a remarkable (although problematic) area of investigation (or more accurately: experimental ground) of modern social science research. The point

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Social Sciences and the Military: Preliminary Remarks

of departure was where everyday military routine was regarded as a highlycontrolled, quasi-experimental field situation, which provides extremely good information about social behavior in situations, which are otherwise only rarely observed (Roghmann and Ziegler 1977: 144). To the present day, this research approach takes the view that military social science is in this way able to make important contributions to social science theory building. Various modern research institutions within the armed forces with a highly empirical and experimental orientation precisely follow this thought (Soeters et al. 2014). The genesis, methods and epistemological basis of modern (internal) military psychology or ‘applied’ army psychology and of the so-called ‘applied military sciences’ (frequently commissioned military sociological research) should some time be examined more closely, especially from this perspective (Geppert 2000). The close links between military practice and preparations for war and social science teaching and research (also at the level of theory-building itself) thus require detached and critical scrutiny. Since the end of World War II, modern military sociology has swung between two focuses: Firstly, toward applied industrial sociology, which elaborates the conditions under which military efficiency can be maximized. Secondly, a sociology of organizations that explores the specific characteristics of military organizations compared to those of other organizations (Klein and Prüfert 1998; Klein et al. 1998; Kümmel and Prüfert 2000). In both cases, however, military sociology pays a high price for it, which René König (1968: 12) described as the loss of its cultural and socio-anthropological prerequisites. Therefore, König himself called upon military sociology to focus on the military’s links once again with all areas of society. According to him, the key issues of military organization and military force can only be satisfactorily addressed when they are placed within the context of a general cultural and socio-anthropological analysis of war and its forms in advanced industrial societies as well as in the economically underdeveloped societies of our world (ibid.). The real problem facing military sociology as a kind of ‘hyphenated’ sociology (frequently conceived merely for internal military use) can be easily outlined. An organization theory-based approach essentially views the dynamics of military force as nothing more than the growth of a social organization resulting from social interaction and which immediately develops where a collective effort is explicitly organized for specific ends (Argyle 1969: 271). The sociological or organization theoretical analysis concentrates almost exclusively on elements of this social interaction, i.e., questions concerning hierarchical structure, the division of labor or specific rules (ibid.; in addition, see: Huczynski and Buchanan 1991; Fincham and Rhodes 1988; Hall 1991; Handy 1985). A more far-reaching

References

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critical conceptualization of military force is alien to it. In this way, military force becomes solely a factor of social action, which can be adequately described in terms of the structure, method, organization, purpose, hierarchy, and calculation (Soeters et al. 2014). In contrast, the interdisciplinary approach of modern peace and conflict studies has for years been trying to break through the narrow theoretical framework of this type of social science and the sociology of the military (Grundmann and Hummel 1998; Krippendorff 1973). Some newer approaches strive for a comprehensive social science ‘critique’ of the military (Krippendorff 1993; Kernic 2003). Even today, many attempts at a critique of the military either rapidly lead to an emotional—frequently moralizing—debate of questions of war and peace or to a discussion of alternative concepts and war prevention strategies. The problem of military force is either likely to be ignored or reduced to organizationtheoretical or functional aspects. In the 1990s, innovative intellectual impulses therefore tended to come from other fields such as gender studies or feminist theory. From there it was possible to break down modern social science theory’s narrow horizons of explanation and interpretation. Taking gender differences as a starting point, questions of war, politics and military force appeared in a completely different light and the totality of the traditional approach simultaneously became visible (Eifler and Seifert 1999; Seifert 1996; Lennon and Whitford 1994; Reinharz 1992; Grant and Newland 1991). For this undertaking, which should essentially be viewed as a phenomenological ‘search for evidence’ and social science reflection, it is not important to reconstruct all the individual social science approaches to the military and war in minute detail with a view to developing a state-of-the-art organizational or system theory of the military institution. In fact, this analysis sets out only to highlight firstly the developments and approaches of those comprehensive theories, which in social sciences play an important role in explaining social processes within the context of the military and war. Secondly, its goal is to examine the role of twentieth century social science research with respect to the academic and public discussions of key issues pertaining to the relationship between society, politics and the military.

References Argyle, Michael (1969): Social lnteraction. London: Methuen young books. Bald, Detlef (1976): Militär und Gesellschaft als Gegenstand der Forschung. In: Wehrwissenschaftliche Rundschau (WWR), no. 5, 154–161.

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Bahrdt, Hans P. (1987): Die Gesellschaft und ihre Soldaten. Zur Soziologie des Militärs. München: C.H. Beck. Boene, Bernard (2000): Social Science Research, War and the Military in the United States. An Outsider’s View of the Field’s Dominant National Tradition. In: Kümmel, Gerhard/Prüfert Andreas D. (Eds.): Military Sociology: The Richness of a Discipline. BadenBaden: Nomos, 149–254. Bourdieu, Pierre (1995): Structures, Habitus, Practices. In: Faubion, James D. (Ed.): Rethinking the Subject. An Anthology of Contemporary European Social Thought. Boulder: Routledge. Bunge, Mario (Ed.) (1964): The Critical Approach to Science and Philosophy. London: Taylor & Francis Inc. Buzan, Barry/Herring, Eric (1998): The Arms Dynamic in World Politics. Boulder: Lynne Rienner Publishers. Buzan, Barry/Wæver, Ole/Wilde, Jaap de (1998): Security. A New Framework for Analysis. Boulder: Lynne Rienner Publishers. Caforio, Giuseppe (2003): Military Officer Education. In: Caforio, Giuseppe (Ed.): Handbook of the Sociology of the Military. New York: Springer, 255–278. Caforio, Giuseppe (Ed.) (2007): Social Sciences and the Military. An Interdisciplinary Overview. London: Routledge. Caforio, Giuseppe/Nuciari, Marina (Eds.) (2018): Handbook of the Sociology of the Military. Cham: Springer International Publishing. Calhoun, Craig (Ed.) (1994): Social Theory and the Politics of Identity. Oxford: WileyBlackwell. Callaghan, Jean/Kernic, Franz (Eds.) (2004): Armed Forces and International Security. Global Trends and Issues. Münster-Hamburg-Berlin-Wien-London: Lit. Campbell, David (1992): Writing Security. United States Foreign Policy and the Politics of Identity. Manchester: University of Minnesota Press. Campbell, David/Dillon, Michael (Eds.) (1993): The Political Subject of Violence. Manchester-New York: Manchester University Press. Cha, Victor D. (2000): Globalization and the Study of International Security. In: Journal of Peace Research, vol. 37, no. 3, 391–403. Chorley, Katharine (1943): Armies and the Art of Revolution. London: Faber and Faber. Croft, Stuart/Terriff, Terry (Eds.) (2012): Critical Reflections on Security and Change, London: Routledge. Der Derian, James/Shapiro, Michael (1989): International/intertextual Relations. Postmodern Readings of World Politics. Lexington: Lexington Books. Eifler, Christine/Seifert, Ruth (Eds.) (1999): Soziale Konstruktionen – Militär und Geschlechterverhältnis. Münster: Westfälisches Dampfboot. Elbe, Martin (2006): Der Offizier – Ethos, Habitus, Berufsverständnis. In: Gareis, Sven B./Klein, Paul (Eds.) (2006): Handbuch Militär und Sozialwissenschaft. 2., aktualisierte und erweiterte Auflage. Wiesbaden: VS Verlag für Sozialwissenschaften, 459–472. Ernst, Werner W. (1993): Zu einer Phänomenologie von ‘Fest’-Setzung und ‘Gegen’-Stand. In: Reinalter, Helmut (Ed.): Vernetztes Denken – Gemeinsames Handeln. Interdisziplinarität in Theorie und Praxis (Band 1 – Interdisziplinäre Forschungen). Thaur-WienMünchen: Österreichischer Kultur-Verlag.

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Ernst, Werner W. (1996): Metapsychologie und ‘egologisches Subjekt’. In: Werlhof, Claudia von/Schweighofer, Annemarie/Ernst, Werner W. (Eds.): Herren-Los. HerrschaftErkenntnis-Lebensform. Frankfurt-Berlin-Bern-New York-Paris-Wien: Peter Lang. Fincham, Robert/Rhodes, Peter S. (1988): The Individual, Work and Organization. Behavioural Studies for Business and Management Students. London: Oxford University Press. Fleming, Chris (2004): René Girard. Violence and Mimesis. Cambridge: Polity Press. Gareis, Sven B./Klein, Paul (Eds.) (2006): Handbuch Militär und Sozialwissenschaft. 2., aktualisierte und erweiterte Auflage. Wiesbaden: VS Verlag für Sozialwissenschaften. Geppert, Heinrich (2000): Commissioned Military Sociological Research: The Military’s Point of View. In: Kümmel, Gerhard/Prüfert, Andreas D. (Eds.): Military Sociology: The Richness of a Discipline. Baden-Baden: Nomos, 55–67. Gilpin, Robert (1981): War and Change in World Politics. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Girard, René (1996): The Girard Reader. Edited by James G. Williams. New York: Crossroad. Girard, René (2010): Battling to the End. Conversations with Benoît Chantre. East Lansing: Michigan State University Press. Gordon, Scott (1991): The History and Philosophy of Social Science. London: Routledge. Grant, Rebecca/Newland, Kathleen (Eds.) (1991): Gender and International Relations. Milton Keynes: Indiana University Press. Grundmann, Martin/Hummel, Hartwig (Eds.) (1998): Militär und Politik – Ende der Eindeutigkeiten? Zum Wandel institutionalisierter Gewalt. Baden-Baden: Nomos. Hall, Richard H. (1991): Organizations. Structures, Processes, and Outcomes. 5th edition. Englewood Cliffs: Routledge. Halliday, Fred (1991): International Relations: Is There A New Agenda? In: Millennium. Journal of International Studies, vol. 20, no. 1. Handy, Charles B. (1985): Understanding Organizations. 3rd edition. London: Oxford University Press. Huczynski, Andrzej A./Buchanan, David A (1991): Organizational Behaviour. An Introductory Text. 2nd edition. NewYork: Prentice Hall. Kernic, Franz (2003): Kritik der militärischen Gewalt. Eine gesellschaftstheoretische Analyse zum Verhältnis von Politik, Staat und organisierter kollektiver Gewaltanwendung. Frankfurt/Main: Peter Lang. Klein, Paul/Kuhlmann, Jürgen/Rohde, Horst (Eds.) (1993): Soldat – ein Berufsbild im Wandel. Band 2: Offiziere. Bonn: Bundeswehr-Verlag. Klein, Paul/Kriesel, Werner/Lippert, Ekkehard (1997): Militär und Gesellschaft. Bibliographie zur Militärsoziologie 1979–1997. Strausberg: Sozialwissenschaftliches Institut der Bundeswehr (SOWI) – Berichte, no. 66. Klein, Paul/Lippert, Ekkehard (1979): Militär und Gesellschaft. Bibliographie zur Militärsoziologie. München: Bernard und Graefe. Klein, Paul/Prüfert, Andreas (Eds.) (1998): Militär und Wissenschaft in Europa – Kritische Distanz oder hilfreiche Ergänzung? 25 Jahre Arbeitskreis Militär und Sozialwissenschaften. Baden-Baden: Nomos.

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Klein, Paul/Prüfert, Andreas/Wachtler, Günther (Eds.) (1998): Das Militär im Mittelpunkt sozialwissenschaftlicher Forschung. Beiträge und Bibliographie. Das Werk von Ekkehard Lippert. Baden-Baden: Nomos. König, René (Ed.) (1968): Beitrage zur Militärsoziologie. In: Kölner Zeitschrift für Soziologie und Sozialpsychologie, Sonderheft 12. Krippendorff, Ekkehart (1993): Militärkritik. Frankfurt/Main: Suhrkamp. Krippendorff, Ekkehart (Ed.) (1973): Internationale Beziehungen. Köln: Kiepenheuer und Witsch. Krysmanski, Hans J. (1972): Soziales System und Wissenschaft. Zur Frage wissenschaftlichen ‘Außenseitertums’. 2nd edition. Düsseldorf: Bertelsmann. Kuhn, Alfred (1974): The Logic of Social Systems. A Unified, Deductive, System-Based Approach to Social Science. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass Publishers. Kümmel, Gerhard (2005): Auftrag und Aufgaben des Militärs im Wandel. In: Leonhard, Nina/Werkner, Ines-Jacqueline (Eds.): Militärsoziologie – Eine Einführung. Wiesbaden: VS Verlag für Sozialwissenschaften, 50–67. Kümmel, Gerhard/Prüfert, Andreas D. (Eds.) (2000): Military Sociology: The Richness of a Discipline. Baden-Baden: Nomos. Kümmel, Gerhard/Caforio, Giuseppe/Dandeker, Christopher (Eds.) (2009): Armed Forces, Soldiers and Civil-Military Relations: Essays in Honor of Jürgen Kuhlmann. Wiesbaden: VS Verlag für Sozialwissenschaften. Lennon, Kathleen/Whitford, Margaret (Eds.) (1994): Knowing the Difference. Feminist Perspectives in Epistemology. London-New York: Routledge. Leonhard, Nina/Werkner, Ines-Jacqueline (Eds.) (2005): Militärsoziologie – Eine Einführung. Wiesbaden: VS Verlag für Sozialwissenschaften. Luhmann, Niklas (1991): Zweckbegriff und Systemrationalität. Über die Funktion von Zwecken in sozialen Systemen. 5th edition. Frankfurt/Main: Suhrkamp. Luhmann, Niklas (1996): Social Systems. Translated by John Bednarz, Jr. with Dirk Baecker. Stanford: Stanford University Press. Mann, Michael (1992): States, War and Capitalism. Studies in Political Sociology. Oxford: Blackwell. Merton, Robert K./Lazersfeld, Paul F. (Eds.) (1950): Continuities in Social Research: Studies in the Scope and Method of ‘The American Soldier’. Glencoe, IL: Free Press. Myrdal, Gunnar (1969): Objectivity in Social Research. New York: Pantheon Books. Natter, Wolfgang/Schatzki, Theodore R./Jones, John Paul (Eds.) (1995): Objectivity and Its Other. New York-London: The Guilford Press. Outhwaite, William (1987): New Philosophies of Social Science: Realism, Hermeneutics and Critical Theory. Basingstoke: Macmillan Education. Palaver, Wolfgang (2013): René Girard’s Mimetic Theory. East Lansing: Michigan State University Press. Parson, Talcott (1964): Essays in Sociological Theory. Glencoe, IL: The Free Press. Popper, Karl (1959): The Logic of Scientific Discovery. Abingdon-on-Thames: Routledge. Reinharz, Shulamit (1992): Feminist Methods in Social Research. New York: Oxford University Press. Roghmann, Klaus/Ziegler, Rolf (1977): Militärsoziologie. In: König, René (Ed.): Handbuch der empirischen Sozialforschung, vol. 9. 2nd edition. Stuttgart: Deutscher Taschenbuch Verlag.

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Ryan, Joseph W. (2013): Samuel Stouffer and the GI Survey: Sociologists and Soldiers during the Second World War, Knoxville, TN: University of Tennessee Press. Segal, David R. et al. (Eds.) (2011): Military Sociology. London: Sage. Seifert, Ruth (1996): Militär, Kultur, Identität. Individualisierung, Geschlechterverhältnisse und die soziale Konstruktion des Soldaten. Bremen: Edition Temmen. Shields, Patricia M. (2020): Dynamic Intersection of Military and Society. In: Handbook of Military Sciences. Cham: Springer. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-02866-4_31-1. Skinner, Quentin (Ed.) (1990): The Return of Grand Theory in the Human Sciences. Cambridge-New York: Cambrdige University Press. Soeters, Joseph/Fenema, Paul van/Beeres, Robert (Eds.) (2010): Managing Military Organizations: Theory and Practice. London and New York: Routledge. Soeters, Joseph/Shields, Patricia M./Rietjens, Sebastiaan (Eds.) (2014): Routledge Handbook of Research Methods in Military Studies. New York: Routledge. Stouffer, Samuel A. et al. (1949a): Studies in Social Psychology in World War II: ‘The American Soldier’; Vol. 1: Adjustment during Army Life. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press. Stouffer, Samuel A. et al. (1949b): Studies in Social Psychology in World War II: ‘The American Soldier’; Vol. 2: Combat and Its Aftermath. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press. Storer, Norman W. (1966): The Social System of Science. New York: Holt, Rinehart & Winston. Warburg, Jens (2015): Das Militär und seine Subjekte. Zur Soziologie des Krieges. Bielefeld: transcript. Weber, Max (1980): Wirtschaft und Gesellschaft. 5th and revised edition (Studienausgabe). Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck.

2

Modern Society and the Military: Early Sociological Approaches

The roots of social science theory building concerning the relationship between politics, society and the military can be traced back to the beginnings of modern sociology in the late nineteenth century. The study of the military institution and of civil-military relations by the evolving social sciences differed significantly from all earlier historical attempts to establish a separate ‘military science’ (or theory of war), which had primarily been regarded as a technology of war or as teaching and research to efficiently prepare the armed forces for war and the use of force. In terms of the basic concept, modern sociology brought a critical approach to the military (as an institution of both state and society) and to war (as a field of both state policy and social action). From their inception, social sciences focus mainly upon the relationship between society and the military, with the military usually being perceived as an element of society (or as a sub-system of the social system), which assumes specific historical-social organizational forms and fulfils certain societal functions (Joas and Knöbl 2013). The theories of August Comte, Herbert Spencer and Max Weber in particular are worth looking at in greater detail as they provide examples of how the relationship between the military and society was conceptualized in early sociology. This chapter will focus upon the military-oriented sociological themes and theoretical components, which generated increased scientific interest in the late nineteenth century. Three thematic areas merit particular attention as they have significantly shaped the sociological debate from the late nineteenth century until today. Firstly, the question of social change experienced by modern society as result of industrialization and the related issue of how these social changes effected the armed forces and military institutions and which role the military as an organization itself played in this process of social transformation. Secondly, the question of the social function of military power and the problem of the compatibility or incompatibility of modern military organizations (and of © The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Fachmedien Wiesbaden GmbH, part of Springer Nature 2023 F. Kernic, War, Peace and the Military, Militär und Sozialwissenschaften/ The Military and Social Research 56, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-658-40521-2_2

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war) with modern industrial society. Thirdly, the question introduced into the scientific debate, above all by Max Weber, regarding the link between modern rationalization and the proliferation of technology with the specific characteristics of military discipline. In the following sections, these three topics will be examined in detail.

2.1

Industrialization and Modernity: Changes in the Military Institution and its Role in Modern Society

Many historical studies point out that in almost all nineteenth century continental European states, the armed forces were largely separate from the constitutional and political structures of state. While the interest of the bourgeois political movement in principle approved of military power as an important pillar of the political system, its basic political orientation, at least in the first half of the nineteenth century, was still attached to a civilian, democratic way of thought and wanted little to do with a standing army (Böckenförde 1967: IX). It was only after the introduction of compulsory military service that the middle classes started to identify with the military institution and a ‘militaristic spirit’ on a widespread basis, the ultimate consequence of which was the virtual militarization of the bourgeoisie. The process of industrialization, of course, affected the military itself as well, i.e., parallel to industrial mass production and the mechanization of the production sector began the industrialization and proliferation of technology in warfare and the revolution in weapons technology (Howard 1981: 137; Brodie 1973; Parker 1996; Black 1991). From the middle of the nineteenth to the middle of the twentieth century, this transformation in weaponry proceeded at a breath-taking pace. The start of this rapid change, which occurred within a mere one hundred years, was marked by the introduction of the breech-loading rifle and proceeded with the development of machine guns, aircraft and armored vehicles, ultimately leading to the production and use of the first nuclear weapons. Toward the middle of the nineteenth century, advancing industrialization decisively changed the social importance and position of the military throughout Europe. In particular, war as a source of wealth and political power increasingly lost the social function, which had been ascribed to it for centuries. In the industrial age, the economic-material justification of war and military power mainly found in societies with natural economies lost its validity (Elias 1980: 205 f.). In addition, from an economic perspective, military power and war were cast

2.1 Industrialization and Modernity: Changes in the Military …

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in a completely new light, which questioned the extent to which they impeded, i.e., were counter-productive to societal economic and social progress (Silberner 1972; Frevert 1997). Furthermore, industrialization and the related economic, social and political processes of transformation changed the justification for military power in another completely different way. The growing autonomy of individual social groups and their greater involvement in political events (as well as the rising level of political participation by these groups) meant that the military not only opened itself to new social classes and groupings, but the application of military force henceforth required an increasingly broad social consensus. This in turn necessitated new strategies for justifying the use of military force and the armed forces as a whole, which had to be capable of upholding at least a minimum degree of social consensus. The earlier, thoroughly material-economic legitimation was, therefore, in most European nation states replaced by an exclusively ideological legitimation predicated upon the military’s function as an instrument to preserve the state. The gradual emancipation of the legitimation of military power away from a war-orientation toward a state-defense task was, however, also closely linked to the emergence of several large nation states in Europe and the dissolution of many smaller political entities (Tivey 1981). For one thing, limiting the use of military power solely to defense proved much better able to garner consensus than the previous focus upon its use for external purposes and expansion. This was particularly true about the preservation of previously acquired colonial territories, which—now that the entire ‘colonial cake’ had already been seized and divided up between the European nation states—had to be defended. Secondly, military power was in this way bound more strongly to the established political system of rule and simultaneously nationalized. In this way military power was assigned a new role within the political system in which it was not restricted to its function as an external instrument for establishing and strengthening the sovereignty of the nation state, but was assigned additional internal security and integration functions, which the traditional absolutist power structures were no longer able to fulfil (Wachtler 1983: 16 f.). This new basis for the legitimacy of military power thus became the precondition for the emergence of national mass armies at the turn of the century and in the first half of the twentieth century. The enormous consensus in society over the military’s defense orientation precisely formed the social foundation for the mobilization of mass armies and facilitated the influx and absorption of almost all social classes into the military organization. The real dilemma of this development was that the ostensibly new legitimation of military power by no means changed military power itself (which would have

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been necessary to achieve a genuine emancipation from a war-orientation). As a result, the military not only retained its enormous destructive and offensive capacities, but it was also actually able to increase them due to the increased numbers of soldiers. The greater acceptance enjoyed by the military, initially achieved by pointing to its defense-orientation, did not however lead to a limitation of military power to defensive war purposes, on the contrary it increased military power for all types of warfare, i.e., also for military aggression and an offensive war. In conjunction with the development of nation states, this process had fatal consequences at the end of the nineteenth century. The extensive similarity of socio-structural change processes exhibited in all European nation states during industrialization not only promoted the development of similar social and societal structures, but it also made it harder for the nation states to follow their own course. These economic-social conditions simultaneously created that competitive capitalism, which exhibited a clear orientation toward war and thus brought with it a new seed for military confrontations between the states. It is certainly not surprising that such a development, in conjunction with mass armies (even if their broad social basis was rooted exclusively in the recognition of the military’s defensive purpose) carried the danger of radicalization and a further expansion of war. Herein lies the root cause of the enormous scale of destruction in the two world wars of the twentieth century—a radicalization of military power and an advance from mass armies (Foerster 1994) to mass destruction, from a focus on defense to actual military attack behavior and wars of conquest, from territorial wars to world wars. The incipient industrial revolution led to social development as such, the change and transformation of society, becoming a problem. It is in these changes that the emergence of the modern social sciences is rooted, as they embraced this societal development and change with new approaches and lines of reasoning. The science of war was gradually replaced by a social science perception of the military, which viewed the use of force, military violence and all action of the armed forces as dependent upon the structure of society. Parallel to this, and with important impetus being provided by Social Darwinism, a new view of the relationship between history and war, of human nature and aggressive behavior developed (Cook 1994).

2.2 The Classical Social Science Incompatibility Theorem …

2.2

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The Classical Social Science Incompatibility Theorem (Comte, Spencer and Tocqueville)

August Comte viewed military power from the perspective of a historical model of progress in which the historic development of human society proceeded according to a law of three stages, moving from a theological-military stage to a transitional metaphysical stage and finally to the scientific or positive stage and an industrialized society (Comte 1896, 1923, 1933, 1998; Wachtler 1983: 28–37). Comte defined progress as the final abandonment of the original state of war in favor of a life of gainful employment. He posited that war had characterized the beginning of human development and was the result of man’s natural laziness and aversion to regular and sustained toil; a life of war being the only one to which man is suited and which most easily provides him with the means for his sustenance (Comte 1998; compare: Comte 1896: 43 f.). This function of war formed a prerequisite for industrial development, just as the entrepreneurial spirit was only able to develop from the military spirit. According to Comte, it was through the ‘school of war’ that the first societies learned to maintain order and establish governments. For Comte, the theological-military age was a necessary prerequisite for the development of industrial activity, but one which in its development increasingly subordinated the warrior spirit of the early period to the industrial spirit. Comte therefore ascribed to military power merely a historic function, which in modern society was not only outdated, but already alien to the system. According to Comte, the development of the sciences and industry constituted the main cause of the decline of the theological-military social system of the early period but was at the same time the guarantee that there would be no relapse into a new military-theological age. Comte attributed this to a general incompatibility of the scientific and military-theological spirit. He was thus one of the first to formulate the theory of the incompatibility of the military and industrial society. In doing so, he also attempted to point out a fundamental incompatibility of military power with the scientific spirit shaped by industry or the contemporaneous science paradigm. The idea of progress within his rigid model of history also allowed Comte to determine the direction of the future progress of modern societies (Comte 1933). After the disappearance of the final general motives for modern wars, the age of peace could dawn in which military power completely loses its function. The early signs of the introduction of general military conscription were interpreted by Comte as an innovation, which bears testimony to the peaceful disposition of modern populations (Comte 1896, 1923, 1933), “which furnish a few volunteer

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officers, but few or no volunteer privates. At the same time, it extinguishes military habits and manners, by destroying the special character of the profession, and by making the army consist of a multitude of anti-military citizens who assume the duty as a temporary burden” (Comte 1896: 249). In terms of his appraisal of the political and social function and application of military force, Comte exhibits an optimism, which from today’s perspective is completely unfounded. He evidently succumbed to a peace euphoria derived from his belief in progress, which while understandable given the intellectual selfimage and political and social yearnings of his age, has been unable to deliver the empirical proof of its correctness about the further development of modern industrial societies. Following on from August Comte it was above all Herbert Spencer who attempted to place military power within the context of a comprehensive, universal theory of the evolution of human society (Cazeneuve 1961; Aron 1958; Murray 1929; Spencer 1858, 1898, 1966; Andreski 1972). He viewed the military and war as integral components of society, the existence, social status and function of which permitted the status of a society’s entire development to be determined. Spencer too regarded the military as only a temporary phenomenon in the evolution of human societies, which at a certain point in time reach a stage in which war and the application of military force would become obsolete and consequently ousted from human cohabitation (Spencer 1898). Spencer divided social systems into two types: The militant society which comes into existence primarily for the purposes of offence and defense and secondly, the industrial society in which the sustaining organization is the most highly developed and aims to increase the productivity of industrial labor (Spencer 1898, vol. 2). Although it is not possible to draw a sharp line between these two types of society, the military type does display a comprehensively coercive character arising from the need to develop the institutions necessary for the purposes of conquest and defense. On the other hand, providing food is a necessary social function, which leads to the development of a separate organization dedicated to fulfilling this purpose. According to Spencer, the structure and development of this organization is directly related to the particular type of society. In a militant society, the system of food production is fully in the service of the military activity, while in an industrial society the organization with the dominant social position is the one whose main function is to ensure the food supply (Spencer 1898, vol. 2). It only preserves structures for offense and defense to protect this system of food supply. Spencer asserted that there is a fundamental incompatibility between these two types of society, which he believed was rooted in the fact that the organizational principles underpinning the militant society,

2.2 The Classical Social Science Incompatibility Theorem …

21

in particular centralized control, were not applicable to industrial production. In fact, industrial organization requires a change in the inner structure of the society under which the master maintains slaves to work for him/her so that there is a transition through stages of increasing freedom to a condition [...] in which all who work or employ, buy and sell, are entirely independent; and in which there is an unchecked power of forming unions that rule themselves on democratic principles. (Spencer 1898, vol. 1, chapter X, § 260) Foregoing instances make it clear that they [class-distinctions] are still maintained rigorously in societies characterized by that type of organization which continuous war establishes; and that they prevailed to considerable degrees during the past warlike times of more civilized societies. Conversely, they show that as, along with the rise of a wealth which does not imply rank, luxuries and costly modes of life have spread to those who do not form part of the regulative organization; the growth of industrialism tends to abolish these marks of class-distinction which militancy originates. No matter what form they take, all these supplementary rules debarring the inferior from usages and appliances characterizing the superior, belong to a social régime based on coercive co-operation; while that unchecked liberty which, among ourselves, the classes regulated have to imitate the regulating classes in habits and expenditure, belongs to the régime of voluntary co-operation. (Spencer 1898, vol. 2, chapter X, § 422)

It is at this point that Spencer’s belief in progress manifests itself, causing him to view contemporaneous industrial society as a transitional type to a perfect type of industrial society in which the greater productivity of industrial activity leads to the withering away and complete disappearance of the military type of society and the organizational principles underpinning it. The compulsory character of cooperation in the military society is replaced by the principle of voluntary cooperation, “multitudinous objects are achieved by spontaneously-evolved combinations of citizens governed representatively” (Spencer 1898, vol. 1, chapter 10, § 260) and the relationship between the citizen and the state is governed by “the doctrine that the will of the citizens is supreme and the governing agent exists merely to carry out their will” (ibid.). With this prediction of how society would develop in future, Spencer undoubtedly departed from his empirical analyses toward a social-political utopia based on a universal theory of the evolution of human society (Battistelli 1993; Schuurman 2016). In the middle of the nineteenth century, a comprehensive analysis of the relationship between democracy and military power was provided by Alexis de Tocqueville. A consequence of equality in democratic societies is that the military organization was essentially open to all, i.e., any citizen could (at least in theory) become an officer and pursue a military career. Tocqueville’s observations,

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which he made in the USA, prompted him to draw attention to a grave conflict of interest between democratic society and the military (Freund 1974; Mayer 1972; Jardin 1984; Diez del Corral 1989). On the one hand, democracy creates a people which has created property and now wishes to preserve it, i.e., is fundamentally peace-loving, on the other, in times of peace, soldiers’ desire for rapid advancement cannot really be fulfilled. “All the ambitious spirits of a democratic army are consequently ardently desirous of war, because war makes vacancies” (Tocqueville 1976: 758; translation follows Tocqueville 2006). In Chapter XXII of his work Democracy in America from 1840, Tocqueville explained why the democratic peoples are the most naturally desirous of peace while the democratic army has an equally natural and strong desire for war. It is for him self-evident that those most ardently desirous of war are democratic armies, and of all nations those most fond of peace are democratic nations; and, what makes these facts still more extraordinary, is that these contrary effects are produced at the same time by the principle of equality. (ibid. 758; translation follows Tocqueville 2006)

According to Tocqueville, in a democracy officers no longer held the same social position, the same high rank as they had originally held in the aristocratic nations. A man’s rank in society and in the army was no longer determined by his birth, indeed in democratic armies all soldiers could become officers “which makes the desire of promotion general and immeasurably extends the bounds of military ambition” (ibid.). The desire for advancement is almost universal and “is ardent, tenacious, perpetual; it is strengthened by all other desires and extinguished only with life itself” (ibid.). From this is derived the longing for war of democratic armies which stands in contrast to the people’s longing for peace. These conflicting attitudes on the part of the people and the army pose some of the most formidable threats to democratic societies. On the one hand, the best men shun a military career because of the low regard in which the military is held, while on the other, the soldier feels he occupies an inferior position, and his wounded pride either stimulates his taste for hostilities which would render his services necessary, or gives him a turn for revolutions, during which he may hope to win by force of arms the political influence and personal importance now denied him. (Tocqueville 1976: 759; translation follows Tocqueville 2006)

This incompatibility between a democratic society that is oriented toward peace and an army that is impatient for war in one and the same society alienates

2.2 The Classical Social Science Incompatibility Theorem …

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the army from society, increasing the aforementioned danger to democracy. The majority of the population who hold property and wish to preserve it, of course now fears revolution far more than in the age of the aristocracy. Moreover, as amongst democratic nations […] the wealthiest, the best-educated, and the most able men seldom adopt the military profession, the army, taken collectively, eventually forms a small nation by itself, where the mind is less enlarged, and habits are more rude than in the nation at large. Now, this small uncivilized nation has arms in its possession, and alone knows how to use them: for, indeed, the pacific temper of the community increases the danger to which a democratic people is exposed from the military and turbulent spirit of the army. Nothing is so dangerous as an army amidst an unwarlike nation; the excessive love of the whole community for quiet continually puts its constitution at the mercy of the soldiery. (ibid. 759; translation follows Tocqueville 2006)

At this point, Tocqueville’s incompatibility theorem raises the question whether there is a remedy for such a tendency, which does not itself involve waging war, for according to Tocqueville it is the first axiom of science that “all those who seek to destroy the liberties of a democratic nation ought to know that war is the surest and the shortest means to accomplish it” (ibid.). Neither does the option of increasing the size of the army offer a solution to this problem because “the number of aspirants always rises in exactly the same ratio as the army itself” (ibid.). The only means of solving this dilemma, Tocqueville concludes, is to be found in the people. I am of the opinion that a restless and turbulent spirit is an evil inherent in the very constitution of democratic armies, and beyond hope of cure. The legislators of democracies must not expect to devise any military organization capable by its influence of calming and restraining the military profession: their efforts would exhaust their powers, before the object is attained. The remedy for the vices of the army is not to be found in the army itself, but in the country. (ibid. 762; translation follows Tocqueville 2006)

This is the general spirit of the nation, the spirit of civic freedom combined with a deep longing for peace, which by being infused into the spirit peculiar to the army at least tempers the longing for war of the latter.

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Modern Society and the Military: Early Sociological Approaches

Max Weber: Military Discipline, Rationality and Domination

Max Weber regarded the military as part of a social process of rationalization (Weber 2019), which changed not only the structure of the military, but also its function. According to Weber, the structure of the military cannot be solely explained by technological change or industrialization, but by the development and transformation of society as a whole. He sees the reciprocal relationship between society and the military, the close link between military power and the political and economic development of societies in their specific historic forms. Within the comprehensive processes of social rationalization, both the forms of state rule and the structure and function of the military are subject to change. Embedded in this societal process of the rationalization and international domination, military power brings about a situation where the “obedience of a plurality of men is rationally uniform” (Weber 1980: 681) producing an instrument of state without a will of its own (Diggins 1996). The military constitutes the clearest expression of the objectification, rationalization and domination of power relations (Drake 2002). Military power thus becomes an ideal model and pattern of ruling power, inherent to the structure of domination. Its effectiveness is not therefore limited to its function as a rational instrument of state rule, it extends much further. The particular form of military discipline—notwithstanding the economic foundations upon which it is based—thus has far-reaching consequences for the constitution of all levels of state, economy and the family. Max Weber views rational discipline as the most irresistible force constraining individual action. He defines the content of rationalized discipline as the consistently rationalized, methodically prepared and exact execution of the received order, in which all personal criticism is unconditionally suspended and the actor is unswervingly and exclusively set for carrying out the command. In addition, this conduct under orders is uniform. The effects of this uniformity derive from its quality as social action within a mass structure. (Weber 1980: 681; translation follows Weber 1968, vol. III: 1149)

This discipline is thus ‘something rational’ and in its unswerving rationality puts itself at the disposal of any power that reflects on its services and knows how to use them. The increasing rationalization of military power in the modern period is revealed by numerous signs, such as

2.3 Max Weber: Military Discipline, Rationality and Domination

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the transition from the professional army to the people’s army of the French Revolution, its reorganization by Napoleon into a partly professional army, and the general introduction of universal conscription during the nineteenth century. (ibid. 682; Weber 1968: 1155)

in short, all measures which increase the importance of discipline. For Weber, the type of weapon was the result and not the cause of this intensification of discipline, which has its economic roots in the “separation of the warrior from the means of warfare, and the concentration of the means of warfare in the hands of the warlord” (ibid. 683; Weber 1968: 1154 f.). Max Weber’s main interest is the link between changes in the structure and function of the military caused by historic, social and economic factors. Discipline, which is completely based on rationality and increasingly calculating, is accorded a key role in the process of social and political change. Essentially, military discipline expands to cover all areas of social life; “military discipline gives birth to all discipline” and becomes the “ideal model for the modern capitalist factory” (ibid. 686; Weber 1968: 1155). Thus, “discipline inexorably takes over ever larger areas as the satisfaction of political and economic needs is increasingly rationalized. This universal phenomenon more and more restricts the importance of charisma and of individually differentiated conduct” (ibid. 686; Weber 1968: 1156). Saint-Simon, August Comte and Herbert Spencer all shared a belief in the radical incompatibility of industrial society and the military, but they did not yet provide a specific economic theory of military power. However, by directing the main focus of their research to the spheres of work, production and the process of rationalization and, by including for the first time social factors such as technology, investment and economic efficiency in the discussion of war and peace in their analyses, they opened the door to a view of the military institution based on the idea of economic efficiency, i.e., the principle of achieving maximum results with limited means. However, what in this way infiltrated a concept of politics and of military power under the cover of an economic principle was basically nothing but traditional warlike thought, which had always been concerned with a goal-oriented interplay of planning and technocratic procedures with a view to obtaining victory in a conflict. Thus, traditional military thought—which under the heading of ‘strategy’ had dominated political processes for centuries—led directly to modern economic thought, in fact even tacitly became its actual foundation. Strategic thought now entered modern social sciences and political economy.

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The apparent priority of work (and thus of peace) over war, which can be found in these early theories, could therefore later easily be turned to mean the opposite, namely that it is war that creates work. Essentially, such thinking even permits the conclusion that it is not just war, but equally the preparation for it, that creates work. Such assumptions could indeed be supported by a historical perspective. Is it true, especially with regard to the nineteenth century, that the rise of mass armies and the introduction of general military conscription in most European states increasingly turned the military itself into an employer? Of course, the military—like any large industrial enterprise—in due course developed new organizational strategies and methods of supply, which consequently called for a specific number of employees. From this perspective, does not the entire state economy become an economy that is geared towards war, or actually, in the final analysis, a war economy? Such thought processes, however, were still alien to early sociology. It is only the twentieth century that due to the experience of the world wars has become receptive to a way of thinking that is able to recognize elements of war in the economy, although of course specific currents of thought in the nineteenth century did indeed recognize and attempt to theorize the danger of a linkage between war and the economy (Sombart 1913; Sandler and Hartley 1995, 2007; Richter 2005; Keupp 2021). In contrast to the early theoretical approaches to a fundamental incompatibility of military and modern society, of war and industrialization, the process of technological and industrial development no longer appears to guarantee peace, during industrialization and mechanization, by exposing military force to be unproductive thus leading to its gradual dissolution. This opens up the possibility for a view of the relationship between politics and military power which posits that modern industrial societies, and the idea of economic efficiency that they emphasize, basically chose those principles and categories which have since time immemorial been linked to strategic thinking and the military.

References Andreski, Stanislav (Ed.) (1972): Herbert Spencer. Structure, Function and Evolution. London: Thomas Nelson & Sons. Aron, Raymond (1958): War and Industrial Society. London: Oxford University Press. Battistelli, Fabrizio (1993): War and Militarism in the Thought of Herbert Spencer. In: International Journal of Comparative Sociology, vol. 34, no. 3–4, 192–209. Black, Jeremy (1991): A Military Revolution? Military Change and European Society, 1550– 1800 (Studies in European History). Basingstoke: Red Globe Press.

References

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Böckenförde, Ernst-Wolfgang (1967): Lehre vom Heerwesen: Als Teil der Staatswissenschaft. Osnabrück: Biblio-Verlag. Brodie, Bernard (1973): War and Politics. London: Pearson. Cazeneuve, Jean (1961): Société industrielle et société militaire selon Spencer. In: Revue française de sociologie, vol. 2, no. 2, 48–53. Comte, August (1896): The Positive Philosophy of August Comte. Freely translated and condensed by Harriet Martinau, vol. III. London: George Bell&Sons (used edition: Kitchener: Batoche, 2000). Comte, August (1923): Soziologie. 3 volumes. 2nd edition. Jena: Fischer. Comte, August (1933): Die Soziologie. Edited by V.F. Blaschke. Leipzig: Kröner. Comte, August (1998): Early Political Writings. Edited by H.S. Jones. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Cook, Paul (1994): Darwinism, War and History. The debate over the biology of war from the ‘Origin of Species’ to the First World War. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Diez del Corral, Luis (1989): El pensamiento político de Tocqueville. Formacion intelectual y ambiente histórico. Madrid: Alianza Editorial. Diggins, John Patrick (1996): Max Weber: Politics and the Spirit of Tragedy. New York: Basic Books. Drake, Michael S. (2002): Problematics of Military Power. Government, Discipline and the Subject of Violence. London: Frank Cass. Elias, Norbert (1980): Über den Prozess der Zivilisation. Band 2. Frankfurt/Main: Suhrkamp. Foerster, Roland G. (Ed.) (1994): Die Wehrpflicht. Entstehung, Erscheinungsformen und politisch-militärische Wirkung. München: De Gruyter. Freund, Dorrit (1974): Alexis de Tocqueville und die politische Kultur der Demokratie. Stuttgart: Kohlkammer. Frevert, Ute (Ed.) (1997): Militär und Gesellschaft im 19. und 20. Jahrhundert. Stuttgart: Klett-Cotta. Howard, Michael (1981): Der Krieg in der europäischen Geschichte. München: Beck. Jardin, Andre (1984): Alexis de Tocqueville (1805–1859). Paris: Hachette. Joas, Hans/Knöbl, Wolfgang (2013): War in Social Thought: Hobbes to the Present. Translated by Alex Skinner. Princton: Princton University Press. Keupp, Marcus M. (2021): Defense Economics. An Institutional Perspective. Cham: Springer. Mayer, Jacob P. (1972): Alexis de Tocqueville. Analytiker des Massenzeitalters. 3rd edition. München: Beck. Murray, Robert H. (1929): Studies in the English Social and Political Thinkers of the Nineteenth Century, vol. 11: Herbert Spencer to Ramsay MacDonald. Cambridge: Heffer & Sons. Parker, Geoffrey (1996): The Military Revolution. Military Innovation and the Rise of the West, 1500–1800. 2nd edition. Cambridge-New York: Cambridge University Press. Richter, Gregor (2005): Militär und Ökonomie. In: Leonhard, Nina/Werkner, Ines-Jacqueline (Eds.) (2005): Militärsoziologie – Eine Einführung. Wiesbaden: VS Verlag für Sozialwissenschaften, 198–215. Sandler, Todd/Hartley, Keith (1995): The Economics of Defense. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

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Sandler, Todd/Hartley, Keith (Eds.) (2007): Handbook of Defense Economics. Defense in a Globalized World. Amsterdam: Elsevier. Schuurman, Paul (2016): Herbert Spencer and the paradox of war. In: Intellectual History Review, vol. 26, no. 4, 519–535. Silberner, Edmund (1972): The Problem of War in Nineteenth Century Economic Thought. Translated by Alexander H. Krappe. New York: Garland Publisher. Sombart, Werner (1913): Studien zur Entwicklungsgeschichte des modernen Kapitalismus. Volume 2: Krieg und Kapitalismus. München-Leipzig: Duncker & Humblot. Spencer, Herbert (1858): Essays: Scientific, Political, and Speculative. London: Longman. Spencer, Herbert (1898): The Principles of Sociology. 3 volumes. New York: Appleton and Company (1876). Spencer, Herbert (1966): The Works of Herbert Spencer. 21 volumes. Osnabrück: Otto Zeller. Tivey, Leonard (Ed.) (1981): The Nation-State. The Formation of Modern Politics. Oxford: M. Robertson. Tocqueville, Alexis de (1976): Über die Demokratie in Amerika. München: Deutscher Taschenbuch-Verlag. Tocqueville, Alexis de (2006): Democracy in America. Vol.2, translated by Henry Reeve. The Project Gutenberg E-book, Book III, Chapter XXII. Wachtler, Günther (Ed.) (1983): Militär, Krieg, Gesellschaft. Texte zur Militärsoziologie. Frankfurt/Main-New York: Wissenschaftliche Buchgesellschaft. Weber, Max (1968): Economy and Society. 3 volumes, edited by Guether Roth and Claus Wittich. New York: Bedminster. Weber, Max (1980): Wirtschaft und Gesellschaft. 5th , revised edition (Studienausgabe). Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck. Weber, Max (2019): Economy and Society. A New Translation. Edited and translated by Keith Tribe. Cambridge, MA-London: Harvard University Press.

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Political Economy and Military Organization

Early sociology’s assumptions of the incompatibility of modern industrial society and war came into conflict at a very early date with a social theory that focused mainly on economic questions and which regarded military service, efforts to arm and military ventures as an important stimulus for further technical, industrial and economic development (e.g., David Hume, see: Meek 1973: 50–53). Of course, in this sphere too, voices were raised, which radically questioned the productivity of the armed forces (e.g., Jean Baptiste Say or Francois Quesnay; compare Meek 1973: 104–113). Adam Smith, who to the present day is considered the father of modern economic theory, viewed modern armies as a necessity of state (Smith 1986: 41–44), although he had little esteem for the soldiers and regarded the economic productivity of the army itself as marginal. In Book V of the Wealth of Nations Smith undertook a first economic analysis of the costs of war and defense, whereby he reasoned that the costs of preparing and waging war differed according to a society’s state of development. It appeared to him that the entire course of history was characterized by a steady rise in military spending, although he evidently had no doubts about the need to maintain a standing army and prepare for war (Smith 1976). In formulating his social theory Smith had before him the ideal of an entire people practiced in bearing arms. The contempt of risk and the presumptuous hope of success are in no period of life more active than at the age at which young people choose their professions. How little the fear of misfortune is then capable of balancing the hope of good luck appears still more evidently in the readiness of the common people to enlist as soldiers, or to go to sea […] What a common soldier may lose is obvious enough. Without regarding the danger, however, young volunteers never enlist so readily as at the beginning of a new war. (Smith 1776: Book I, Chapter 10, Part I) © The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Fachmedien Wiesbaden GmbH, part of Springer Nature 2023 F. Kernic, War, Peace and the Military, Militär und Sozialwissenschaften/ The Military and Social Research 56, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-658-40521-2_3

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The assumption that military power should be seen in close connection with economic questions has not really been called into question since antiquity. In many societies, the military or warrior class joined forces with a specific social class, which had to possess a minimum amount of capital to gain access to the military in the first place. The close ties between military elites (especially the officer corps) and the nobility in the modern period is self-evident, as is the fact that in many types of society those without property were excluded from the military sphere. Otto Hintze drew particular attention to this relationship from a historical perspective (Hintze 1941). Almost all historic societies were clear about the threat to a ruling class that could arise from arming men without possessions. It is from this perspective that we must understand what Mandeville, for example, had in mind when he proposed banishing the risk of a threat from the unpropertied classes by introducing a forced labor service run along military lines (Euchner 1973: 31). Karl Marx on the other hand, clearly recognized the practical and revolutionary opportunities that became available to an oppressed class when it gained access to weapons. Ever since the early civilizations, explanations have been put forward suggesting that the real cause of war is to be found in a specific economic constellation (Henry 1962: 268 f.). A poor harvest in one’s own community can provide a reason to engage in military enterprises, as can the mere observation that others possess more or different resources. Even the ‘war over women’ is sometimes explained in exclusively economic categories. Wherever historians or economists have difficulty attributing the outbreak and conduct of a war to purely economic factors, they usually take recourse to idealistic motives or psychological factors (as in the case of the so-called wars of religion). But essentially, there was a general consensus that the application of military force was usually directed toward a taking of possession or destruction, was directed against people and goods, and that any formation and maintenance of armed forces or waging of war incurred costs. Modern rational theories of warfare and security policy place this ‘costbenefit’ question at the center of their analyses, emphasizing the instrumental rationality of military power and a belief in its almost mathematic ‘predictability.’ Thus, modern political economic theory developed its own view of military force, the main aspects of which are outlined below. Some of the ideas that surface here are certainly familiar to modern political thought: security as a product of military power, prosperity as a by-product of the arms industry or simply the assumption that war is the real engine of technological and industrial progress and the driver of innovation. Given that modern life is shaped by such concepts, no critical analysis of military power can ignore these conceptual approaches.

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Any survey of the explanations developed by modern political economy or economic theory might just as well start with Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels, and in attempting to answer the question regarding the cause of modern wars and the use of military force will refer to the modern theory of imperialism. Starting from here, it is then easy to understand the direction of modern theories of war that have been influenced by Marxism and the assumptions upon which they are based. In this context, specific attention needs to be paid to the conceptual approaches of Georges Bataille and Henri Lefebvre, and the model developed by Martin Shaw. The analysis will then focus on the broad array of modern economic science approaches and economic theory to ask how they view military power and which explanatory models they adopt. The singularity of this perspective ultimately leads to the question as to whether the scientific approach and methods of modern economics do not in fact reflect those of military power and military organization, and whether they do not carry within them the ‘spirit of the military’ (military logic).

3.1

Class Structure and Military Power: From Marx and Engels to Lenin

The twentieth century with its two world wars and the East-West conflict after 1945 undoubtedly provided a strong motive for everyday political thought to study the phenomenon of war—and thus the question of maintaining peace— more closely. In the same way, the experience of war and the danger of a new outbreak of war between rival powers inspired a form of political thought, which perceived itself primarily as a means of preserving the peace and preventing war. While the theoretical approaches of modern realism based on the political ideas of Machiavelli and Hobbes concentrated mainly on questions of international security and viewed military power as a factor in a global power game, socialism and Marxist-socialist theory focused on the class structure of modern societies, regarding military force as not just an instrument for safeguarding the rule of the bourgeoisie and oppressing the working class, but as an important factor in the class struggle. There can be no doubt that Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels gave particular consideration to issues of war and peace in their blueprints for a comprehensive political theory based on a new materialism (Kissin 1989; Semmel 1981; Gallie 1978: 66–99). Engels’ strong personal relationship to the military (Engels 1959: Introduction, IX–XIX) and his service as a volunteer in a Prussian artillery regiment (from October 1841 to September 1842) undoubtedly increased his interest

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in military organization and military affairs. The fact that Engels early on engaged in a serious study of military history and strategy, earned him a reputation as a military expert (Engels 1957; Neumann and Hagen 1986), in contrast to Marx who focused more on economic, social and industrial problems. Engels’ interest was by no means inconvenient to Marx, who, for example, in 1857 asked him to formulate the article Army (and other military articles), which dealt with the history of warfare (MEGA I 1972–1992, vol. 15). Marx merely urged Engels to pay particular attention to the link between war, productive forces and social relations, as the military seemed to him to be of particular importance for economic development (MEGA III 1972–1992, Vol. 8: 175 ff.). Engels undoubtedly wrote about the military and military topics much more extensively than did many other theorists who in the main devoted themselves to economic problems. Concerning the question of the relationship between the military and society, the writings of Marx and Engels show a clear difference in emphasis. On the one hand, a view of military organization and war that was guided by economic theory and expressed severe criticism of the capitalist economic system and the militarism it entailed. On the other, a genuinely military-strategic view of history and social systems, which placed its political thought (above all with regard to the strategies and tactics of a social revolution) in the shadow of Clausewitz (MEW 1963: vol. 29, 252). The idea of linking social revolution to the application of force is far less pronounced in the case of Marx and Engels than among other nineteenth century political theorists. Nineteenth century Russian anarchism explicitly formulated a strategy of ‘propaganda by the deed’ of terrorism and the targeted use of violence as a means of catalyzing revolution (Ernst 1986: 255–261; Avrich 1967; Carr 1961; Bakunin 1969; Ulam 1981). Even in the early writings of Engels and Marx it becomes clear that the structural analysis of historical materialism is ultimately geared to altering the fundamental way society is structured so that in its final state, society is pacified and harmonious. The historical-philosophical perspective aspires to eliminate class differences and thus the class struggle; “in proportion as the antagonism between classes within the nation vanishes, the hostility of one nation to another will come to an end” (MEW, vol. 4: 479; translation follows MECW, vol. 1, 461 ff. In: Marx 2000: 260.). Marx clearly had as his goal political internationalism (Molnar 1975; Boersner 1957). Even though he regarded the intra-state dimension or the nation state as the actual field of political action, the goal of political action for him was always international. The same is also true of his view of military force. The Marxist understanding of force is certainly not a radical pacifist view, nor one that is

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principally hostile to violence, but is shaped by moral judgements that justice does occasionally necessitate the application of force. The justification for the use of force in the sense of ‘counter-force’ flows in Marxist theory from the very distinction that can be made via economic concepts between exploiters and the oppressed (the working class) which in itself is violent. The structure of capitalism thus already constitutes social or societal force, which carries the seed of violence, regardless of whether it relates to acts of oppression or safeguarding the rule of the bourgeoisie, or resistance or revolutionary efforts on the part of the oppressed and exploited class (Harris 1974: 193 f.; Moore 1966; Tucker 1969). Marxist political theory is implicitly predicated upon the assumption of war as a status naturalis and transforms this into the basic assumption of a class struggle. As with Hobbes’ theory, its foundation is thus also war, the conflict between human beings, yet not so much as a struggle of all against all, or of individuals against others, but as a struggle between rival social groups or classes who are forced into such a confrontation because of their material situation. From this perspective, it also becomes understandable why in the Marxist-Leninist tradition, the theory of social-political status and the importance of force could lead to a ‘militarism of a different kind’. Capitalism and Marxism are both founded on the basic assumption of a war or struggle upon which the conception of the political is predicated and which can only perceive the relationship of the one to the other as a contradiction to be resolved. Not even the high value placed on the idea of solidarity and cooperation within a social class can hide this fact. Engels left no doubt about this when he wrote “There is but one good line of policy in war: to go at it with the greatest rapidity and energy, to beat your opponent, and force him to submit to your terms” (Engels 1970: 246; translation follows MECW, vol. 39: 425). Viewed from this perspective, it can be understood why Marx and Engels— and subsequently Marxist and socialist movements of all orientations—repeatedly gave their special support to military ventures. The reasons also become clear why Marx was most severe in his condemnation of certain military campaigns (such as the annexation of Alsace-Lorraine during the 1870–1871 war). Marx viewed all late nineteenth century revolutionary movements in Europe in terms of the extent to which they would be able to accelerate the progress of socialism. It is from this perspective that the question of the justified use of force is evaluated. It was this that gave rise to the differing evaluations of the international significance of the individual revolutionary stages and the divergent attitudes towards the question of the employment of force (Cole 1954; Connor 1984; Gilbert 1978; Berger 1977). The discussion of the differing stages in which individual countries find themselves on their individual paths to socialism went hand in hand with a

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differentiated allocation of the role and function ascribed to military force in this process of societal development (Kubalkova and Cruickshank 1985). The political economy conceptualized by Marx and Engels thus essentially constitutes an historical science, which does not proceed from eternally valid laws, but which first and foremost studies the particular laws of each stage in the development of the means of production and exchange, which determine the character of the existing social formations. At the same time, this necessitates a differentiated evaluation of military power. The Marxist view of international relations suggests that military power should be regarded as the foundation, which allows societies to defend their own territory from hostile neighbors, thus making independent inter-state relations possible in the first place. Military force is the prerequisite for the possibility of taking practical political action based on one’s own independence and the basic similarity of societies and states with the same modes of production. Marx and Engels regarded the standing armies of their age both as “organs or instruments of power” for the ruling class of exploiters and, to the extent that that this military apparatus could be gradually substituted by the armed people, as a “field of revolutionary activity” (MEGA I 1972–1992, vol. 22: 53–58 and 137–142). Violence and social revolution appeared to them to be compatible in cases of a justifiable war against the oppression and exploitation of the working class by the bourgeoisie. In war, fire is an arm as legitimate as any. Buildings held by the enemy are shelled to set them on fire. If their defenders have to retire, they themselves light the flames to prevent the attack from making use of the buildings. To be burnt down has always been the inevitable fate of all buildings situated in the front of battle of all the regular armies of the world. But in the war of the enslaved against their enslavers, the only justifiable war in history, this is by no means to hold good! (MEGA I 1972–1992, vol. 22: 219; translation follows MECW 1975, vol. 22: 351)

Such thought is undoubtedly a far cry from a radical pacifism that has committed itself to non-violence. Here it is evidently only a matter of choosing the ‘right’ war, of waging a justifiable revolutionary war or a war of liberation to end an unjust social relationship of exploitation and dependency between people. It is from this perspective that every war, even every new war that breaks out, must be regarded and evaluated. From a historical perspective, euphoria on the part of the working class for a specific war was thus inevitable. It was then merely a question of judging whether this war was indeed in the interests of the working class and furthered their goal of a social revolution.

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In the summer of 1914, the social democratic parties themselves became a force for war. In France, England and Belgium, as in Germany and the AustroHungarian monarchy, the social democrats backed the national war efforts and preparations (Haupt 1972; Walling 1915; Kissin 1989). The pacifism and antimilitarism of the First and Second Internationals thus evaporated within a very short period (Haupt 1986; Joll 1955). The question, which has been repeatedly and intensively discussed since then, of whether the early twentieth century socialist movement had not thrown Marxism overboard or even betrayed it, focuses on the ability of Marxist theory to explain the phenomenon of war. Theoretical deficits appear to exist above all where Marxism recognized war as a ‘social condition’, but failed to conclude from this that war is a natural occurrence (war as a status-naturalis). Likewise, Marxism did not develop a concept of international politics against the background of a ‘balance of power’, instead adhering to a seemingly utopian concept of peace, namely the achievement of a general state of peace by means of the Socialist Revolution (Waltz 1959: 125–130). The actual difficulty of Marxist theory and practice in relation to the problem of war lies less in the concept of a ‘utopian social theory’ itself, but in the way that military power is incorporated into this theory and the value that is attached to it within society. Marxist political theory certainly does not rule out the military defense of one’s own country. All programmatic appeals for a ‘war against war’, all signs of a radical anti-militarism in Marxist theory always take second place to a kind of ‘right to self-defense of the oppressed’, which by no means rules out the application of collective force a priori. The social importance of military power, however, does not exhaust itself in such a defensive function. Instead, the actual place of military force is determined by the course of the class struggle and the individual power-constellations, always dependent upon the state of production regarding its organization and material preparation for war (Semmel 1981). The Franco-German War marked a turning-point of entirely new implications. In the first place the weapons used have reached such a stage of perfection that further progress which would have any revolutionising influence is no longer possible. Once armies have guns which can hit a battalion at any range at which it can be distinguished, and rifles which are equally effective for hitting individual men, while loading them takes less time than aiming, then all further improvements are of minor importance for field warfare. The era of evolution is therefore, in essentials, closed in this direction. And secondly, this war has compelled all continental powers to introduce in a stricter form the Prussian Landwehr system, and with it a military burden which must bring them to ruin within a few years. The army has become the main purpose of the state, and an end in itself; the peoples are there only to provide soldiers and feed them. Militarism dominates and is swallowing Europe. But this militarism

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also bears within itself the seed of its own destruction. Competition among the individual states forces them, on the one hand, to spend more money each year on the army and navy, artillery, etc., thus more and more hastening their financial collapse; and, on the other hand, to resort to universal compulsory military service more and more extensively, thus in the long run making the whole people familiar with the use of arms, and therefore enabling them at a given moment to make their will prevail against the warlords in command. And this moment will arrive as soon as the mass of the people—town and country, workers and peasants—will have a will. At this point the armies of the princes become transformed into armies of the people; the machine refuses to work and militarism collapses by the dialectics of its own evolution. What the bourgeois democracy of 1848 could not accomplish, just because it was bourgeois and not proletarian, namely, to give the labouring masses a will whose content would be in accord with their class position—socialism will infallibly secure. And this will mean the bursting asunder from within of militarism and with it of all standing armies. (Engels 1971 [Anti-Dühring]: 144 f.; translation follows MECW, vol. 25, 158)

In this way, Marxism leaves the door open for a militarism of a different kind. Engels’ dictum that “the most resolute Communists made the most courageous soldiers” (MEW, vol. 7: 185) could thus easily become a political program for twentieth century communism. Werner Ernst (1986) claimed that the question of political and military strategy had been crucial for the workers’ movement from the very beginning, and in this connection referred to Karl Liebknecht who regarded the entire Social Democratic question of the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries as a military one (ibid. 269; Liebknecht 1969: vol. I: 37). While Marx and Engels saw the dangers of new martial confrontations, they were not able to detach themselves from the thought that even a world war would bring certain opportunities and advantages for the realization of the world revolution (MEW, vol. 37: 416). Marx and Engels’ position might therefore also be regarded as vacillating, willing to consider both the possibility of a policy of disarmament (MEW, vol. 22: 369 f.) as well as thinking in the category of deterrence owing to the unpredictability of the final result of a war (MEW, vol. 11: 189). Due to the strong emphasis, it placed on the materialist basis of human societies and history (Fleischer 1970), Marxist political economy also required a new explanation of the phenomenon of war, as it could no longer be based on anthropological assumptions alone. This effort gradually found its theoretical interpretation in the form of studies on imperialism, which were influenced by Marxism, although Karl Marx did not develop a mature theory of imperialism himself. Marx’s concepts for a political economy are dominated by a historical-philosophical concept, which lays the groundwork for a genuinely economic theory of military force and war (Davis 1991: 191–225). A central role here is played by his prediction of the increasing concentration and centralization

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of capitalism, which prompted Marx to utter the famous prophecy that “centralisation of the means of production and socialization of labour at last reach a point where they become incompatible with their capitalist integument. This integument is burst asunder” (MEW, vol. 23: 791; translation follows MECW, vol. 35: 750). Notwithstanding this, the writings of Marx and Engels reveal the beginnings of an approach that seeks to view and explain war and military force based on an economic analysis of society. To begin with, proceeding from the idea of accumulation, war itself can be seen as an enterprise to amass labor and resources, and military violence as an instrument of an expansionary policy, which will at the same time reinforce the divisions between the classes. As such, war is always a means of strengthening class divisions. Engels’ critique of militarism starts with the economic costs of the military. In his view, it is not the responsibility of the peoples to feed the soldiers; the armies have become the chief instruments of the states and an end in themselves; the financial burden caused by the military budget would automatically lead to financial collapse. For Engels, the solution lay in making everyone “familiar with the use of arms”, thereby “enabling them at a given moment to make their will prevail against the warlords in command” (Engels 1971 [Anti-Dühring]: 144 f.; translation follows MECW, vol. 25, 158). Marx’ and Engels’ writings contain numerous studies and analyses of the relations between the individual nation states and regard the phenomenon of imperialism as both a creative and destructive force. Capitalism itself did not, in their opinion, require imperialism, although they considered it highly likely that both would eventually combine. In this case, imperialism would be one instrument within a whole range of other options to increase capital and profit. Capitalist societies undoubtedly profited from imperial markets, because of which they also tended toward an expansion of these markets, but capitalism could also evolve and progress in societies which had no imperial markets or colonies. Marx saw that imperialism harmed societies on the Asian and African periphery, but at the same time regarded it as a progressive force that would bring these oppressed and exploited societies to socialism. Of course, his studies of imperialism as a phenomenon were essentially concerned with a critique of capitalism, but for him this was already the first truly revolutionary society. Capitalist competition produced a concentration, which reduced the number of capitalists and weakened the bourgeoisie as a political class. Thus, capitalism ultimately strengthened the working class, facilitating the breakthrough of socialism in the historic process. Socialist society itself is then international, i.e., the class struggle will come to an end as will the system of the nation states. Although a socialist utopia of peace

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can be recognized in the writings of Marx and Engels, this appears to depend on the structure of capitalist societies. This can be seen in several respects: On one occasion, Marx recognized in the capitalist reaction to the socialist revolution a factor that could lead to a capitalist fraternity, even if only for a limited period. On the other hand, it is by no means absurd to suggest that a solidarity like that, which prevails within the proletariat, could arise within the capitalist class. Furthermore, capitalism itself then appears as a form of anti-militarism because it is concerned with safeguarding power relations by economic means, but not with war and militarism, which appear unproductive and would destroy the profits and social orders upon which bourgeois rule was founded. Of course, war is also able to stimulate economic demand, but it would at the same time generate enormous costs, which would in turn have to be borne by the capitalist class. This makes it understandable why according to Engels the army itself will increasingly become a mass movement, which will turn to socialism, and war will become a general revolution. These Marxist and early socialist approaches, however, did not really provide any new social science insights into the phenomenon of war or a comprehensive explanation of military force in terms of social theory. Instead, genuinely military-strategic thinking was absorbed into materialistic social theories, or more accurately, revolutionary theories. In this way, thinking in Clausewitzian military categories formed the actual foundation of political thought from Engels, Kautsky, Trotzky, Stalin and Mao to Che Guevara and Castro (Trotzky 1925; Fuller 1981; Kondylis 1988). The ‘tactics’ of revolutionary activity dominate the main political field, and the social revolution becomes a ‘military enterprise of a different kind’. In his study of the Marxist and social democratic understanding of force, Werner Ernst drew attention to this sensitive aspect of the social theory or political economy of this period: For its radical representatives, socialism is characterized by revolution. The revolutionary attitude as such does not have to be strategic, however. We only refer to a strategic-revolutionary mindset when the content and goals of revolutionary thought are subordinated to all (military) efforts for strategic victory. Its difference to the technical is merely that its focus is directly aimed at the revolutionary seizure of power, the establishment of and assumptions of new positions of rule by revolutionaries. We are thus following political parlance which a long time ago claimed the military expression ‘strategy’ for itself. Thus, there is also a strategic (=technical) definition of politics which refers to the question of asserting power. The technical-instrumental perspective pertaining to strategies has penetrated all areas of politics. There is a type

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of power politics, which has completely taken over the thought styles of the military. In other words, strategic thought constitutes normality for thought that refers to political activity. (Ernst 1986: 268)

Vladimir I. Lenin’s study Imperialism as the Highest Stage of Capitalism written in 1917 drew the expansionist tendencies of modern societies more strongly into the focus of social theory analysis (Lenin 1963). Lenin identified imperialism as capitalism in its monopoly stage and as such considered it to be a direct result of the historic-dynamic development of the capitalist economic system described by Marx. At the same time, this evaluation provided him with an economic explanation of the question of war, which suggested itself with particular urgency due to the outbreak of World War I. According to Lenin, the monopoly stage of capitalism itself promotes war: Firstly, because the rule of highly developed capitalist societies over backward areas and underdeveloped countries fosters the emergence of revolutions and uprisings (in particular against the colonial masters) as an insurgency or resistance against economic dependence and exploitation. Secondly, the ‘expropriation of large numbers of capitalists by a few’ also leads to an increase and intensification of inter-imperialistic rivalries and wars. Lenin’s approach radicalized the theoretical explanations of Marx and Engels in respect to the problem of war (Lenin 1930: 237). Where Marx still saw a tendency toward transnational cooperation or fraternity, Lenin saw nothing but an inevitable advance toward war. The imperialist state appeared to him to be the Leviathan of the bourgeoisie, which had to be toppled. At the same time, violence provoked counter-violence; indeed, it carried within it the seed for a sweeping revolution of the entire social system. In the same breath, this theory provided a basis for legitimizing the revolutionary struggle for political power. The revolution called for a continuous weighing up of strategic and tactical means, which undoubtedly include military force and the arming of the people. Lenin’s instruction for political action therefore recognized the strategic purpose and at the same time justified military force as a means of achieving revolutionary goals, even if the application of force was of a clearly offensive character. Although Lenin’s revolutionary program and his attempt at a theoretical interpretation of imperialism had a lasting impact in terms of realpolitik, his mono-causal model lacked the necessary social-scientific persuasive power. His proffered solution to the question of war and peace thus appears altogether too simplistic. A modern contemporary theory cannot satisfy itself with attributing the entire problem solely to the ‘evolution of capitalism’ and then deriving from there the need to develop a comprehensive strategy of revolution. Lenin’s theory

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of imperialism therefore differs significantly from all other theoretical approaches of his time that set out to explain this phenomenon. In the history of political thought, the relationship between capitalism and military power has essentially been regarded in one of two ways. On the one hand, capitalism and war appear contingently connected, i.e., in accordance with the theory of ‘military capitalism’, capitalism is not just the key to modern society, but is by its nature, militaristic (for example, Wright Mills). On the other hand, there is also an optimistic theory of ‘peaceful capitalism’, according to which capitalism is fundamentally peaceful by reason of its transnational orientation (for example, Smith, Bastiat, Carey, Schumpeter; compare Schumpeter 1918/19: 1–39 and 275–310). The early theories of imperialism (Hobson, Hilferding, Luxemburg etc.; compare Hobson 1965; Hilferding 1923; Kautsky 1914; Mertens and Rosen 1981: 414–420), by which Lenin was undoubtedly influenced, still focused mainly on the economic situation and the resulting economic and social changes, while the question of war did not appear as an urgent problem. They did not therefore concentrate on investigating military force or war. It was only the political goal of a revolutionary strategy to be combined with these theories that focused attention on the question of violence (Mommsen 1980; Brewer 1980; Kemp 1967; Winslow 1948). The particular achievement of Marxist political theory undoubtedly consists in the emphasis it placed on socio-economic factors within international relations and society. By placing the problem of economic equality at the center of the analysis of world politics, military violence and the use of force also appeared in a new light, namely from the perspective of a political economy that blurred the boundaries of traditional political theory. The close relationship of military power to the state, from which traditional political theory proceeded, dissolved in favor of a view of military violence as a transnational force. In this way, the question of war and peace is no longer primarily a matter of state policy and inter-state relations, but a problem of social classes across state borders.

3.2

Capitalism, Militarism, the Nation State and War—Selected Neo-Marxist Explanations

The perception of an antagonism between capitalism and socialism, which in succession to or in dissociation from Marx, Engels and Lenin, fascinated political thought throughout the entire twentieth century, itself became the basis of modern strategies for justifying the use of military force. Once again, the old idea of bellare came to the fore, an unavoidable confrontation in which it is imperative

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to gain victory using all necessary means. Almost all twentieth century political theory approaches and ideologies, which have been shaped by Marxism, have revolved around this idea of confrontation. Leninism, Stalinism, Maoism and Castro’s political program as variants of modern socialism uniformly follow this line and have adopted its emphasis upon the military and hope in the strength of military force to achieve victory. Against capitalism’s supposedly inherent tendency to wage war and apply force is set a strategy for revolution, which is itself predicated upon the strength of organized collective force and which regards the military and the arming of the people as a path toward the victory of socialism. In this sense, the peace strategy emphasized by Marx in the course of a democratic revolution was increasingly, and as early as the start of the twentieth century, turned into a strategy for revolution, which quite consciously recognized war and the application of force as a means of revolutionary action (Lenin 1947; Neurath 1928: 43–58; Sorel 1969: 129). In practical terms, the tradition of twentieth century Marxism repeatedly became a ‘militarism of a different kind’. This tendency was already becoming apparent in August 1914 and continued through the 1917 revolution, through the political developments leading up to and during World War II and the military buildup and proxy wars during the Cold War. In Mao Tse-tung’s theory, political strategy eventually reached a stage at which it was determined solely militarily, with the desired political liberation and shaking off class and foreign domination being achieved through war and war alone. This goal necessitated strong military forces, and the mobilization of the masses for the People’s War. In war, politics and the military merge to form an indivisible unit, which at the same time constitutes the power necessary for achieving revolutionary victory (Mao Tse-tung 1969; Schickel 1970; Kroker 1976). Notwithstanding the political changes and upheavals in how the antagonism between capitalist and socialist societies in the course of the twentieth century was regarded (especially in view of the events of 1989), an economic analysis of social conditions and structures continues to merit particular attention for the purposes of interpreting military force. In this connection, numerous authors stress the existence of militaristic tendencies in contemporary society, which, paradoxically, can be most easily identified where simultaneous reference is made to the end of the Cold War and a new world order, in which major rivals or opponents no longer even exist. Such tendencies clearly go beyond a specialist economic interest in the arms market and armaments, indeed a number of social science analyses even show that capitalist entrepreneurs are by no means always interested in a heavy arms build-up, instead in times of full employment often speaking out against the rapid expansion of the arms sector.

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According to Michael Mann (1984: 25–46), the militarism of modern industrial societies does not derive from capitalism, but from geopolitical aspects of modern social structures (‘geopolitical militarism’): Capitalism and militarism are both core features of our society, but they are only contingently connected. In contrast to both these traditional views on the relation between capitalism and militarism, I will make the following three points: 1. Militarism is a central part of modern society. 2. But its centrality does not derive principally from either capitalism or industrialism. 3. Instead, militarism derives from geopolitical aspects of our social structure which are far older than capitalism. (Mann 1984: 28)

Mann then expanded these three points with three additional hypotheses: 4. Militarism became contingently associated with the rise of capitalism. 5. This association had the effect of greatly increasing both technically and socially the menace of militarism. 6. But in the twentieth century both menaces became the general property of expansionist industrial societies and are no longer specific to capitalism. (ibid. 29)

Twentieth century neo-Marxist or social philosophical thought that was influenced by Marx is, overall, characterized by the ambivalence of its evaluation of military force. On the one hand, there is an acknowledgement of its significance in the concepts of revolutionary strategy, on the other, a radical pacifist orientation in terms of a comprehensive social theoretical critique of the state. The latter is manifested not only in post-war attempts to reformulate the Marxist theory of imperialism (in the case of Marxist authors in Western democracies usually with a clear rejection of Lenin’s theories. Compare Baran and Sweezy 1966; Held and Ebel 1983), and in the clearly anti-militaristic attitude of the social democratic movements, but also in numerous economic theories concerning a modern social philosophy of war. Henri Lefebvre and Georges Bataille (Schmidt 1990) can be regarded as prominent examples of this type of social philosophical thought, which flows from Marxist political economic theory. Lefebvre’s critique of the state in his treatise De l’état (1976–1978) is undoubtedly a radical criticism of military force. Lefebvre is concerned with analyzing the inner link between state rationalism and state power, whereby he does not lose sight of the role of the individual decision-maker in these entanglements and the social practice that is shaped in this manner. It is precisely his focus on the individual and his ‘will to power’,

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which distinguishes his analysis from classical Marxism, as his individual subject does not get lost in determinative objectivations. Regarding the question of violence, Lefebvre notes that Marxist theory usually neglects the inherent aspect of force, and therefore the conflictual nature of the processes of exchange in the social philosophical analysis. For him, violence is as inherent in economics as it is in politics, i.e., violence itself is by no means something non-economic, but is instead already a condition of the abstraction of trade; it realizes itself in the act of exchange (Schmidt 1990: 189). The increased importance of economics in human thought and action is accompanied by an increase in violence, expanding the opportunities of the will to power, which always has an inner relationship to politics. This increase in force and the parallelism of economic and state rationalism merely blurs the boundaries between war and peace, between civil and military power, between productive and destructive forces. The world system of states is thus increasingly determined by power. It is, as Hajo Schmidt pointed out, with reference to Lefebvre’s text, the simple truth that the actual position of the worldwide state is defined by its economically based and brokered power, which ultimately is based on military strength. Inequality dominates: the inequality of power (puissance) resumes all others. The state system does not establish itself as a circle (of equals) but as a pyramid. At the top: The strongest, the heaviest. While American imperialism, with undoubted successes, attempts to control it all through its economic and political, and consequently military power, the Soviet Union knows how to assert itself thanks to the development status of its SMP [state-directed mode of production = mode de production étatique]. Two superpowers, two imperialist centers dominate the world and assert their order, from the top of the planetary hierarchy—known as peaceful coexistence. (Schmidt 1990: 261 f.)

Undoubtedly, Henri Lefebvre’s analysis of military force is thus embedded in a broad-ranging social theory of violence. The military is not just a state institution that, once created, can be abolished again at will, but is rather a constitutive element of the state that is deeply rooted in society. “That the army takes power is not the result of a coincidence; it is reasons of state taken to an extreme” (Lefebvre vol. 4: 358). Lefebvre was in no doubt about the warlike nature of the state (L’Ètat porte dans ses flancs la guerre). The modern state has a martial basic structure, which is embodied in its armed forces. However, Lefebvre explained the link between the state and the military differently to writers such as Krippendorff, as Hajo Schmidt emphatically pointed out:

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The state is not, as Krippendorff suggests, the necessary mantle or disguise for the military, the military is a ‘component’ of the state as a political form. With the rise of the latter to the ‘form of form’ (only proportionately as a result of the state’s own activity), all form-relationships change, the significance of the military for the preservation and development of the social synthesis changes with that of the state. Military and repressive apparatus will gain importance to the same extent as the state dictates the conditions of the social synthesis, as a growth state is compelled to solve tasks of an ever-broader scope and discharge increasing form-violence. Ultimately, they dominate and threaten social life to an extreme as the state nonetheless (or precisely because of this) must expect that every serious growth crisis will not only call into question its social production and power relations, but its very existence. (Schmidt 1990: 281 f.; compare Krippendorff 1985)

George Bataille adopted a different approach to the problem of war and military force to Lefebvre, even though the former’s analysis also took economics as its point of departure. On the one hand, he included an old motif of philosophical thought in his analysis, namely the reflection upon the natural basis of human activity. Secondly, he combined his natural philosophy and economic approach to form a specific view of human history, which ascribed great importance to the sovereign self-confidence of the historical subjects. In his view, the concept of humanity pointed to an ambivalent relationship and a system of contradictory movements, where people find themselves in a dynamic relationship between prohibitions and the violation of such prohibitions. In this sense, he recognized man’s disposition to destruction and violence and squarely confronted the fascination which war has held for people for thousands of years. Accordingly, the prohibition of killing is always accompanied by a violation of this prohibition, a fundamental general willingness to kill oneself and others. For Bataille war is by no means a natural occurrence, but in fact a specific socio-cultural creation. Notwithstanding the fascination of killing, he derived from this a demand for the abolition of war, although he did not combine this with such a radical critique of the state as Lefebvre. Instead, he regarded as crucial the point where the state and the military unite for the purpose of organized violence, for this is also the crucial point at which democratic politics can put the modern state in its place. Containing a state that is willing to wage war, limiting its destructive potential is thus one of the key tasks for democratic politics, which in this sense can be regarded as structurally ‘war-inhibiting’, if and when they fulfil this function. In the 1980s, Martin Shaw (1984) once again picked up the Marxist theories of war and attempted to modify them in the light of the new social and economic conditions of the nuclear age. Shaw took up the results of Marwick’s study of British society in wartime (Marwick 1968, 1977), according to which it is not

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a specific military participation, but the general participation of a society in war that delivers the key for social change. With Marwick’s analysis in mind, Shaw wrote: Analysing the experiences of a number of societies in the two world wars, he identifies four aspects of the effect of war: the destructive (war as disaster), the test (of the institutions of a society), participation (of the population, leading to social changes both ‘guided’ and ‘unguided’) and the psychological. Suggesting a number of major dimensions of change: in social geography, economics, social structure, social cohesion, social ideas, welfare politics and politics. Marwick sees these as developing chiefly in proportion to the participation of the population in war. This basic cause is not exclusive to the ‘total wars’ of the twentieth century, but can be sought in earlier wars and in modern guerrilla wars, in different degrees. (Shaw 1984: 5 f.)

The nuclear potential has now, however, made this possibility for progress impossible. Shaw pointed to numerous contradictions in the past Marxist tradition of a theory of war. Marx and Engels themselves had undoubtedly been strongly influenced by Clausewitz and therefore had a particular predilection for justifying the application of military force and war. According to the later theoretical analyses of Karl Liebknecht, Rosa Luxemburg, Vladimir Lenin and Nikolai Bukharin, however, militarism undermines parliamentary democracy, automatically leading to bureaucratic military dictatorships in western societies. From an analysis of these classical examples of Marxist thought, Shaw concluded that the Marxism of the 1980s would have to be developed further in a radically different socio-economic context. Firstly, in terms of theory, the existence of a global system of states must be acknowledged to even understand ‘world society’ as a whole. Crucial for this state system, which precedes capitalism, is that we are always concerned with ‘nation-states within the context of a system of states’ and a tendency towards domination (Shaw 1984: 47–70). Despite the end of the Cold War and a general decline in the influence of Marxist thought in early twenty-first century societies, the modern theory of imperialism has to the present day lost little of its power of attraction in the search for the causes of war. On the one hand, it forms the basis for many sociological theories of the world system and world society (Wallerstein 1974; Moor and Wesseling 1989; Bosch 1968), on the other it refers directly to the structure and modes of the relationship between different societies as the actual ‘sore point’ in terms of peace policy. The center-periphery model (Galtung 1971: 81–117; Senghaas 1972), frequently used in current peace and conflict studies, does provide explanations in respect of the relationship between the military and society, above all, in the following regard:

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Firstly, the center-periphery model raises awareness of the dependence of small states and economically less developed countries upon a small number of ‘central states’ or hegemonial powers in terms of military and arms policy. Such dependency not only exists in respect of arms and weapons technology, but also in the areas of military training and military administration and organizational structure. The adoption of military structures based on those of the colonial powers should also be seen in this category, as should the development of a complex system of military alliances and cooperation agreements. Secondly, the center-periphery model allows an economic explanation of the enormous arms-building efforts in peripheral areas and the developing world, in as much as these less developed countries are to be regarded as important sales markets for the central powers. The highly developed capitalist states are able to exchange arms for raw materials, but can just as easily rid themselves of old stocks of weapons and ammunition or even test new weapons systems in smaller regional wars. What is decisive for them is the perpetuation or even strengthening of the dependency, the preservation of the asymmetry in terms of military policy. Thirdly, the center-periphery model indicates the danger of a backlash, the possibility of resistance against the central power or the exploiter, a revolution of the periphery against the center, in which the weapons and military force could be turned against those who had cultivated and nurtured them. This in turn prompts the central powers to engage in a further arms buildup and greater military efforts or to initiate ‘corrective measures’, such as certain international restrictions and arms control or partial disarmament activities. Fourth, the center-periphery model points to a tendency toward monopolization that is always inherent in military force and which here is coupled with overall economic policy. In this regard, military force is fully associated with the capitalist economic system, at least as long as there is no real monopoly stage. The hope for a peace that is based on the absolute supremacy of a center secured by military means (even if it is called a ‘world policeman’), boils down to a totality in which the periphery can ultimately only be understood as part of the center, i.e., the relationship between the different societies becomes de facto extinct. A political economy conceptualized thus, which places the structure of capitalism at the center of its analysis (Amin 1976; Frank 1978; Mandel 1980; Hoogvelt 1982) and sees the tendency toward monopolization as an important factor promoting war, can, ultimately, only define military force in one direction: as a central factor for achieving victory—be it to safeguard domination or for a social revolution, and irrespective of whether such a ‘last military endeavor’ leads to total annihilation or to everlasting peace. In a genuine ‘monopoly phase’, in

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which there is nothing whatsoever left outside the all-encompassing self, these differences become obsolete.

3.3

Economic Theory and Military Thinking

It is impossible to overlook the legacy of Adam Smith in contemporary theories pertaining to the problems of war and military force. It resonates wherever expenditures for the defense of the state are associated with the idea of a resulting advantage for society as a whole. In this manner defense and armaments become a public good (Schmidt 1987: 20–39). Modern economic theory as a science presents a conspicuous problem regarding the analysis of military force. To the present day, its protagonists follow either the tradition of classical political economy (Smith, Marx), who consciously devoted themselves to the problem of military power, or are held in thrall by modern economic theories (Edgeworth, Keynes), for whom the problems of war and peace are of marginal interest only, which does not, however, mean that their approaches do not suggest a certain view of military power. The main focus of modern economic theories is directed toward the defense or armaments industry and its impact on the civilian economy (De Vestel 1993). Such theories often rely on descriptive and static methods, i.e., they are mainly concerned with showing the reciprocity (interplay of factors) of economic processes with social and societal components. It is fair to say that the concepts of modern economic theory concentrate on the military-industrial complex and the armaments industry (Adams 1968: 652–665; Cary 1969; Halperin et al. 1973; Duchin 1983; Schmidt 1987) as well as upon the economic impacts of modern security and military policy (such as a war) on society as a whole. In the case of the latter, the main emphasis is upon questions of military expenditure (defense budgets), the economic implications of a policy of alliances, and the military’s effects on employment (Abell 1990; Blank and Rothschild 1985). With regard to wars, economic theory mainly focuses on the extent to which wars can be seen as motors of technological and industrial advances, while at the same time questioning the Janus-faced nature of the armaments industry as a ‘producer of security’ on the one hand and as a ‘threat or risk system’ on the other, i.e., it is also interested in analyzing the dangers emanating from the armaments industry (arms race, weapons transfer) (Bischak 1991; DeGrasse 1983; Mosley 1985; Müller 1985; Smith and Smith 1983).

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Reference has been made several times to the fact that economic theory draws attention to one aspect of military force, which is ignored in many other sciences: the welfare effect of military efforts. From this perspective, military force appears almost to be the decisive factor behind technological progress and industrial and technological innovation. At the same time, economic theory analysis focuses on the economic impacts of expenditure for the military apparatus, for armaments and space exploration above and beyond the purely military sector; i.e., it is concerned with measuring the spin-offs of technologies, research and arms efforts promoted by the military. Spin-offs comprise the “transfer of products, processes and materials (direct spin-off) as well as scientific and technical information (indirect spin-off) from the military sector to the civilian sector” (Glismann et al. 1993: 39; compare Kubbig 1986; Welles and Waterman 1964; Cypher 1987). In particular, civilian economic development is advanced by military armaments and research wherever applications with a civilian use can be developed simultaneously with cutting-edge military technology. In this connection, economic theory refers to the ‘benefit’ of military research and development for society as a whole (Hansen 1953: 228 f.). Of particular interest in this context is the attempt to strictly separate economic, political and moral valuations of the armaments sector (especially with a view to arms exports). The political component is adjudged to possess a high degree of independence, which manifests itself above all in practical decisions, which are not driven by economic criteria. Based on a negative conceptualization, all those factors which are diametrically opposed to economic criteria, such as consideration for allies, restrictions due to export bans etc. are thus essentially designated as ‘political’. In turn, the economic analyses consider the modern state mainly by highlighting its role as the monopolist of military force. From an economic perspective, all state-controlled defense and armaments policy must fulfil a variety of social and economic functions, such as increasing employment levels within the state, keeping up with technological developments abroad or expanding a competitive edge, increasing social prosperity and generally strengthening the position of the state in an international context (Neumann and Harkavy 1980; Thompson 1979). Keith Krause (1992) strove for a view, which did not neglect the link between the modern state and the arms industry, but placed the military economy and the arms transfer in an historic context. His model of a three-tiered structure of the weapons transfer, comprising the three components of a) the defense production base, b) military research and development capabilities, and c) dependence upon arms exports, ultimately leads, from an epistemological perspective, to an attempt to study the overall dynamics inherent in military force, i.e., psychological factors

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(such as the underlying motives and expectations that people have of weapons production), people’s general concepts of security and social order and the idea of the sovereign state. Thus, arms transfers become part of a greater network, a system of interactions between economic theory, foreign policy, society and culture in a global nexus of weak and strong states (Krause 1992: 214 f.). However, this approach casts economic theory as either a comprehensive social theory or as a philosophical attempt to trace the relationship between society, politics and military power. A study of modern economic theories in respect of the military quickly creates the impression that many approaches view military expenditure as an important stimulant of economic growth and as a means for stabilizing the economy. In a way, this perception was rationalized by Keynesian assumptions regarding military expenditure, which at the same time led to an extremely positive evaluation of the economic and social impacts of armaments and military expenditure. In the Keynesian macroeconomic universe, military and arms expenditures have a strongly stabilizing effect if they lead to the greater utilization of existing resources with regard to employment. Waging war, this view suggests, leads to increased employment. As a result of this view, the concept of ‘military Keynesianism’ has in recent decades found its way into the economic discussion as a “diffuse set of ideas and assumptions about the compatibility, and even beneficial effects, of a high level of military spending and economic prosperity” (Mosley 1985: 5). For Hugh Mosley, military Keynesianism leads to several assumptions and consequences: Military Keynesianism as a more or less explicit conception of economic policy entails the use of military expenditures to promote economic stabilization and growth within a broadly Keynesianism framework. Its five basis elements are: 1) A demand management perspective on the economy and a concern with the problems of insufficient aggregate demand. 2) The willingness to use government fiscal and monetary policy to stimulate aggregate demand to maintain employment and spur growth. 3) The willingness to engage in planned deficits to support continued or expanded countercyclical government demand, in contrast to the other fiscal orthodoxy of the necessity for balanced budgets. 4) Reliance on government military expenditures to create such demand. 5) The assumption that the government-subsidized high-technology component of military-industrial production contributes significantly to innovation and growth in the economy as a whole. (ibid. 5)

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What comes to light here is less a matter of dispute between different schools of economic theory or analysis than a criticism of the entire theoretical approach of modern political economy. The criticism is not directed solely against Keynes’ theory (Keynes 1924, 1971ff., 1974; in addition, see Bombach et al. 1976; Hall 1989; Lekachman 1966: 144–175), but against the reduction of military force to an apparently predictable factor within a social theory, which assumes that social processes such as war or the application of military force can be explained and predicted solely through economic processes. The seemingly ‘ethical neutrality’ and distance of modern economic theories in respect of the interpretation of the social status and function of military power is precisely the point at which the philosophical critique of political economy is applied. More specifically, this refers to the disregard for ethical considerations in the formulation of economic theories. This deficiency was of course recognized and increasingly discussed within modern economic theory and economic sciences. Today, a systematic critique of the arms race has become an integral aspect of several more recent economic theories. Even from within the economic sciences, critical voices claim that the 35-year arms-race during the Cold War created a legacy of reduced security and economic decay. At the same time, these theories posit that the reduction of weapons is the key to stabilizing and stimulating the economy and increasing security (Dumas 1982; Nincic 1982). For the first time, the fact that a country’s economic prosperity is not simply derived from its arms expenditures or military strength is recognized as a problem relating to the role of military power. Nor can the public good of external security be strictly circumscribed or defined. This reveals what is obviously a fundamental problem for modern economic theory in respect of the conceptualization of military force. This problem can be illustrated most clearly with a question, namely how can the relationship between the military and the economy be conceptualized in an economic theory if economic theory for its part is already militarily conceptualized? This raises the question as to whether we are not moving in circles if we, on the one hand, conceptualize war in terms of economic theory, and on the other economic theory in terms of war (Bell 1976: 248–268). This dilemma can be demonstrated more clearly if we examine the concept of ‘economic war’. The discussion of economic war developed above all during the Cold War as a consequence of the escalating arms race. The main threat posed by this arms race was seen in the possibility that a political power, afraid to lose the economic war, might feel impelled to launch an offensive war (Wolfson and Farrell 1987). A solution to this problem was expected from politics by way of political agreements, not from the economy. In this way, the economy as a

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whole was perceived as war, as an appropriation of the economy and industry for waging war against another power. The bipolarity of the international system (the rivalry between the USA and the USSR) facilitated this view even more. This was one of the reasons why Wolfson and Farrell concluded that the arms race was not caused by mutual deterrence, but should be regarded as a weapon in the economic war: Each nation can force its opponent to keep up its military expenditures, and if countries have different production possibilities either in size or kind, they can inflict economic damage on the other. The economic damage takes the immediate form of reduction in consumption and investment, and ultimately in military potential. Thus the distinction between economic, political and military war is eroded, as nations choose one or the other combination of these instruments. (Wolfson and Farrell 1987: 178)

Is economic theory not already conceptualized as war, so that the economy is basically nothing but the continuation of war with the same means, but without the physical application of military force? Is it not true to say that high technology has long since been militarized? Do not the efforts toward monopolization show a tendency toward a totality, toward an appropriation, which erases all boundaries, including those between civilian and military technologies, between civilian industry and the arms industry, between space exploration for civilian and for military purposes? In economic terms, military power is once again manifesting the kind of tendencies to monopolization (as in the Defense Technology Cooperation in NATO or efforts to create a single European military industry), which lead to the separation of a center from its periphery, while at the same time maintaining a universal claim. Of course, potential competitors (opponents, enemies) should be disabled, i.e., trumped or overcome (or appropriated). The ‘logic of the economy’ is a logic of opposites. In this respect, it follows the logic of war. In this way, one can justifiably speak of a ‘war economy in peacetime’ (Melman 1974). The difficulties of modern economic theories in their attempts at an allembracing analysis of military force are rooted in the fact that we are dealing less with an economic theory of military power, than with a militarily oriented theory of the economy. Modern economics as a science should in fact be viewed as the child of military power. The entire terminology that it uses, the scientific concepts upon which it builds reflect the military. The strategic analysis which it attempts by applying mathematical models to the use of force (as in game theory) represents the traditional war games of the military, with both being

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predicated upon the same criteria (cost-benefit calculation, perception of strength, offensive/defensive, instrumental rationality, etc.). The central role of the concept of strategy in modern economic theory demonstrates not only the borrowing of military terminology, but rather the incorporation of a way of thinking in genuinely military categories. The other is the opponent, the competitor against whom one must hold one’s own in a power struggle. The competition or struggle for predominance becomes the basis of economic reality and theory (Chamberlin 1932; Fellner 1949; Galbraith 1952; Robinson 1933). It is one’s own survival that is at stake. However, it also implies the use of certain means to achieve a defined goal, involving decision-making processes, leadership (command) and choices (Heilbroner 1993: 33–37), a relationship between the choices and the results, implementation and efficiency, enhancing one’s own performance, the structuring and deployment of groups of people (units) for specific purposes and to achieve certain goals etc. (Besanko et al. 1996). The instrumental rationalism of the military corresponds to the instrumental rationalism of the economy. Economics as a modern science is a mirror of war outside the actual field of military power (Krippendorff 1983: 189–214).

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Mommsen, Wolfgang (1980): Theories of Imperialism. Chicago: University of Chicago Press. Moor, Jaap A. de/Wesseling, H. L. (Eds.) (1989): Imperialism and War. Essays on Colonial Wars in Asia and Africa. Leiden: Brill. Moore, Barrington Jr. (1966): The Social Origins of Dictatorship and Democracy. Lord and Peasant in the Making of the Modern World. Boston: Beacon Press. Mosley, Hugh G. (1985): The Arms Race. Economic and Social Consequences. Lexington: Lexington Books. Müller, Erwin (1985): Rüstungspolitik und Rüstungsdynamik. Fall USA. Baden-Baden: Nomos. Neumann, Sigmund/Hagen, Mark von (1986): Engels and Marx on Revolution, War, and the Army in Society. In: Paret, Peter/Craig, Gordon A./Gilbert, Felix (Eds.): Makers of Modern Strategy from Machiavelli to the Nuclear Age. Princton: Princton University Press. Neumann, Stephanie G./Harkavy, Robert E. (Eds.) (1980): Arms Transfers in the Modern World. New York: Praeger. Neurath, Otto (1928): Lebensgestaltung und Klassenkampf. Berlin: E. Laub. Nincic, Miroslav (1982): Arms Race. The Political Economy of Military Growth. New York: Praeger. Robinson, Joan (1933): The Economics of Imperfect Competition. London: Macmillan. Schickel, Joachim (Ed.) (1970): Guerilleros, Partisanen. Theorie und Praxis. München: Hanser. Schmidt, Christian (1987): Peace and War Economics in Retrospect: Some Reflections on the Historical Background of Defense Economics. In: Schmidt, Christian/Blackaby, Frank (Eds.): Peace, Defense and Economic Analysis. Houndsmill-London: Palgrave Macmillan. Schmidt, Hajo (1990): Sozialphilosophie des Krieges. Staats- und subjekttheoretische Untersuchungen zu Henri Lefebvre und Georges Bataille. Essen: Klartext. Semmel, Bernard (Ed.) (1981): Marxism and the Science of War. Oxford-New York: Oxford University Press. Senghaas, Dietmar (1972): Rüstung und Militarismus. Frankfurt/Main: Suhrkamp. Shaw, Martin (Ed.) (1984): War, State and Society. London: Palgrave Macmillan. Smith, Adam (1776): An Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations (edition: The Modern Library 1937). Online: Adam Smith Reference Archive (marxists.org): Random House 2000. Smith, Adam (1976): An Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations. Oxford: Clarendon. Smith, Adam (1986): The Essential Adam Smith. Edited by Robert L. Heilbroner. New YorkLondon: W.W. Norton. Smith, Dan/Smith, Ron (1983): The Economics of Militarism. London: Pluto. Sorel, George (1969): Über die Gewalt. Frankfurt/Main: Suhrkamp. Thompson, Earl A. (1979): An Economic Basis for the National Defense Argument for Aiding Certain Industries. In: The Journal of Political Economy, vol. 87, 1–36. Trotzky, Leo (1925): Die Lehren der Revolution. Berlin: Laubsche Verlagsbuchhandlung. Tucker, Robert (1969): The Marxian Revolutionary Idea. New York: Norton.

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4

Democracy and the Military—Updating the Incompatibility Theorem

In the immediate aftermath of World War I, the classic sociological theorems concerning the relationship between the military and modern society appeared to have been overtaken by political reality, leading to a rapid turning away from the pacifist assumptions in the social theories of Comte, Saint-Simon, Spencer and others (Kool and Krause 1967). The theorem that the military and war were incompatible with a modern industrial society appeared outmoded after the political events of the two world wars. It was not until the mid-1960s that Ludwig von Friedeburg (1966) attempted to revise these classic military sociology theories, despite or maybe precisely because of the new dimension that war had gained in modern societies. Friedeburg picked up the ‘incompatibility theorem’ of industrial labor and military power developed by Saint-Simon and Comte (Saint-Simon 1957, 1975; compare Ionescu 1976; Manuel 1956), which referred predominantly to the historic opposition of the bourgeoisie to the feudal system in the eighteenth century, and modified it to take account of the modern social context. Essentially, it was only the relatively long period of peace in Europe after World War II and the beginning of the nuclear age that permitted a rediscovery of the incompatibility theorem by modern military sociology. This revival, however, only took up the main basic idea of the incompatibility of traditional military power and industrial society; otherwise, the assumptions and prophecies implicit in the nineteenth century were consciously excluded. The new assumption of the incompatibility of the military and a modern industrialized society was based on four central theses (Lippert 1986): Firstly, the thesis that the military has lost its function. In a political costbenefit calculation war—and with it the use, and ultimately even the existence of military forces—have lost their function as a means with which the political sphere can enforce specific interests by the application of force.

© The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Fachmedien Wiesbaden GmbH, part of Springer Nature 2023 F. Kernic, War, Peace and the Military, Militär und Sozialwissenschaften/ The Military and Social Research 56, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-658-40521-2_4

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Democracy and the Military—Updating the Incompatibility Theorem

Secondly, the assumption of the structural inability of modern industrialized societies to wage war. Modern societies appeared to be structurally no longer able to wage war against their peers without at the same time entertaining the risk of self-destruction (Knies 1988: 79 f.; Lutz 1988; Neuneck 1988; Schwarz 1989; Müller 1987). Thirdly, the thesis of the economic unprofitability of war and the military. War and the military appeared to be highly unprofitable in economic terms. The economic costs of preparing for war, which are anyway intended only to prevent war, appeared to be an unproductive investment, and at the least raised the question of whether there are no cheaper means of preventing war than that of costly armaments. Fourthly, the assumption that the military has lost its legitimacy. The principle of the organized collective employment of force was becoming increasingly problematic in modern industrialized societies. Consequently, the military in the post-war period started to suffer an enormous loss of legitimacy and public support. This chapter seeks to trace the question of the compatibility/incompatibility of modern, post-war (democratic) society with military force in greater detail. It will commence with an examination of the incompatibility theorem in its new form, before proceeding to an analysis of the modern social science critique of the theorem as articulated, above all, within political science and political sociology (Huntington 1957; Janowitz 1960). This line of argument within the social sciences can be understood as a theory of ‘interdependence’ between the military and society. A further aspect, which is raised in this connection in the empirically focused social sciences, is that of the difference between military and social value hierarchies. Finally, the social science discussion regarding the compatibility/incompatibility of the military and modern society—proceeding from the discussion of values—generally leads to a discussion of the relationship between the political system (form of government) and the military or defense structure. Late twentieth century discourse started to center on the structural relationship between democracy and the military (military violence). It is self-evident that this issue touches a point that has become the focus of a broad public debate in various countries around the globe, particularly in liberal democratic societies. The key question here is the structural link between the modern defense or military system and the concepts of political order and governance that are today associated with the idea of democracy (i.e., concepts of ‘civil-military relations’ in democratic states; Shields 2015; Croissant and Kühn 2011).

4.1 The New School of the Incompatibility Theorem

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The New School of the Incompatibility Theorem

There can be no doubt that the period of peace in Europe after World War II produced a social climate that was no longer primarily oriented to war and which therefore opened up the possibility of reading the theorems of classical sociology, with their basic pacifist tenor, in a new light. In this way, the normality of peace in the Western hemisphere in the 1970s and 1980s opened the door for a rediscovery of the classical theory of the incompatibility of the military and society. This revival picked up the main basic idea of the incompatibility of traditional military force and industrial society, but otherwise deliberately left aside the early sociological prophecies of the impending ‘death of the military’. At the same time, the incompatibility theorem was integrated into a new societal context, i.e., adapted to the new conditions of the nuclear age (Vogt 1978: 545–591, 1980: 37–74, 1983). The traditional theorem of an incompatibility between the military and society was based on a specific image of the soldier that had its roots in the political, economic and social conditions of the eighteenth century. This is the image of the military as the main pillar of the monarchy and the state (with which the monarch is identified), a role, which led to the rejection of civil rights and all aspects of the modern industrial world by the military. Undoubtedly, social conditions have decisively changed since then, but then military organizations and the institution and application of military force have also significantly changed (Croissant and Kühn 2011; Elbe and Richter 2005). The dichotomy between a bellicose and an industrial society that played such a dominant role in nineteenth century sociology vanished from its theoretical approaches after World War II. Industrial society and war were no longer mutually exclusive in modern incompatibility theorems, even though some social scientists and sociologists continued to cling to the idea of a fundamental incompatibility (Mosen 1967). Above all, the aim was to avoid the fallacies of nineteenth century social science approaches, which predicated—frequently based on the philosophical assumption that history followed a linear progression—the guaranteed development from industrialization to democratization and hence to demilitarization. Essentially, in the 1970s and 1980s two lines of thought emerged in the revival of the traditional incompatibility theorem. The first was oriented to the problem of nuclear weapons and the related question of human survival, the second, to the relationship between military and democratic structures. The relevance of the updated assumption of incompatibility proceeding from a sociology of the nuclear age was first and foremost the result of the technological development and

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perfection of modern nuclear weapons and the associated potential for destruction. A ‘forced rationality’ based on fear of a nuclear catastrophe caused war and the military to appear obsolete as instruments of rational calculating policy, of rational security and defense policy. An escalation of (conventional) military force to nuclear force with the possibility of overkill would lead to a breakdown of Clausewitzian thought, according to which war is an instrument of politics, because the use of this instrument would destroy those who employ it (Nerlich 1966). On the other hand, behind the idea that military and democratic structures were incompatible lay the conviction that a bellicose—and thus centralized and authoritarian—societal structure follows different rules to an industrial-democratic society (Cunis 1968: 123). The incompatibility of a modern democratic-liberal society with the military assumes that the military still orients itself to the bureaucracy of an authoritarian state and has therefore always opposed all liberal civic movements and democratization processes. This problem of incompatibility can easily be considered from an organizational theory perspective: The principles of military organization recognize an essential dichotomy between organizational demands and individual interests to a much greater degree than does, for example, industry regarding the relationship between employer and employee. In contrast to an industrial enterprise, within the military there is indeed a genuine incompatibility of family life with life in the barracks as well as a completely different social and communicative relationship between superiors and subordinates. Achieving maximum organizational efficiency within the military demands the complete submission of the individual, up to and including his/her willingness to die for the organization (or the state represented by the military institution). It is precisely this point that constitutes the unique quality of the military organization, what distinguishes it most clearly from all industrial organizations. This does not mean, of course, that all parts of the military organization seek to implement this totalitarian claim in daily practice. In this respect, there are gradual differences, especially in peacetime armies, but the basic tendency certainly applies to the organization as a whole. The updated incompatibility theorem radically broke with the traditional assumption of a ‘gradual integration’ of the military into society, and with all predictions regarding a symbiosis between the military, society and the state (Zapotoczky 1978; Zoll 1979). Various authors even suggested to interpret the Cold War societal trends as a process of ‘disintegration’, in which the military increasingly distances itself from social spheres and civilian life. According to this view, the Cold-War military organizations in Western democratic societies increasingly tended to enter into a kind of ‘societal isolation’ in which a new,

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genuinely military subculture was able to develop, which clearly dissociates itself from all that is civilian or non-military (Vogt 1986; Bigler 1968).

4.2

Social Science Critique of the New Incompatibility Theorem

From the outset, the updated theory of a general incompatibility between the military and modern society was also heavily criticized by certain strands of social science research. Following Samuel P. Huntington in particular, numerous researchers have tended to view the civil-military relationship as a complex system of interdependent elements or factors (Huntington 1957). Changes on the one side in each case provoke reactions on the other, for which reason one can rightly speak of society’s basic ability to integrate the military and vice-versa of the military’s ability to integrate the predominant societal values and forms of behavior (Ashkenazy 1994; Bald 1994; Burk 1994). Recognizing this interdependence between society and the military does not signify that there are no differences and distinctions between the two spheres, but instead points to an interaction of different social constructions. However, these differences are not to be interpreted as opposites, but rather as diverging social expressions. Moritz Janowitz and Roger W. Little (1965a, b) even went one step further in their treatise Sociology and the Military Establishment and saw a change in as much that a general harmonization between the two spheres was taking place, which would increasingly reduce the divergences. In this way, they turned the incompatibility theory on its head so to speak, turning it into a general ‘compatibility theorem’. Janowitz stated that the modern armed forces were changing, in as much as there was a shift away from military authority toward an emphasis on building a common consensus. According to him, this process was accompanied by a widening of the social background of military personnel with increasing representation of all social strata (during this change, lower social strata were in fact even overrepresented). Of course, a core military elite of unconventional, adaptable individuals would continue to exist who would differ in this way from the technical elite. But the radical changes experienced by the military organizations in the second half of the twentieth century (as a result of social change) went hand in hand with increasing doubts about the traditional military self-image. Janowitz regarded the reduction of the divergence between military and civilian activities as a consequence of the rising share of technical and bureaucratic specialists in modern armies. According to him, the organizational differences between military

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and non-military bureaucracies could never be completely eliminated (Janowitz and Little 1965b: 29). In conjunction with this process of social modernization, rapid technological progress and the changed function of military force in democratic industrialized societies after World War II, Huntington (1962) identified rising levels of frustration and increased tensions within the military elite. The increasing reduction of differences between society and the military thus contrasted with an increase in divergences within the military organization. According to Huntington, this new civil-military relationship was only one aspect of the new roles of violence and of military elites in world politics resulting from the balance of terror, technological advancement, the decline of empire, the process of modernization, and the increased importance of general and regional collective-security arrangements. In most modern industrial societies, the changing functions of the military establishment seemed to produce significant tensions and frustrations within the officer corps. The traditional military officer—the ‘generalist’ skilled in the command of troops in battle—was caught between the technician, on the one hand, and the guerilla, on the other. (ibid. 13 f.; compare Lyons 1961: 53–63)

Two decades later, Gwyn Harries-Jenkins (1982), on the other hand, viewed the question of incompatibility from the perspective of a ‘warfare versus welfare’controversy. As we enter the 1980s, defence planning continues to be considerably affected by the issue of whether an industrialized democratic society can ‘afford’ to maintain armed forces of a traditional kind. To an understandable extent the question is often seen as an economic issue. (ibid. 2)

These government decisions concerning which specific endeavors a society should undertake and which it should eschew are ultimately nothing but an expression of a political decision option. Undoubtedly, such a decision is always shaped by a series of factors, such as the general threat perception and the attitudes or values of society as a whole. Within social science research there is a discernable trend to transfer the question of the incompatibility theorem from the societal level to that of the individual. A civil-military divide then manifests itself at the level of the individual soldier and his/her values and actions. In the early 1980s, Nils Andrén and Einar Lyth (1982) used the example of the Swedish armed forces in their attempt to argue in favor of an elimination of the difference between civil and military society. They pointed out that “in Sweden there is a distinct tendency to reduce the difference

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between ‘civil’ and ‘military’ society and a desire to emphasize that the military is simply carrying out one of the many functions accepted as necessary by the society as a whole” (ibid. 138). At the same time, however, this tendency shifts the question of a civil-military difference away from the societal level to that of the individual: “The civil-military interplay between society and army may then be said to take place within these individuals themselves and not, as in many countries, between soldiers and other citizens” (ibid. 139). Accordingly, the issue of compatibility/incompatibility is reduced to the question of whether an individual is playing two different conflicting roles—once as a soldier, then as a citizen. From this, modern thought derived the concept of the ‘citizen in uniform’. Economically focused analyses do not, as a rule make explicit reference to a theory of incompatibility, but they do raise the problem of ‘alienation’, which should draw attention to an incompatibility existing between the military and society: The patterns of authority typical of all armies are adapted to the requirements of a situation, violent combat, which is atypical for all societies—or at least is normally treated as such by civilians—and which is indeed rare in the experience of most armies. As the technological resources for warfare have been developed, war has become more socially inclusive. And as war becomes more socially inclusive, the contradictions between the social structure of armies and the social structure of civil societies (particularly large-scale democratic societies), have become more striking and more problematic. (Abrams 1970: 27)

Even an ideology of common purpose can then no longer stem, let alone reverse, an alienation of the social structure of the armed forces from those of the civil societies. In this way, the dilemma of the military is to some extent inevitable, the actual crisis of the military lies in this alienation from society: The military dilemma is clear. The soldier’s task involves the authoritarian creation of order. But the purpose of the task is to defend a society in which authority is legitimate only to the extent that it is the product of democratic processes and in which disorder rather than order is treated as the defining feature of democracy. The services thus find themselves in the position of being a socially necessary institution of which the distinctive values are socially derogated. This is of course a gross exaggeration of the day-to-day situation as experienced by most soldiers. (ibid. 27)

In this context, Abrams picks up the five elements, which Seemann identified in the term alienation: isolation, powerlessness, meaninglessness, normlessness and self-estrangement (ibid. 29).

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It appears that some, but not all, of the elements of alienation are likely to characterize all military establishments and especially the military establishments of capitalist democracies. […] In sum, it appears that the functions imposed on the armed forces by civil society in capitalist democracies […] make military institutions particularly suitable settings for the development of some elements of alienation. (ibid. 34)

Abrams is by no means alone with this interpretation. Several other modern social science researchers draw attention to the problem of alienation between the military and society (for example, Greenwood 1970), although some of them regard the chief consequences of such a process as nothing more than a social attitude toward the military and the behavior of soldiers that is characterized by indifference and apathy. In contrast, a completely different line of interpretation emerged as part of a trend within empirical social research that placed greater emphasis on social theory and a theory of the integration of the military in society. In the mid-1970s, Bachman et al. (1977) attempted to study the contemporaneous relationship between the military and society in the USA and to answer the question as to what were, and would in future be, the specific consequences for the civilmilitary relationship of the new recruitment system of the all-volunteer force. Their research results initially pointed in principle to the gradual rise of a more strongly career-focused military with a narrower pro-military ideology within the armed forces. Furthermore, the radical transition from a mass army to a volunteer force also had corresponding effects on American civil-military relations: The last few decades have seen sweeping changes in the nature of the U.S. military and its relationship with the civilian society. The development of awesome new weapon systems led to a decreasing need for massive amounts of military manpower. This, plus the growing dissatisfaction with the Vietnam War, set the stage for a crucial decision made in the late sixties and implemented in the early seventies: the decision to end conscription and rely entirely on volunteers to staff the armed forces. One of the undesirable side effects of this decision may have been the exacerbation of two problems: (1) the problem of representativeness, i.e., whether service personnel reflect a range of demographic characteristics and ideologies nearly as broad as those in the civilian sector; and (2) the related problem of civil control of the military, i.e., whether military personnel can be counted upon to function in ways that are generally consistent with the ideology of the civilian population. […] Our review of recent reenlistment data suggests that one-term citizen-soldiers are on the decline, being replaced more and more by those who reenlist and perhaps contemplate military careers. (Bachman et al. 1977: 23 f.)

Decisions concerning the specific structure of a military or defense system undoubtedly influence the way the military organization and military force are

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embedded in society. Generally, it appears that professional armies are at a much higher risk of being pushed into social isolation than are conscript armies. The research results obtained by Bachman, Blair and Segal are also interesting in as much as they conclude that one cannot really speak of a real incompatibility between the military and society as long as there is no dramatic decline in the willingness of young people to serve in the military, even when it is no longer mandatory, and the esteem in which the military is held is not detrimentally affected in comparison with other social institutions, and especially as long as there is no loss of public confidence in the leadership qualities of the military elite (ibid. 39). As an institution, the military has been highly regarded by the American people, and it retained this regard throughout the Vietnam War period. Confidence in the people in charge of the military, by contrast, declined in conjunction with decreased confidence in the leadership of other social institutions, but remained at a high level relative to these other institutions. There are indications that civilian rather than military leaders are held responsible for America’s involvement in war. Therefore, the decline in confidence in the leaders of the military may, in fact, reflect decreasing faith in the civilians in control, rather than in the military institution. (ibid. 38 f.)

4.3

Changing Values and Military Organization

In modern sociology, there is almost a surfeit of analyses and studies pertaining to the question of social change in the era of modernity. The emergence of countless social movements, upheavals within the landscape of political parties and the end of the Cold-War-bipolarity in international relations have raised awareness of the discontinuities. But what is in fact different in comparison to the past, what is specifically new about late-modern, post-modern or post-industrial society (Haferkamp and Smelser 1992)? The problem of defining our own current position (without having the necessary distance yet to judge from a historian’s perspective), is reflected in the terms generally used to describe the ensuing periods (from post-modern to post-Cold War). One influential approach to dealing with this issue was the empirically focused one, which emerged within the context of the discussion concerning a sweeping ‘change of values’ in the 1970s and 1980s and which saw a contradiction between the respective value hierarchies of the military and society (Kohr 1991; Wiesendahl 1980, 1990; Zoll 1982). Following Inglehart’s (1977) theory of a general shift from materialist to so-called post-materialist values in modern societies,

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a view developed according to which values are gradually gaining ground in society that are diametrically opposed to those which predominate within the military (Klages and Kmieciak 1979, 1997; Hillmann 1986; Inglehart 1990, 1995). In the mid-1970s, Inglehart reached the following conclusion about a general change in attitudes towards the military within American society: If the value priorities of the American people are indeed changing, this would constitute a force tending gradually but steadily to undermine public support for military institutions. The American public has, at present, a predominantly positive image of military service and a generally sympathetic view of the military. Moreover, attitudinal changes in the last few years seem to have been favorable. […] Assuming, on the other hand, that there will be a revival of prosperity and continued peace, the process of value change would apparently continue. This would not in itself ensure an automatic decline in mass support for military institutions. In a given situation, different motivations can lead to similar attitudes. One can conceive other circumstances under which both materialists and postmaterialists would wholeheartedly support the maintenance of strong defense forces. […] If this is true, we may be witnessing a gradual but protracted erosion of public support for military institutions. (Inglehart 1976: 277)

The assumption of a radical change of values of course points equally to radical changes in the social integration of the military (Bredow 1995). If it really is the case that modern societies are moving toward new lifestyles and new value orientations, then the military as a stabilizing factor for established forms of rule and as a fundamentally conservative element will either become isolated or will be forced to participate in various social changes itself. In any case, such an assumption indicates a deepening of the divide between the military and society. This becomes even clearer when one realizes the way such a value change is conceptualized in these theoretical approaches (Vogt 1986: 11–34). The basic idea here is that there is a shift in orientation away from socalled materialistic values (‘to have’, material enjoyment, economic growth, competition, egoism, individualism, traditionalism, masculinity, domination, subordination, state, consumption etc.) to more post-materialist or ideal values (‘to be’, intellectual-sensual enjoyment, sociality, autonomy, modernity, emancipation, cooperation, participation, self-determination, pluralism etc.). In terms of the political and military spheres, this change can be described using the following concepts (Hillmann 1986: 175–190, in particular: 182–184): Areas of State, Authority and Politics

Downgraded

Upgraded

4.3 Changing Values and Military Organization

Totalitarianism, abuse of power

Human dignity, human rights

Strong state

Loss of statehood by the state

Authority

The right to privacy

Centralism

Regionalism

‘Gleichschaltung’, conformism

Pluralism, individualism

External control, indoctrination

Self-determination, ability to think critically

Manipulation

Discussion, freedom of opinion

Ethnocentrism

Equal status of cultures, tolerance

Nationalism, patriotism

Cosmopolitan orientation

Military strength, superiority

Peace

Arms race

Disarmament, arms control

Stereotypical image of the enemy

Contempt for stereotypical image of the enemy

Violence

Non-violence, peaceable

Offensive defense

Defensive defense

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etc.

From a current perspective, this theoretical approach appears to suffer from the same shortcoming as the classical incompatibility theorem, i.e., the view of social developments and change is shaped by utopian visions and anticipation. This is not to say that change has not actually taken place in this direction or that it is not even still taking place, merely that polarization and the contrasting of extreme positions always opens up such latitude, such a range of variation that a specific categorization of social reality quickly becomes problematic. Consequently, the explanatory capacity of such theories is decisively limited. Undoubtedly, the social changes of recent decades have also produced alterations to military structures, which are closely related to such change in values. However, this change should not be understood as a ‘revolution’ in the sense of Inglehart’s ‘silent revolution’, finally leading to the abolition of the military institution or a militaristic spirit. In fact, these changes seem to proceed so silently that they are barely noticed. Of course, gradual shifts and other nuances can be highly significant too, although caution and restraint should be shown with regard to the question of a deepening divide between the military and political spheres, and between society and the military, as a result of the modern value change.

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Political System and Military and Defense Structures

While modern military sociology and political science tend to study the relationship between the political system and military and defense structures by comparing different typologies, historic research has always focused on the genesis of the individual systems (Werkner 2005). Otto Hintze’s (1941) famous declaration that all state constitutions had originally been ‘military constitutions’ (Heeresverfassungen), is probably the best-known example of this type of historical analysis. The following analysis will devote itself to both aspects in equal measure, as ultimately even a critique of a pure typology is impossible without taking into consideration the historical context. The question of the genesis of the type of state and military is at heart a question concerning the ‘driven nature’ of the military or the dynamics of military violence, alternatively, military power as a promoter of social change and the establishment of political order. As such, the question of the relationship between state constitution and military constitution in the broadest sense should be posed as a question concerning the role of military force in the process of social change and in the historical process per se. In this context, the following two questions seem important: Is military force the actual promoter of social change, the engine of progress, especially when it is employed during times of war? Or is military force itself the outcome, i.e., a driven form of societal violence that is contingent upon and pre-formed by society? Otto Hintze’s answer is already familiar. In his 1906 lecture Staatsverfassung und Heeresverfassung (1941) he claimed succinctly that all state constitution is originally war constitution: Large groups of people united in the more solid structure of the state, primarily for defensive and offensive purposes. Out of this martial organization there first developed a more severe government with coercive power over individuals, and it increased in strength the more frequently wars were waged. All free men capable of bearing arms were warriors; on the side they probably also hunted or raised cattle, but agriculture and housekeeping were left to women and slaves. The assembly of the warriors was the political assembly. The commander became the head of the state; whoever was not a warrior had no place in the political community. But then there came a period, as agriculture expanded, as men took root in the soil they cultivated, as the population increased, as communications and technology increased, in short with the changed conditions of economic life, a division of military and commercial activity occurred, a separation of the warrior class and the farming class. The army becomes a specialist part of the whole; the military constitution represents a special aspect of the state constitution. (ibid. 43)

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Hintze understands the concept of the state constitution in a broad sense, i.e., he focuses in particular on two aspects, which determine the actual state constitution: “the formation of social classes on the one hand and the external formation of the states on the other; their position vis-à-vis other states and in the world” (ibid. 45). In his opinion, these two factors have always influenced the organizational structure of the military and state since antiquity: on the one hand, the social differences and conflicts between the social groups and classes within, on the other, pressure from without. The historical perspective then enables Hintze to ascribe specific ‘military systems’ (military constitutions) to the individual types of political constitutions: warrior groups to tribal and clan systems; peasant army to feudalism; mercenary armies and conscription to the absolutist state and finally, the militia system to the liberal-pluralist state constitution (compare Kernic 1997: 31–37). Since then, Hintze’s position has been repeatedly and severely criticized, for example by Christian Grimm (1981), who holds the view that the state form as such is neutral in relation to the defense structure and that considerations other than constitutional ones are decisive for the choice of the military and defense system. In this context, the reverse argument to Hintze, that each military system is the result of the respective political system, appears far more plausible than Grimm’s ‘theory of neutrality’. Thus Reinmar Cunis (1968), for example, regards the recruitment system as a consequence of the political order, from which the individual functions of the military (conquest, protection, policing tasks etc.) are derived (ibid. 124). Numerous authors follow him with this line of argument, as it corresponds with the ideas of the primacy of politics. It is upon this thought that the assumption is based that a comprehensive democratization of a state must lead to corresponding changes in the military sphere, specifically the military system and military structure. The question of the relationship of the state system and the military system is in this case, as in Hintze, interpreted as causal, but in reverse, i.e., primacy is ascribed to the political order (compare Holm 1953; Giller 1992). The crucial question in respect of the relationship between the state and military system (Werkner 2005) is therefore not one of a clear causal relationship, but instead one that enquires about the interplay between politics and the military, under which social and economic conditions military force—especially in its most extreme manifestation: war—must be ascribed the role of an engine for human culture and politics. Undoubtedly, the breakup of an exclusive social military structure after the French Revolution was linked to radical changes in state and military constitutions. It becomes apparent that the respective military and defense system does indeed correlate to specific power relationships. However, this relationship cannot

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be reduced simply to ‘standing armies/absolutist state structure’ and ‘conscription/democratic state structure’, but is instead shaped by the respective power relationships and the prevailing conviction with regard to the conceptualization of the social and political importance of military force. The greater the importance of the military for the continued existence of the community vis-à-vis external threats, the more extensively and intensively people will be called upon for military service. The greater the importance of military force for the regulation of internal conflicts, the more cautious and restrained the rulers will be with regard to arming the population (i.e., they will prefer a professional, standing army) while on the other hand, the ruled will tend to favor the arming of the people in order to emancipate themselves by military strength. As well as the respective social power relationships and the social and economic foundations of society, the conceptualization of the relationship between the state constitution and military constitution must therefore also take into account the prevailing basic convictions concerning the ‘political’ and the military. Only against this background can one understand why democracy and universal conscription or dictatorship and professional army do not automatically coincide, why the relationship between the state and military constitution cannot be understood as merely a causal relationship in one direction. Furthermore, one should not lose sight of the fact that the military never assumes just an outward social function, but always also carries out internal tasks and functions, be it the oppression of certain social classes (internal preservation of power, domination) or the integration of all social classes. It is remarkable that the latter task is incumbent upon military forces in both dictatorships and democracies. When it comes to typologies, it is worth considering the model of Morris Janowitz (1966) who used ‘value orientations’ as the basic criterion of his typology. Janowitz conceptualized military and defensive structures by distinguishing between a) an aristocratic model, b) a democratic model, c) a totalitarian model, and d) the model of the garrison state (ibid. 258). Overall, he thus allocates to each different political order an adequate military structure. His typology is of interest in as much as it does not make the usual distinction between professional armies and conscript armies the main criterion. However, this typology appears to be of limited informative value, as it is predicated upon the implicit assumption that every military structure reflects the political state of society on a small scale. However, another distinguishing criterion offers itself for the development of a typology, namely the social functions carried out by a military organization in a political order. Rapoport (1962) conceptualized the relationship between the military and the state on the basis of three different functions ascribed to an army:

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[…] it may be an instrument of foreign policy, it may be employed in domestic partisan politics to supplement police units, or it may perform general nonpartisan administrative functions that could conceivably be carried on by associations not organized for combat purposes. (ibid. 71)

Even if history shows that all armies repeatedly do, or at least could, perform all three functions; the degree of intensity with which one of these specific functions is carried out allows us to recognize, which basic political concepts and ideas underpin this society. Rapoport therefore distinguishes between three different types of state to which he ascribes a specific type of military, depending on which main function the military force has to perform. Firstly, the nation-in-arms type, a “state which uses military training to educate its citizens”, secondly, the praetorian state, and finally, the civilian-and-military polity (ibid. 71–101). For Rapoport the praetorian state represents a military force, which is independent of political control, which itself completely dominates the political domain but which at the same time loses its ability to wage external war as its power within the state expands. This type of state is one, “where private ambitions are rarely restrained by a sense of public authority or common purpose; the role of power (i.e., wealth and force) is maximized” (ibid. 72). In Rapoport’s view, this modern praetorian state is an ‘overdeveloped country’, which is not associated with a specific form of state or government, because a praetorian state is unable to provide the institutional foundation for either a democratic or a despotic orientation: Thus, in the modern world those countries that are most democratic or those that are most despotic (totalitarian dictatorships) are least likely to be praetorian […] A praetorian society has a small, extremely wealthy oligarchy and a large, poverty-stricken mass. (ibid. 73) […] The army is the most fruitful source for political intrigue, and the government conspires to promote its military supporters, while the opposition attempts to curry favor with the most strategically placed military men. The officer corps invariably attracts two distinct political types—the political adventurer willing to gamble all in a dangerous stroke and the petty bureaucrat anxious to hold his rank in successive regimes and, therefore, reluctant to proceed vigorously against a rebel group. […] The political situation makes it impossible to organize an army with real fighting qualities. (ibid. 74)

In a civilian-and-military-state the most important function of the military is to support the state’s foreign policy. Internal political stability is the product of a balance of groups, in which military power is only one aspect. For this reason,

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military service in these states is always limited and affects social groups to differing extents; frequently a significant proportion of society is completely exempt. “An enormous build-up or deterioration of the military establishment is invariably related to the waxing and waning of an external threat” (ibid. 76). If one looks at such typologies it becomes clear that the military organization is always contingent upon the social context, but ultimately they provide little information about the way in which military force exerts an influence that penetrates the political sphere. It is almost impossible to find typologies, which have the type of political decision-making as their criteria. Generally speaking, military influence on the process of political decision-making is discussed independently of questions of political order. If military force is now in its essence deemed to be an agent of state power (domination), a closer interdependence exists between governments (or the ruling class) and the military (or military elites) than exists between the political system and the military system. The military’s primary social function is then to preserve and defend an existing pattern of rule. The task of putting down and preventing revolts against the government or the rulers is thus not tied exclusively to a monarch, aristocracy or ruling class, it is so to speak, a function in the service of rulers in general, irrespective of how these are constituted (e.g., as a political party). In this context, George K. Tanham (1990) points to the military’s ‘counterinsurgency’ function: To counter such an assault, most if not all government agencies, including the military, must be mobilised. Security becomes a primary concern, as the government must assure it in order to function effectively and provide needed services to its people. The military is the only institution able to effect security once insurgency has broken out. (ibid. 82)

Of course, this point opens up an interesting perspective in relation to military structures and security policy in a broader sense (Bächler 1989). The traditional English militia system has since the Middle Ages been combined with a strong emphasis on the citizen character of the military. The English militia grew out of the Assize of Arms of 1181 and the Statute of Winchester of 1285. It was laid down that every freeman should provide himself, or be provided at the country’s expense, with certain weapons and that he should be liable to serve in a military or police capacity on the summons of the sheriff of the county, at the King’s command. (Chorley 1943: 164) The traditional English defence institution was the militia, origination in the Anglo-Saxon fyrd; the duty of all able-bodied subjects to bear arms in defence of the

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realm. Unlike a standing professional army obedient to the monarch, it presented no social or political dangers: it was simply English society with a weapon in its hand. Bearing arms was not only a duty, but a right—an aspect of English liberty. To defenders of the militia in the 18th century, the militia was the ‘constitutional force’, in contrast to that alien excrescence, the regular army of the Crown. When by the late nineteenth century the principle of obligatory service in the militia withered away, and the militia itself sank into a reserve force, the ancient civic obligation to bear arms was not, as in Prussia or France, transferred to the Army. By a historical parody, and by the grace of liberalism, it had become instead an Englishman’s birthright not to be compelled to bear arms. (Barnett 1970: 5 f.)

Barnett points out that it was only with the growth of the British Empire that the militia became obsolescent as this necessitated a professional army to play the new imperial role, i.e., for expansion tasks (ibid. 6). At the same time, however, this led to a significant drifting apart of the nation and army, as the soldiers stationed throughout the Empire now had little to do with the life of the nation in the mother country. It was only World War II that compelled the British to reintroduce conscription, which in turn contributed to a fusing together of the nation and the army, a relationship which, however, broke down again following the abolition of conscription in 1957. There is a widespread agreement in social science analysis that a professional army is the most suitable for the social function of stabilizing domination or rulership. However, such a perspective seems highly problematic. Chorley points out that the view in favor of a professional army and the general status-quo orientation overlooks a crucial point, which can be identified in modern antirevolutionary practice: “This is the device of calling up classes of men to the colours in order to hamstring whole sections of workers, who are thus obviously prevented from acting against the government in power unless they commit a definite act of mutiny” (Chorley 1943: 162). Chorley also cites examples of resistance against a professional army. At the same time, she sees a clear incompatibility between membership of a trade union and the role of the soldier, as in revolutionary situations reservists have repeatedly been used to putting down an uprising or to ending unrest or strikes. It has already been shown that contact with the civil population during the course of his military life is an important influence in undermining that conception of impersonal instrument which has been set up for the soldier as his ideal mentality. (ibid. 163) […] Now it is obviously much harder to build a palisade between soldiers and people when the soldiers are under arms for a short period only, and regard their military duty

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merely as an incident in their lives […]. The difference in mentality between a professional soldier and a citizen under arms in a force of militia type is fundamental. (ibid. 164) […] It is important […] to emphasize the fundamental political distinction which in fact exists as between officer and man in armies where the officers’ corps is based on social homogeneity. Officers […] have never been indifferent to politics in practice. (ibid. 177)

Of course, several political events in history demonstrate an officer corps’ rejection of the government. The development of a professional esprit de corps clearly shows that “in a long-service army the theory of the ‘impersonal instrument’ works only as far as the rank and file is concerned. The officers are never apart from politics in any genuine sense” (ibid. 180). On the other hand, equally numerous examples show that universal conscription is certainly not an adequate instrument for establishing a democratic army. From the standpoint of a progressive democracy a conscript army is not, therefore, in itself a sufficient safeguard even against counter-revolution. […] The salient fact seems to emerge conclusively that in revolutionary situations, with the exception of those placed against a background of unsuccessful war, the attitude of the army will be determined mainly by the attitude of the corps of officers. (ibid. 181)

The theoretical subordination of military force to the primacy of politics in the modern period is also in keeping with the main approach of contemporary social science research pertaining to the military. Besides the question of how well the military is integrated into society, it is the issue of clear political control over the military that constitutes the main research focus. However, all this ignores the most paradoxical situation in which the military finds itself when it is not being directly employed, namely, its complete orientation toward the application of military force, i.e., even in peacetime, war is the standard according to which the organization is measured. The resulting legitimation strategy, according to which the prevention of war ought to be the military’s prime objective, is at best a temporary one with an exclusively outward focus. The form of organization taken by military force in peacetime is always different to the one it assumes in the event of an operational scenario or deployment. This is also true of professional armies, which—albeit to a far lesser extent than a militia army—change their organizational form or the formation of military force (at least partially) in times of war. This marks a fundamental difference between a political system and a military structure: While the political system aims for

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permanency (even beyond a war), i.e., is designed for continuity, a peacetime military structure is always only ever a ‘provisional’ organizational form that is geared to deployment while at the same time anticipating transmutation into a different formation of military force.

4.5

Democracy and the Military

Modern sociology uses numerous of adjectives such as democratic, pluralistic, industrial etc. to describe the structure of modern society. This is an attempt to describe society as a large social entity in which a host of individuals and groups are linked to one another in a frame of reference. The use of the term ‘democratic’ refers to a frame of reference, which is oriented toward social equality, a universally valid system of norms and freely competing system of societal roles. To the present day, the conviction that a martial societal structure follows different laws to an industrial democratic one lies behind the idea that the military and a democratic structure are incompatible with one another (Cunis 1968: 123). This is the point of departure for a broad sociological discussion (starting in the second half of the twentieth century), which has its focus on the issue of a general compability/incompability of modern democratic society with the military organization and use of force. This debate has also drawn attention to the aspect of ‘democratization’ of the armed forces and security policy in general and political participation by soldiers in democratically structured states (Klein 1991a, b; Moerchel 1989; Burk 2002). Before proceeding further, the term democracy needs to be clarified. Paul Noack rightly pointed out that none of the forms of state, which have emerged since the eighteenth century have eschewed the term democracy (Noack 1976: 123). This is essentially possible because democracy has always been an ambiguous term, which even in the ancient Greek period could be used to refer to both the citizens of a community in their entirety and merely the underclass, the majority of the propertyless and assetless population. The reference to the rule of the people (governance) becomes visible through the etymological origin of the term (demos, people; kratein, rule). Nevertheless, the extent to which democracy implies the rule of the people still requires interpretation. This is firstly because in the second half of the twentieth century two contrasting understandings of the term emerged, namely free and totalitarian democracy. Secondly, however, differing approaches wish to see democracy interpreted differently: on the one hand as a general form of state rule, on the other as the constitutional structure of a society and state, or however, as the valid structure

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of organization and rule within important social sub-spheres (e.g., the economy). Overall, the modern understanding of democracy is oriented toward a variety of aspects, as shown by the elitist, economic, pluralist, participatory, social and critical approaches to a theory of democracy (Bealey 1988; Eisenstadt 1992; Held 1987). The French Revolution can be seen as a turning point for the modern understanding of democracy. Following Jean-Jacques Rousseau’s doctrine of the sovereignty of the people—with an emphasis placed upon the general will (volonté générale)—a new social movement unfolded. This popular movement initiated a gradual rise of the modern democracies in the nineteenth century, and at the same time significantly contributed to the development of those different ideologies, political mass movements and (subsequently) parties, which in the late nineteenth and twentieth centuries chose democratization as one of their key political catchwords. The struggle over the priority to be accorded to liberty or equality within democracy at the same time highlights a fundamental difference between opposing democratic movements and ideologies. Historically the political conflicts between the various social groups over democratization in the nineteenth century gradually led to the development of those specific modern forms of state and society, which to the present day are characterized by a mixture of liberal-constitutional and democratic elements. The Greek polis was—and this has to be said from a modern perspective—not a democracy in the sense of civic equality (Sinclair 1988), and was therefore certainly not an ‘ideal type’ of a modern democratic form of state. It is above all the idea of representation that is the quintessence of the modern understanding of democracy. In place of a direct representation of the people, rule in modern democracies is exercised by different political leaders and governments, who are able to gain acceptance in a competitive contest between various political groups and parties on behalf of and under the control of the people. The development of representative democracy is at the same time a central feature of the prevailing modern democratic state type. Frequently, the ‘democratic method’ was first and foremost linked to the concept of institutional arrangements and political decisions for the common good by making the people itself decide issues through the election of individuals who are to assemble to carry out its will (Schumpeter 1950: 397). This concept stood out in contrast to the theory of ‘competitive democracy’, as espoused above all by Josef Schumpeter in the middle of the twentieth century. He defined the ‘democratic method’ as “that institutional arrangement for arriving at political decisions in which individuals acquire the power to decide by means of a competitive struggle for the people’s vote” (ibid. 428).

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The linking of the concept of democracy with the idea of the state founded on the rule of law is an important legacy of the liberal-constitutional movement. Above all the idea of the constitution as a key element of democracy played a decisive role in terms of practical politics in the past. The basic idea is that a people regulates the manner in which it lives together (social existence) by means of laws (legal system), which are its own work, whereby the basic principles of this social existence are anchored in the constitution. In this way, and at the same time, a specific problem of legitimacy developed for modern democracy as this requires a constitution as a framework (a constitution as a common basic agreement) through which simultaneously the central procedural rules of political life (decision-making) are prescribed. This anchoring of principles and procedures within the constitution clearly demands a certain transparency to keep pace with processes and social change. The theory-based distinction between a narrow and a broad concept of the state founded on the rule of law embodies in this context the conceptual transition from a constitution to a state of ‘being constituted’. The state does not then have a constitution, it is a constitutional state; it does not have a parliamentary democracy, it is a parliamentary democracy. Thus, a further element of the modern understanding of democracy must be addressed: parliamentarianism. Although the modern international system is also characterized by different parliamentary types and systems, parliamentarianism nevertheless forms a key political system for control and the regulation of conflicts, which in modern societal systems has developed into a central and important instrument (in this context, also compare the current discussion regarding plebiscitary and direct democracy). Of course, each specific form of democracy and each of the understandings of democracy referred to here has different consequences for the relationship between democracy and the military/defense structure. In respect of the relationship between military organization and democracy, this raises a multitude of questions. Firstly, one fundamental question refers to the ‘place’ held by the military within a political system. Which social functions and tasks are ascribed to the military organization? How is the will of the people expressed? How can the people exercise control over the military organization? Secondly, this can be taken a step further, with democracy being interpreted as a specific form of societal organization, which in turn raises the question of whether a democratic society that is understood as a comprehensive system is in fact even compatible with undemocratically structured social sub-systems (e.g., the economy or the military). Thirdly, the idea of constitution and the rule of law raises the questions of the legality of the military and the lawfulness of its actions, particularly of how military force is anchored in the constitution. The

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idea of the constitution is once again linked to the question of the relationship between state constitution and military constitution. The idea of democracy as a model for resolving conflicts in turn raises the question of whether the attempt to mediate internal conflicts without the use of force does not lead to a demand to also eschew military force as a mean of asserting external interests. Reinmar Cunis presented the classical view of the relationship between a modern societal democratization process and a (related) structural change within the military organization when he wrote: The military thus loses its educating function, much of its special norm system and its sub-cultural ‘soldierly’ character. However, the democratization of a large organization also means bureaucratization. […] A democratic army is not characterized by the abolition of channeled command structures, by avoiding hierarchies or the ownership of weapons. It is instead characterized by integration in the democratic (pluralist) societal system, the avoidance of sub-cultural peculiarities and by comprehensive civilian control. (Cunis 1968: 128)

As Cunis makes clear, the striving by modern Western democracies for a clear separation of the military and political spheres, places the spotlight on the question of effective political control over the military. It is precisely this problem that is addressed in the recent social science discussion concerning ‘democratic control’ of the armed forces (Born 2003), above all in connection with the social and the political transformation processes toward democratization (of political systems and armed forces) in many regions at the end of the twentieth century (Ehrhart 1998). The idea of a comprehensive ‘democratization of the military organization’ means a clear subordination of military force to politics, the clear instrumentalization of the military and (related to this) the establishment of an effective possibility for the control and management of this instrument by the political sphere. It is the question through which techniques and procedures military force can itself be mastered and controlled. Samuel Huntington made two, perhaps surprising suggestions (Huntington 1957: 80). Firstly, the maximization of civilian power—which he identified as subjective civilian control –, and secondly, the maximization of military professionalism or objective civilian control. According to Huntington, this objective control is achieved in the case of a professional army because the armed forces stand outside the civilian societal structures, thus minimizing their impact on and the extent to which they shape wider society. In Huntington’s view, a specialist army is the one most likely to meet these expectations of objective civil control. His argument is based on the assumption that such an army grows out the civilian sphere itself (civilian professions) and is

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thus actually comprised not of soldiers in the traditional sense, but rather of scientists and specialist technicians who carry out their profession as civil experts for military purposes (ibid. 83 f.). This led Huntington to the idea that a highly professionalized army produces an extremely apolitical attitude. Predicated upon his theory of professionalization, Huntington regarded the officer corps of the modern armies as the guarantor of effective control over the military, as they, as a professional group with specialist expertise, are indeed willing to defend democracy. However, Huntington’s theory provokes criticism. It is more than questionable and cannot be empirically proven whether Huntington’s theory of professionalization does indeed apply to modern societies and whether the military really does enjoy the extensive autonomy that is characteristic of the professions. In fact, history shows that it cannot be taken for granted that a professional officer corps will automatically defend democracy. Indeed, the basically conservatively oriented officers in Western industrialized nations tend to ally themselves with rather traditionally-oriented political elites, i.e., in the final analysis, they see themselves as the custodians and servants of the traditional state. Recent empirical studies concerning the self-perception of and political orientation within the military elites of Western democracies point less to a deeply rooted understanding of democracy than to a strong affinity on the part of the professional soldier for a conservative-traditional political orientation, which frequently possesses not even a hint of democratic consciousness. This tendency is, moreover, strengthened by the hierarchically directed, bureaucratic organization of the military, which if anything promotes authoritarian rather than democratic views (Bermbach 1991; Bahrdt 1987). Jacques van Doorn (1969) picked up Huntington’s question regarding the relationship between professionalization and the primacy of politics. He advanced the theory that only a highly professionalized officer corps was willing to completely accept political control by a civilian government. Jacques van Doorn granted that Huntington’s theory was empirically strengthened by events in modern democratic societies, where the highly professionalized armies did indeed appear to have little inclination to intervene in politics. “It may be concluded that the reprofessionalization of the military in the post-revolutionary period […] will not really endanger the political control pattern unless the political culture is low” (ibid. 30). He therefore saw a need to modify Finer’s and Huntington’s theory: It is not a low political culture as such that permits military intervention, but the impotence of the regime to safeguard the political order by a rapidly constructed pattern of organizational and other controls. Nor is it professionalization as such that prevents

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military intervention in politics, but the existence of a deep-rooted tradition of military detachment as well as the existence of a pattern of political control. (ibid. 31)

It is only where there is a functioning democracy that professionalization might be seen as an element that could optimally reduce the political ambitions of the military in favor of an unlimited political primacy of the civil sphere (Bald 1994: 160; Finer 1962: 87 f.). Abrahamsson (1971) on the other hand, attempted to show that specialization and professionalization always carry within them the seed of militarization, as the military permanently lives in the assumption that it could just as well carry out governmental and administrative tasks in a civil sense. For this reason, there is a continuous potential risk of the military encroaching upon politics. In turn, only a high level of bureaucratization is able to promote the primacy of politics. “In this sense bureaucratic rationalization contributes to political stability, to internal and to international security” (Bald 1994: 161). Seen from this perspective, ‘overbureaucratization’ indeed appears to be a contribution to peace. It is necessary to re-examine the process of social democratization and to consider the impacts of this change on the principles of political order. Reinmar Cunis’ hypothesis is that within the framework of basic democratic orientations, the quickening of the social division of labor and the altering of military functions have resulted in a process of evolutionary change from an army based on conscript cadres to one predicated upon specialists. (Cunis 1968: 124)

The conceptions of a strategy of exhaustion underpinning the conscript armies of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries thus had finally to be abandoned since, according to Cunis, they no longer correspond at all to a society based on the division of labor in which specialist functions are reserved for specialist institutions (ibid.). Conscription would thus be replaced by a free choice of profession. This raises the question of the military system, which in public and political science discussions since the 1990s has primarily articulated as a problem of retaining or abandoning the system of universal conscription (Werkner 2004; Malešiˇc 2003). For modern political thought the choice of a particular military/defense system is no more than a partial problem of practical politics. The decision to opt for a specific military system and the determination of military functions are both considered to be consequences of the political order and the decision-making processes associated therewith. The military/defense system is

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thus a component part of the political order in which the value systems, behaviors and convictions necessary for the genesis and development of the political system are applied completely independently of military force. Such a concept, which clearly proceeds from the primacy of politics and perceives everything that is military solely as a component part of the political system demonstrates without doubt its inherent coherence and logic. Various sociological studies attempt to place the diverse forms of modern military systems in a historical framework, in which a specific military system is a consequence of a comprehensive technologization or industrialization forming part of a process of modernization or civilization. Referring to the development of Western civilization (in his words, the world of the Germanic-Roman peoples), Hintze differentiated between three great epochs, in which specific types of state and military constitutions appear to be linked: the epoch of the tribal and clan constitution in early history, the epoch of feudalism in the Middle Ages and the militarism of the modern age, which presents to us the dual image of, on the one hand, the absolutist military state and, on the other, liberal constitutions with predominantly militia type defense orders. (Hintze 1941: 48)

In so doing, he made direct reference to the work of Spencer, who pointed to the link between the industrial type of society (as in the militia systems of England and the US) and the idea of political self-government. Very early on, the idea of a ‘militia system’ was linked in Switzerland with a specific model of political order. Hintze attempted to demonstrate that a communal-confederal state system does not harmonize with militarism. Already in the middle of the nineteenth century, T.H. Green (1986: 135 f.) had firmly contested the notion that professional armies could be seen as the consequence of a comprehensive process of civilization. In paragraph 173 of his Principles of Political Obligation, he wrote in respect of this question: Standing armies, again, though existing on a larger scale now than ever before, are not products of the civilisation of Europe, but of the predominance over that civilisation of the old dynasteiai. The influences which have given rise to and keep up those armies essentially belong to a state of things in which mankind […] is not yet thoroughly organised into political life. (ibid. 135)

At the same time, Green attempted to show “that the military system of Europe is no necessary incident of the relations between independent states, but arises from the fact that the organisation of state-life, even with those people that have been brought under its influence at all, is still so incomplete” (ibid. 136). It is possible

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to see the historical development of universal conscription (as a form of military recruitment) as linked to the democratically constituted state. However, a system of universal conscription is no more a necessary consequence of democracy than the former necessarily brings with it an automatic democratization of the political system. In this respect, Rautenberg (1987) even expressed the view that the history of universal conscription in the nineteenth and early twentieth century made “no contribution to the history of democratisation, the achievement and securing of social and political civil rights” (ibid. 36). The relationship between democracy and military/defense system is not to be understood as a causal relationship. It is more a case of a special behavioral mode of the political vis-à-vis military force, more specifically, the subordination of the military to the rule of the citizen or people. Democracy is thus characterized as a specific form of state because the monopoly on military force is not in the hands of a ruler (monarchy or dictatorship) or of a specific group or social class (aristocracy, oligarchy), but in the hands of the many, the whole, people (polity or democracy). Viewed in respect of the relationship between democracy and military/defense system, the idea of the primacy of politics and control of the military by the people becomes the real characteristic of this form of state. It is only possible to speak of a democratic form of state in cases where military force is completely subordinated to the political. The relationship between democracy and military/defense system is thus to be understood as a specific relationship of dependency, in which military force must give way to the will of the people. Military force has to incorporate itself into the political system in a subordinate manner that is tied to concrete procedures relating to its deployment. Decisions about the use of military force take place via a specific process of decision making, as a rule based on majority decisions. In the Greek polis this process was tied to the popular assembly; in modern democracies, it occurs via parliament. The binding of military force to this decision is simultaneously an elementary characteristic of democracy, i.e., the military does not make its own autonomous decisions. Deployment of military force (war) and preparations for deployment (the general constitution of the armed forces) are directly dependent on the political, upon political actions and decisions of the people. This concept, common both to ancient and modern democratic thought, gave rise to the idea of a fundamental peaceful orientation of democracy. Alexis de Tocqueville (1976, 2006) criticized democracy’s inability to maintain the capacity to conduct war, which led to its risking losing out to militarily more competent neighbors in the competitive struggle with other states. After all, the whole of modern sovereignty theory is based on the ius ad bellum, the strength and capacity

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of the state to use force internally and externally and thus allegedly simultaneously secure peace. By contrast, the Enlightenment recognized the democratic form of the state as the most important precondition for the creation of peace between states. In this approach, the fundamental orientation of democracies towards peace was seen not as resulting from the complete disappearance of military force within the democratic state form, but rather of depriving it of its tie to the monarch and instead transferring it to the people itself (compare Kernic 2017). It was not until the pacifist movements of the late nineteenth century that the type of political thought emerged according to which democracy and military are fundamentally contradictory, i.e., the assumption of disfunctionality of war and military organization in the modern industrialized society. Morris Janowitz for his part tried to capture the process of democratization of the military by conceiving of the armed forces in instrumental terms as a ‘defensive structure’ of the pluralist society based on the division of labor (Janowitz and Little 1965a). In this way, the military becomes an instrument for overcoming conflict of the democratic state and it is for the people itself to decide upon its concrete organizational form and key tasks. In terms of technical procedure, this means that basic decisions regarding the military/defense system always come about via representative-democratic channels, via government and parliament, and the implementation of these decisions is always subject to the political scrutiny of parliament. Even if there is no military or defense system that can be necessarily ascribed to the system of democracy it is none the less possible to identify some central problems related to military organizations that confront democratically constituted societies. First, one can mention the ever-present tendency of the military sphere, which aspires to autonomy vis-à-vis the political and ultimately to overcoming the democratic state form in favor of one that in organizational-structural respects corresponds more closely to its own system and the decision-making processes and procedures contained therein. Second, democracies are not fundamentally peaceful, but also tend to employ military force against other states. To the extent that there is a dominant view of the necessity of the external application of such military measures and of military force, there will be a strong predisposition towards a professional army. By contrast, where there is a stronger defensive orientation the idea of a militia and of universal conscription (understood here not as a universal obligation to wartime service!) gains strength. Even in a democratic form of state the actual system of recruitment is therefore likely to correspond with a more offensive or defensive orientation of politics.

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German sociologist Ulrich Beck proposed a different way of looking at the linkage between democracy and the military. Taking as his point of departure a ‘sociology of the image of the enemy’ (Beck 1995: 163–182), he updated the traditional incompatibility theory. According to him, modern democracies of the West European states (Beck characterizes them as ‘states without enemies’), the contradictions between military and society, which had already been highlighted by the traditionally pacifist approaches of early sociology, were breaking down through an involuntarily pacifist capitalism (ibid.). In the nineteenth century, democratization and militarization went hand in hand, and the particular function of enemy images was to integrate military and politics. Whilst ‘images of the enemy’ (Feindbilder) continued to have this integration function during the Cold War, Beck argued that this function had collapsed with the end of the confrontation between the blocs. This however also led to the ‘end of the worst-case scenario’: As paradoxical as it might sound, the nuclear arms race made possible a demilitarization of society. Technology replaces labor. Electronic warfare becomes a matter for specialists. Being highly armed swallows up resources: money, technology, knowledge, but enables a demobilization and even a civilization of society. In this way, militarization and democratization can be simultaneously pushed forward. In this connection, I would like to interpret the individualization theory. In the same way as class cultures and the nuclear family, the individualization of the dynamics of the welfare state also dissolves the last bastion of the large collective society, namely, the ‘enemy image society’. Everybody has his own enemy, but precisely for that reason, there is no longer the common integrating enemy. This is the thesis: Individualization eliminates the worst-case scenario (in the orthodox foreign policy sense of Karl Schmitt). This cultural civilization proceeds unconsciously as a side effect of a deep-reaching change which sociologists associate with the division of labor (Durckheim), with interior-world asceticism of Calvinism (Max Weber), with the capital economy (Marx, Zimmerl). As I have attempted to show, however, it has, because of the development of the welfare state since the 1960s acquired a special form and durability. As a result of progressive individualization for the first time in history it is appropriate to state that states that bark do not bite. (Beck 1995: 171 f.)

Beck’s arguments raise several questions: Does he not succumb here to utopian notions akin to those held by early bourgeois pacifist theorists? Does he not go too far when he speaks of a democracy or a state without enemies? In view of the ‘new wars’ at the turn of the millennium, such questions appear in a new light a mere few years after the publication of his work. Is it not merely the case that the enemy is constituted differently than during the period of the Cold War? Is it not the case that in a state without enemies, military force might change in

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a way that causes it to increasingly replace the classical external function with internally-oriented functions? Are we nowadays already on the road to the ‘ecological state’ with an ecological morality and similarly ecological politics? Are we perhaps already much closer to the other in politics (doubtlessly also a subject of this publication) than appeared to be the case based on the previous paradigm analysis and attempts at interpretation? In this respect, Beck’s optimism appears remarkable, especially when he presents the scenario of the ‘sub-politicization’ of society: In the state, which loses its specificity, the ‘intimate’ relationship to force (Max Weber), the political unfolds in a new manner, but outside the political system. The weakening of the state goes hand in hand with the strengthening of other societal actors: for example, the mass media, but also pressure groups, professional associations, citizens’ initiatives and so on. The state’s loss of statehood means two things: first, a ‘sub-politicization’ of society, and second it can, in the most optimal situation, imply the creation of a negotiating state, of the state of round tables, at which domestic political and inter-state conflicts are discussed. (ibid. 179 f.)

In essence, Beck’s societal analysis leads us back to where this analysis of the relationship between politics and military force started, namely, to the conceptualization of the political with its close association to speech that is different and opens differently to war. Perhaps what we are witnessing here really is that through democracy a new relationship is developing between the self and the other than that prescribed by tradition. Yet perhaps such an assumption (as exists in the case of Beck) proves to be merely mistaken, a trap of military force itself, which can also flourish in democracy, albeit in a different guise and possibly even behind the mask of a new humanity and solidarity. Finally, it must again be asked to what extent modern Western democracies can be regarded as structurally peaceable. The concentration of modern political science in the Western hemisphere on this question should not be regarded merely as an attempt at differentiation and self-justification of its own political system vis-à-vis authoritarian systems and societies, but is also to be considered in light of a self-criticism of modern democratic theory. In this connection, reference was always made, particularly on the part of modern liberalism, to the orientation of modern democratic societies towards peace, to a fundamental connection between freedom, democracy and peace (Paine 1995; Schweller 1992; Ember et al. 1992). The thesis that liberal democratically constituted states do not engage in war needs to be relativized to the extent that political experience clearly shows that (direct) democracies or democratically constituted republics do indeed frequently get involved in war and armed conflict, albeit predominantly against

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non-democratically constituted societies (Small and Singer 1976). In such democracies military force does indeed acquire a central importance and role, which can undoubtedly be characterized as conducting or promoting war, notwithstanding the fact that such military actions conducted by modern liberal-democratic societies are presented as justified interventions with military means. Yet in modern democracies, the form of military intervention still has the same tasks and goals as existed in military expeditions in earlier times. A specific dilemma of modern societies proceeds from this position of military force in modern democracies and the function of the military for the implementation of foreign policy goals or transnational interests—as for example within the framework of NATO or UN military actions. Whilst on the one hand, values such as peace, freedom and self-determination are held up and the military organization itself appears in a critical light, on the other, transnational politics as a whole continues to be based upon this foundation of war, i.e., upon the possibility of enforcing its own interests and goals through the threat or application of military force. From this perspective, any hope that the military might wither away, that the increasing democratization of global society will lead to a comprehensive state of peace appears extremely problematic. Democracy may well aspire internally to a peaceful accommodation of interests and thus to a primacy of peace, but with the recognition of the military—at least as ultima ratio—it continues to carry within it the seed of war.

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Bachman, Jerald G./Blair, John D./Segal, David D. (1977): The AII-Volunteer Force. A Study of Ideology in the Military. Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press. Bahrdt, Hans P. (1987): Die Gesellschaft und ihre Soldaten. Zur Soziologie des Militärs. München: C.H. Beck. Bald, Detlef (1994): Militär und Gesellschaft. Die Bundeswehr der Banner Republik, BadenBaden. Barnett, W. Correlli (1970): The Military Profession in the 1970s. In: Wolfe, J.N./Erickson, John (Eds.): The Armed Services and Society: Alienation, Management, and Integration. Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, 5–17. Bealey, Frank (1988): Democracy in the Contemporary State. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Beck, Ulrich (1995): Die feindlose Demokratie. Ausgewählte Aufsätze. Stuttgart: Reclam. Bermbach, Udo (1991): Demokratietheorie und politische Institutionen. Opladen: Westdeutscher Verlag. Bigler, Rolf (1968): Der einsame Soldat. Eine soziologische Deutung der militärischen Organisation. Frauenfeld: Huber. Born, Hans (2003): Democratic Control of Armed Forces. Issues, Problems and Agenda. In: Caforio, Giuseppe (Ed.): Handbook of the Sociology of the Military. New York: Kluwer Academic,151–165. Bredow, Wilfried von (1995): Die Zukunft der Bundeswehr: Gesellschaft und Streitkräfte im Wandel. Opladen: Leske+Budrich. Burk, James (1994): The Military in New Times. Adapting Armed Forces to a Turbulent World. Boulder: Westview Press. Burk, James (2002): Theories of Democratic Civil-Military Relations. In: Armed Forces & Society, vol. 29, no. 1, 7–29. Chorley, Katharine (1943): Armies and the Art of Revolution. London: Faber and Faber. Croissant, Aurel/Kühn, David (2011): Militär und zivile Politik. München: Oldenbourg. Cunis, Rainmar (1968): Rekrutierungsmodelle im demokratischen Gesellschaftssystem. In: König, René (Ed.): Beiträge zur Militärsoziologie (Kölner Zeitschrift für Soziologie und Sozialpsychologie, Sonderheft 12). Köln-Opladen: Springer. Doorn, Jacques van (Ed.) (1969): Military Profession and Military Regimes. The HagueParis: Mouton. Ehrhart, Hans-Georg (Ed.) (1998): Demokratisierung der Streitkräfte im Kontext europäischer Sicherheit: Rumänien, Slowakei, Ukraine. In: Hamburger Beiträge zur Friedensforschung und Sicherheitspolitik, no. 110. Eisenstadt, Samuel N. (Ed.) (1992): Democracy and Modernity. Leiden: Brill. Elbe, Martin/Richter, Gregor (2005): Militär: Institution und Organisation. In: Leonhard, Nina/Werkner, Ines-Jacqueline (Eds.) (2005): Militärsoziologie – Eine Einführung. Wiesbaden: VS Verlag für Sozialwissenschaften, 136–156. Ember, Carol/Ember, Melvin/Russet, Bruce (1992): Peace between Participatory Politics. In: World Politics, vol. 44, no. 7, 573–599. Finer, Samuel E. (1962): The Man on Horseback. The Role of the Military in Politics. London: Taylor & Francis. Friedeburg, Ludwig von (1966): Zum Verhältnis von Militär und Gesellschaft in der Bundesrepublik. In: Picht, Georg (Ed.): Studien zur politischen und gesellschaftlichen Situation der Bundeswehr. Witten-Berlin: Eckart.

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Giller, Joachim (1992): Demokratie und Wehrpflicht. In: Wien: Landesverteidigungsakademie (Studien und Berichte). Green, T.H. (1986): Lectures on the Principles of Political Obligation and Other Writings. Edited by Paul-Harris and John Morrow. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Greenwood, D. (1970): The Scope and Pressures for Change within UK Institutional Arrangements. In: Wolfe, J.N./Erickson, John (Eds.): The Armed Services and Society: Alienation, Management, and Integration. Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, 141–161. Grimm, Christian (1981): Die Allgemeine Wehrpflicht und das Argument der Demokratieadäquanz. In: Neue Zeitschrift für Wehrrecht, no. 3, 81–98. Haferkamp, Hans/Smelser, Neil J. (Eds.) (1992): Social Change and Modernity. Berkeley: University of California Press. Harries-Jenkins, Gwyn (Ed.) (1982): Armed Forces and the Welfare Societies: Challenges in the 1980s. Britain, the Netherlands, Germany, Sweden and the United States. London: Palgrave Macmillan. Held, David (1987): Models of Democracy. Cambridge: Polity. Hillmann, Karl-Heinz (1986): Der Wertwandel. Zur Frage soziokultureller Voraussetzungen alternativer Lebensformen. Darmstadt: Wissenschaftliche Buchgesellschaft. Hintze, Otto (1941): Staat und Verfassung. Gesammelte Abhandlungen zur allgemeinen Verfassungsgeschichte. Edited by Fritz Hartung. Leipzig: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht. Holm, Torsten (1953): Allgemeine Wehrpflicht. Entstehung, Brauch und Mißbrauch. München: Pohl. Huntington, Samuel P. (1957): The Soldier and the State. The Theory and Politics of CivilMilitary Relations. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press. Huntington, Samuel P. (Ed.) (1962): Changing Patterns of Military Politics. New York: The Free Press of Glencoe. Inglehart, Ronald (1976): Changing Values and Attitudes Toward Military Service Among the American Public. In: Goldman, Nancy L./Segal, David R. (Eds.): The Social Psychology of Military Service. Beverly Hills-London: Sage, 255–278. Inglehart, Ronald (1977): The Silent Revolution. Changing Values and Political Styles Among Western Publics. Princton: Princeton University Press. Inglehart, Ronald (1990): Culture Shift in Advanced Industrial Society. Princeton: Princeton University Press. Inglehart, Ronald (1995): Kultureller Umbruch: Wertewandel in der westlichen Welt. Frankfurt/Main: Campus. Inglehart, Ronald (1997): Modernization and Postmodernization: Cultural, Economic and Political Change in 43 Societies. Princeton: Princeton University Press. Ionescu, Ghita (1976): The Political Thought of Saint-Simon. London: Oxford University Press. Janowitz, Morris (1960): The Professional Soldier. A Social and Political Portrait. London: Collier-Macmillan. Janowitz, Morris (1966): Krieg als Sozialkonflikt. Die Rolle der militärischen Eliten. In: Nerlich, Uwe (Ed.): Krieg und Frieden im industriellen Zeitalter. Güttersloh: Bertelsmann. Janowitz, Morris/Little, Roger W. (1965a): Sociology and the Military Establishment. New York: Edition Russel Sage Foundation.

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Rapoport, David C. (1962): Comparative Theory of Military and Political Types. In: Huntington, Samuel P. (Ed.): Changing Patterns of Military Politics. New York: Free Press of Glencoe. Rautenberg, Hans-Jürgen (1987): Wehrpflicht und Wehrdienst im Widerstreit. In: Bühl, Hartmut/Vogel, Friedrich (Eds.): Wehrdienst aus Gewissensgründen. Zur politischen und ethischen Legitimation der Verteidigung. Herford: E. S. Mittler & Sohn. Saint-Simon, Henri (1957): Ausgewählte Texte. Berlin: Rütten & Loening. Saint-Simon, Henri (1975): Selected Writings on Science, Industry and Social Organisation. London: Routledge. Schumpeter, Josef (1950): Kapitalismus, Sozialismus und Demokratie. Bern: Francke. Schwarz, Wolfgang (1989): Gegenseitige Angriffsunfähigkeit zwischen NATO und Warschauer Vertrag. Berlin (GDR): Militärverlag. Schweller, Randall (1992): Domestic Structure and Preventive War. In: World Politics, vol. 44, no. 1, 235–269. Sinclair, Robert K. (1988): Democracy and Participation in Athens. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Shields, Patricia M. (2015): Civil Military Relations. In: Bearfield, Domonic A./Dubnick, Melvin J. (Eds.): Encyclopedia of Public Administration and Public Policy. 3rd edition. New York: Taylor & Francis. Small, Melvin/Singer, David J. (1976): The War-proneness of Democratic Regimes. In: Jerusalem Journal of International Relations, vol. 50, no. 4, 50–69. Tanham, George K. (1990): The Military and Counter-Insurgency. In: Hattendorf, John B./Murfett, Malcolm H. (Eds.): The Limitations of Military Power. London: Macmillan. Tocqueville, Alexis de (1976): Über die Demokratie in Amerika. München: Deutscher Taschenbuch-Verlag. Tocqueville, Alexis de (2006): Democracy in America. Vol. 2, translated by Henry Reeve. The Project Gutenberg E-book. Vogt, Wolfgang R. (1978): Theoretische und ideologische Konzepte zum Verhältnis von Militär und Gesellschaft. In: Schwarz, Klaus-Dieter (Ed.): Sicherheitspolitik. Analysen zur politischen und militärischen Sicherheit. 3rd edition. Bad Honnef-Erpel, 545–591. Vogt, Wolfgang R. (1980): Zivil-militärische Konflikte in der Demokratie. Eine soziologische Konzeptualisierung des ‘Theorems der Inkompatibilität’. In: Schulz, Karl-Ernst (Ed.): Streitkräfte im gesellschaftlichen Wandel. Sozialwissenschaftliche Analysen zum Selbst- und Umweltverständnis moderner Streitkräfte. Bonn: Osang, 37–74. Vogt, Wolfgang R. (1983): Das Theorem der Inkompatibilität. In: Vogt, Wolfgang R. (Ed.) Sicherheitspolitik und Streitkräfte in der Legitimitätskrise. Baden-Baden: Nomos. Vogt, Wolfgang R. (1986): Militär als Gegenkultur. Streitkräfte im Wandel der Gesellschaft (I). Opladen: Leske+Budrich. Werkner, Ines-Jacqueline (2004): Die Wehrpflicht und ihre Hintergründe. Sozialwissenschaftliche Beiträge zur aktuellen Debatte. Wiesbaden: VS Verlag für Sozialwissenschaften. Werkner, Ines-Jacqueline (2005): Wehrsysteme. In: Leonhard, Nina/Werkner, InesJacqueline (Eds.) (2005): Militärsoziologie – Eine Einführung. Wiesbaden: VS Verlag für Sozialwissenschaften, 91–113. Wiesendahl, Elmar (1980): Demokratischer Wertewandel und militärische Subkultur. In: Schulz, Karl-Ernst (Ed.): Streitkräfte im gesellschaftlichen Wandel. Bonn: Osang.

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5

The Issue of Acceptance and Legitimacy of Modern Armed Forces

Besides the way the armed forces are organized and integrated into the political system, it is above all the mentality and attitude of the population toward the military institution, national defense and security policy that crucially determines the societal position, function and role of the military in modern democratic societies. During the second half of the twentieth century, societal and social science discourse focused heavily upon questions relating to the need for, or the necessary scale of, national armed forces and their justification and contributions in times of peace. The military found itself at the center of social awareness, not as a result of the exigencies of war, but due to a particularly strong and widespread longing for peace. In everyday political life of the Cold War and early post-Cold War period, this was expressed, inter alia, in the countless peace and anti-war movements, and in the social sciences in the form of new impulses in the fields of interdisciplinary peace and conflict studies. While political science in recent decades has placed a strong thematic emphasis on questions pertaining to concepts and alternative forms of modern security policy, sociology has concentrated on empirical studies of the predominant attitudinal patterns of the population to the areas of security policy, military and the use of force. From a democracy-orientated point of view, tearing security and military policy from the hands of a small military elite and placing it in the hands of the people seemed to be almost the dictate of the hour. The demand for the democratization of security policy became a catchword, which attached particular weight to the attitudes of the entire population towards matters of security and military policy in Western democracies (Kümmel 2006; Born 2003). The increasing importance of empirical research within modern societies and politics went hand in hand with a stronger social science research interest in civilmilitary relations (Feaver 1999; Huntington 1957; Janowitz 1960; Burk 2002; Hagen 2005: 68–90; Born 2006) and in the question of the social acceptance © The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Fachmedien Wiesbaden GmbH, part of Springer Nature 2023 F. Kernic, War, Peace and the Military, Militär und Sozialwissenschaften/ The Military and Social Research 56, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-658-40521-2_5

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of the military (public support) and prevailing public attitudes toward security and defense policy and the application of military force. The particular interest in the so-called ‘acceptance problem’ arose from the completely new societal need for a public and broad-based discussion of military and security policy with a view to shaping specific security and defense policy measures in accordance with the procedural rules and processes established in modern democratic societies. In this way, social change within modern democratic societies was combined with a ‘deinstitutionalization of the military’ (Lippert 1986: 250 ff.) and a ‘demystification’ of war and military force. In this context, social science theory building endeavored from the outset to clarify and clearly delineate the terms legality, legitimacy, acceptance and legitimation and in this way to contribute to a sound analysis of the societal problem that was concealed behind the catchword of a ‘military acceptance crisis’. Following in the path of the modern social sciences, this chapter will be chiefly concerned with questions of social science research, i.e., the analysis will focus upon the problem of the acceptance and legitimacy of military force in modern democratic societies. At the same time, the term acceptance has a semantic profile, which indicates the actual congruence of individuals and groups with specific conditions (such as the existence of an institution, a certain state etc.) with this condition being accepted without inner or outward reluctance, thus going beyond mere ‘sufferance’ in the sense of the word to tolerate. Acceptance of military force and the military organization therefore denotes the extent of actual assent to the institution of the military and its actions, or rather intentions, on the part of a group of individuals, especially with regard to the willingness of the military to employ physical force. Acceptance in this sense thus represents a ‘concept of being’, in contrast to which legitimacy is a ‘concept of duty’, which—following Habermas’ understanding—refers to a political order’s worthiness of recognition (Anerkennungswürdigkeit) (Habermas 1976: 39; comp. Habermas 1973). If acceptance denotes the actual recognition of an order, irrespective of the reasons upon which this is predicated, the concept of legitimation represents the attempt to create and disseminate persuasions of legitimacy. Acceptance, i.e., the actual recognition of rule, or rather social constructs and ways of acting, can be based on a variety of motives, such as and above all, convictions (insights into the necessity and meaningfulness) and constellations of interests. Below we shall deal with the question of the insights into the acceptance of the military that have been generated by modern empirical social science research. Following on from this, consideration will be given to the legitimation of military force in modern democratic societies, i.e., to the specific strategies for justifying

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modern security and defense policy. This will then permit a critical analysis of whether one can still even talk about a general crisis of acceptance and legitimacy of military force or whether it would not be more appropriate to consider the idea of a ‘rediscovery’ or ‘renaissance’ of military force. This seems particularly true for the ‘globalizing world’ at the end of the twentieth century and the beginning of the new millennium.

5.1

Acceptance of the Military and Security Policy

Since the 1960s, it has been part of political normality that national defense and the national armed forces have been exposed to intense social challenges. The public discussions surrounding the new conflicts of the Cold War and post-Cold War period, over the functions and tasks of the national armed forces and the military alliances, the military-strategic concepts of NATO (Kamp 1990) or over alternative security policy models are just a few examples of this social development. Since the 1980s, even diverse petitions and initiatives demanding the abolition of armies (or which were at least directed against certain defense measures) were launched. Almost all Western, democratically organized states have exhibited a similar tendency toward an increasingly critical and more negative public attitude regarding the military. Of course, this description is particularly true for the last two decades of the twentieth century. However, it would be rash to continue to speak today of a clear trend toward a social reorientation vis-à-vis military force. Various political changes in the early twenty-first century may be seen as signs of a reversal that is taking place in this respect and of a renewed turn toward war and the military. Nevertheless, following on from the discussion concerning a general value change, one can say that the attitudinal pattern regarding the application of military force and the central questions of a modern military policy has changed to a considerable degree. This development has also given birth to new approaches in military/defense-related empirical social science research. The methodological interest of this empirical research has been to highlight ‘snapshots’ of the societal state (and this includes the prevailing attitudinal patterns among the population) and compare the findings with earlier surveys of this kind, i.e., the identification of trends. Many such sociological snapshots indicated, at least during the Cold War period, grave acceptance deficits of the armed forces in the Western democracies. Within sociology, this quickly led to talk of the military’s general difficulty to integrate itself in ‘war-free societies’ (Moskos 1992). At the same time, it is

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remarkable that the Cold War period was considered as having been ‘war-free’ in the Western societies, while the years since the collapse of the Warsaw Pact and the disintegration of the Soviet Union (post-Cold War period) have been described as ‘conflict-prone’ or even as ‘times of war’ (Kuhlmann and Dandeker 1992). For the period from the 1960s to the 1980s, these social empirical analyses largely conveyed the following picture of the social acceptance of the military: The armed forces (especially the profession of the soldier) in Western democratic societies have relatively little social prestige (Wiatr 1969). The low regard for the soldierly profession is judged to be a general characteristic of these societies with no direct link to the specifically established military/defense system (Janowitz 1960; Doorn 1969; Doorn and Harries-Jenkins 1976). This rather reserved attitude toward the military and the military profession was consistent with the fact that the individual’s decision to sign up for a career in the armed forces was rarely idealistically motivated. Driving factors were rather motives such as social security, a certain spirit of adventure or simply the opportunities for promotion, to engage in certain activities or for further education and training. Furthermore, a general decline in applications for voluntary military service or rather an increase in applications for non-military alternative forms of service (alternative civilian service, community service) were compounding the recruitment problems experienced by the armed forces in many states, even where obligatory national service still existed. At the same time, since 1945 the military has always experienced particular ‘legitimacy crises’ where a war conducted by the armed forces or a military operation (such as, for example, intervention, collective security measures, etc.) were clearly rejected by the majority, or at least a distinct minority, of the population. Such acceptance and legitimacy crises—as experienced in the US in the case of the Vietnam War or later on during the mission to Somalia— furthermore tended not to be limited to a particular war or military conflict, but extended to the whole of a government’s military and security policy. In the early 1980s, Gwyn Harries-Jenkins (1982) even posed the critical question as to who in modern societies would still be willing to enlist for military service at all and how the national armed forces in future could satisfy their demand for soldiers. It is this question ‘who wants to join the military?’ which leads to the central problem of modern welfare societies, namely the existence of a general public reserve toward the idea of conscription or military service in general. At the same time, this problem started to compel governments to reorient their military or defense policy and frequently even to restructure their military organization and the recruitment system. The gradual turning away from systems of universal military conscription must be viewed from this perspective as well.

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In this context, attention should be drawn to a social science study, which, using the methods of empirical social research, seeked to gain a differentiated picture of public attitudes toward the military and military force in a specific state. In their analysis of the relationship between the military and society in the Netherlands, Fritz Oliver and Ger Teitler (1982) made a distinction between general societal attitudes regarding the legitimacy of the armed forces (the ‘why’ of the military) and those of opinion-makers and reactions to the specific way in which the armed forces behave and function in the present (the ‘how’ of the military). Although both attitudes can certainly be identical to one another, there is frequently a striking difference in the acceptance of the military as an institution predicated upon fundamental considerations and views, and the acceptance or rejection of a specific military policy. Since the 1970s, at the latest modern societies have experienced particular difficulties in maintaining universal conscription. It was not just the USA, where societal movements, during the Vietnam War, prompted the military to abandon the selective conscription practiced until then. In the years that followed, there was also a distinct trend toward volunteer armies in many other Western countries. The limits of the system of universal conscription initially became clearest in states, which offered conscripts the option of a socially and institutionally established alternative form of civilian service but which, mainly due to alliance obligations, were at the same time unable to restrict their military operation scenarios to the defense of their own state territory (Harries-Jenkins et al. 1982). However, even neutral states such as Austria and Switzerland were affected by this international trend. However, the question of acceptance not only concerns society and its attitude to military service and the application of military force, but also the attitude of military personnel and soldiers themselves to their activity and organization. Immediately after the end of World War II, the British Field Marshal Bernard Montgomery spoke of the soldier’s completely new relationship to military force: The soldiers of today have different standards, and require more enlightened handling than the soldiers of bygone days. They will no longer follow blindly and unquestionably to an unknown end. Today, therefore, a commander must ensure that his troops always know what they are being asked to do, and how that fits in with the longer plan. (Montgomery 1945)

According to Montgomery, this is no longer the soldier in the traditional sense that practices blind obedience and merely waits for orders from above, which he/she then follows unquestioningly and without reflection, but an independently

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thinking soldier with limited obedience. In addition, external motivation plays a crucial role in terms of the degree of support among soldiers for the military as an institution and for its actions, namely the perception of an actual enemy or potential adversary, i.e., a realistic threat scenario. Rosenroll (1973: 30) pointed out that a high level of acceptance and combat morale can be maintained among soldiers as long as they face the specific challenges of an external threat or an intervention in smaller foreign conflicts or a war. “Lacking periodic challenges, it is possible, if not inevitable, that the requirement for permanent military forces diminishes in the eyes of the public and, more importantly, the requirement diminishes in the minds of the servicemen themselves” (ibid. 30). From here it becomes clear why military organizations devote so much attention to the cultivation of threat scenarios and images of the enemy. Notwithstanding the myriad efforts to communicate credible threat scenarios, there are every now and then indications of military acceptance crises and problems within military organizations in modern societies. This is manifested, for example, in a clear decline in the number of applications to become an officer cadet, a rising drop-out rate among professional soldiers, in particular among officers, or simply job dissatisfaction among professional soldiers. At times, this takes the form of soldiers removing symbols of identification with the military, such as a refusal to wear uniform in public etc. From this perspective, the preference for wearing civilian clothing when leaving barracks is characteristic of modern democratic societies, which frequently confine uniforms to barracks and deliberately seek to keep at least military uniforms out of civilian sight. This raises the question of the causes of this socio-political development with its tendency to exacerbate the acceptance situation of the military. Social science research sees the chief causes in a variety of areas. Firstly, a general loss of legitimacy and acceptance of the state order can be discerned, which must be regarded as a consequence of changing social values. This affects the military in particular, as it is seen simultaneously as the guarantor and symbol of this state order. Secondly, as a further consequence of this value change, the principle of violence loses recognition in politics, i.e., a loss of legitimacy owing to the military structure being a non-democratic organizational structure. This development is consistent with a stronger emphasis on the longing for peace within society and the greater value placed on peace, all combined with considerable public anxiety concerning the threat of a nuclear war (Mandel 1991; Listhaug 1986). As a result, the military was increasingly seen as a social ‘counter-culture’ (Vogt 1986). Thirdly and finally, due to the long period of peace there was a loss of military function, which was strengthened by the tremendous technologization of military force (in particular in respect of nuclear armaments) and which cast doubt

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on the basic possibility of military defense. Modern peaceful societies therefore frequently display a public apathy toward the military and its preparations for waging war. Of course, these findings and assumptions were shaken by the collapse of the Warsaw Pact and the Soviet Union, by the first Gulf War and all the other ‘new wars’ during the last decade of the twentieth century (Kuhlmann and Callaghan 2000). With entry into new wars (Kaldor 2007; Münkler 2002), humanitarian interventions with military means or the War on Terror, the acceptance crisis of the military seems to have been overcome in the twenty-first century. Of course, no one can rule out that there will be a further increase or spread of military force and that the use of military force will suddenly again be met with an extremely high level of societal approval and public support even in liberal democracies.

5.2

The Need for the Military to Justify Itself in Modern Democratic Societies

In modern democratic societies, all political actions taken by the players and institutions of the political-administrative system need to be justified. Every form of political rule—as Max Weber (2019) already stated—needs to be justified, although the reasons why this justification is required are themselves complex. The effort that is inherent to political rule to engender and maintain belief in its legitimacy aspires to have a stabilizing effect. It is the belief in legitimacy or convictions of the lawfulness and meaningfulness of an order, which secure the level of obedience and acquiescence required by every power relationship in the long term. Max Weber’s concept of legitimacy (ibid.) is also orientated toward the fact of actual assent. His three pure types of legitimate rule—rational, traditional and charismatic—clearly point to the idea of a relationship between the belief in legitimacy on the part of the governed and the claim to legitimacy on the part of the rulers expressed in the form of a particular principle. For Weber, legitimacy thus remains tied to the real motives of actual recognition and does not become an ethical criterion in itself (ibid.; in addition, see: Winckelmann 1952; Sternberger 1967; Stallberg 1975). However, if one measures a political order’s recognition worthiness solely by compliance with substantive or procedural norms, then the belief of the governed in its legitimacy no longer plays any role. In this way, recognition worthiness can be measured against those norms within the normative framework of legitimacy, the fulfilment or compliance with which constitutes the criteria for recognition worthiness. In accordance with this

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normative understanding, legitimacy constitutes a trait, which may be ascribed to a political order or alternatively must be denied to it (Kernic 1997). Many of the social science studies in recent decades examining the legitimacy of the armed forces adopted such a normative approach. In accordance with their chosen norms of justification and the result of the ‘ought/is’ comparison, they proceeded to evaluate the recognition worthiness of specific armed forces in a specific social and historical situation. On the other hand, there is no shortage of social science studies, which follow a purely empirical approach when discussing the legitimacy of the armed forces. They attempt to explain legitimacy solely in terms of the system’s ability to engender convictions and opinions within society that the existing order is worthy of recognition und public support (Doorn and Harries-Jenkins 1976). Undoubtedly, legitimacy problems of the armed forces, i.e., difficulties in attempts to develop and maintain convictions about legitimacy are contingent mainly upon the political order and the existence of understandings of legitimacy. A scholarly discussion of the problem of acceptance and legitimacy of the armed forces or military force must therefore always consider the overall political and legal-institutional framework (Forster 2006). This, however, raises the practical difficulty of differentiating between general legal-institutional considerations and military-specific aspects. In one respect, the empirical findings are clear: Societal approval of the existence of armed forces and of the application of military force can by no means be taken for granted in the democratic societies of the late twentieth and early twenty-first centuries. In fact, recent decades have clearly shown that the military in particular as an expensive state instrument and the embodiment of the state monopoly of force requires an extremely high degree of political consensus. Military organization as a subject of social approval or rejection is thus compelled to justify its existence. Legitimation of the armed forces, i.e., the effort to engender and maintain belief in the recognition worthiness of this institution, is carried out first and foremost by means of argument, i.e., specific arguments are used to justify the existence, mandate, organization and function of the military institution. Legitimation is thus an effort to persuade, which must always consider the receptiveness of the recipient, that is to say, the possibility that the attempts to convince the intended target group will actually succeed. For this reason, these efforts at persuasion always emphasize specific intentions, which are consistent with the valid normative system, for example, safeguarding fundamental values, safeguarding peace, defending the common good, humanitarian assistance etc. At the same time, all those bases of legitimacy are used, which can support this line

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of argument, such as moral, state, religious, traditional and other prerequisites (Hensel 2016; Demont 2017). As a result, a claim can be made not only for legality, but also legitimacy (i.e., recognition worthiness). The fundamental objective of this legitimation work is voluntary obedience and acceptance, as in the long term a belief in legitimacy is the best foundation for acceptance. Empirically discernable acceptance deficits of a military organization always indicate problems and shortcomings in relation to legitimation efforts. Although almost all democratic societies exhibit a solid basis of approval for the military and defense, i.e., a thoroughly adequate level of political support for the military, this acceptance is not generally particularly firm. This is illustrated most clearly by the steady decline in the rate of public approval for military/defense and the increasing dissociation, especially within younger sections of the population, to questions pertaining to military and defense policy, as well as on the basis of a differentiation between general approval criteria and what are termed support criteria. This shows that while the military is basically accepted by a vast majority of the population, only a minority is willing to provide actual voluntary support to the respective armed forces or defense policy, i.e., to provide support that goes beyond any possible state-imposed obligation to perform military service. The motives, triggers and causes of this change are not just the product of military-technological change, but are chiefly the result of changes in political and societal structures. The most important factors are: 1) The central problem of military legitimacy lies in the difficulty of continuously having to consider social and political changes. Due to the contingency of legitimation work upon the conditions and possibilities of target group receptiveness, efforts at justification always must be modified in terms of both their form and content. However, if such changes are made too frequently, this can effectively undermine the credibility of the legitimacy arguments. Such a destabilization is present in modern armed forces in as much as the traditional bases of military legitimacy in the modern age (e.g., God-KingFatherland etc.) have become obsolete, while at the same time, the central basis of argument in the first decades after World War II, within the framework of the East-West confrontation, has lost credibility. These changes have generated a strong pressure for legitimacy to which armed forces are exposed. The effort to interpret the military as the guarantor of the democratic system moreover has led to considerable difficulties in respect of persuasive power and credibility.

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2) In many states, a yawning gap between the justifications given for political action in theory, and its translation into practice, has frequently become all too evident to the entire population with regard to military and defense politics. Recognition of this difference between the propagated aspirations and reality results in the arguments for legitimacy losing credibility and an ensuing decline in acceptance of the military as an institution. 3) Public criticism of the central functional and structural elements of military organization at times leads to an examination of the content of individual aspects of security and defense policy. This can in turn lead to selective problems or crises of legitimacy (here meaning damage to the belief in legitimacy), even if the defense policy or rather the military itself is not fundamentally and comprehensively called into question as an institution per se. For example, the beginnings of such a development can be seen in questions about task fulfilment and structure, both of which are factors of relevance for legitimacy. At the center of the question ‘legitimacy by virtue of task fulfilment’ is the discussion whether the military’s tasks are consistent with the specific needs of society or whether the armed forces perhaps now only perform yesterday’s tasks, while absolutely no preparations are made for the concerns of the present and the challenges of the future. The theme ‘legitimacy by virtue of structure’ concerns the relationship between the military and democracy. 4) If one perceives acceptance as a dynamic and gradual variable, its maximization becomes a specific challenge for each political order and the associated institutions and players, and thus also for the military. At the same time, it is obvious that public legitimation pressure can only be countered by an increased effort at justification. It is precisely this challenge that the modern military answers by seeking new arguments for legitimacy, which should guarantee success and which are able to replace the traditional legitimation strategies, which are evidently increasingly losing their persuasive power. Attempts to adopt ethical-moral strategies that give meaning or provide ultimate justification or scientific arguments for justification, are just as much part of the modern military’s efforts to gain legitimacy as the search for new functions and tasks that can be carried out by it, even if they do not represent war tasks in the real sense. The rise of a fierce social science discussion about the problems of legitimacy, acceptance and legitimation of the modern military (for example in the USA following the Vietnam War) can be attributed above all to military developments during the Cold War period and the danger of a nuclear war. The countless

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anti-war movements, the emergence of a peace movement and loss of public confidence in the political leadership and its military or security policy led directly to the assumption that the modern military found itself facing a fundamental problem of legitimacy or even a crisis of legitimacy (Doorn and Harries-Jenkins 1976). In other words, dissatisfaction with war led directly to a general uneasiness with the military as an institution in general. Military organizations had to respond to these developments and the related acceptance problems somehow (Kuhlmann and Segal 1994; Kuhlmann and Dandeker 1992). They did so with a host of measures and reforms, all of which add up to a new strategy for legitimating military force. Highlighting the social function of promoting peace conferred a new image on the military (e.g., the armed forces as an instrument for disaster relief or peacekeeping). The discussions concerning ‘civil tasks’ (such as United Nation’s ‘blue helmets’, ‘green helmets’ promoting ecological progress, ‘white helmets’ to support human rights etc.), which the military must carry out in the interests of society as a whole, even indicate that military force is perfectly able to represent itself in peacetime as a ‘civil force’, which fulfils important socio-political functions.

5.3

Toward a Renaissance of the Military?

Despite the military’s obvious public acceptance problems in modern Western democracies in the late twentieth century, the military has not ‘withered away’ or been abolished anywhere. Although for several years a general reduction of military forces had taken place in almost all European countries, this development was by no means synonymous with a general loss of importance and function of military force in international relations. The switch from a system of universal conscription to new highly specialized professional or volunteer armies cannot, therefore, be interpreted as a real step toward a new form of pacifism or peaceful international relations. Today’s armed conflicts and new wars raise the question whether in fact we are not currently witnessing a certain ‘renaissance of the military’, a rediscovery of military force or war as a means of achieving certain ends. To all appearances, the peaceability and criticism of the military in modern Western democracies is again swinging toward greater acceptance of (limited) military operations and more public support for the military. Such operations are at the same time being carried out on a new basis of legitimacy. The concepts upon which this new legitimacy is based range from humanitarian intervention, collective self-defense and security

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to the prevention of military conflagrations. The entire concept presents itself as a ‘rational’ peace policy using military means. Thus, in the early twenty-first century, the military has once again become ‘respectable’. This is not only true for the national level, but also for transnational and international relations, for the global system. Talk of a common European defense identity, of creating a European army, of the need for a common foreign and security policy of the European Union or NATO enlargement has increasingly led to a transferal of the military to an international or supranational level. In this way, military force is even acknowledged to have an important function in the formation of new collective political identities. As such, it is written into each new political legal and institutional framework from the very outset, becoming the accompaniment or foundation of new political orders. In this context, military alliance systems attain new impetus and are expanded, supported by updated theories of alliance cooperation (Chernoff 1995). The renaissance of the military since the beginning of the twenty-first century has formed the counterpart to global efforts to integrate and merge nation state structures. The background to these political efforts at integration is a renaissance of the medieval idea of a universal empire, which arouses hopes of a general peace order (Doyle 1992; Münkler 2005). The medieval Christian idea of a universal empire appears most clearly, albeit in a new, secularized form in the political vision of new empires. Empirically the idea that only such an empire can guarantee peace has a strong innate power of persuasion, which has obviously not failed to exert an influence in the late twentieth and early twenty-first centuries. Yet there is another component of the Christian idea of a universal empire, which appears to be taking on new life today: the firm belief that justice cannot be established by violence. From this perspective, it becomes clear why presentday military operations are so enthusiastically combined with new attempts at justification, with the term ‘war’ being largely avoided. The attempt to engender a belief in the general legality and legitimacy of such military operations (interventions etc.) not only seeks to increase the general level of public support for concrete military actions, but it is also primarily concerned with enhancing public support for modern military and security policy in general, which is at the same time camouflaged as peace policy. The possibility of maintaining a distance to war is simultaneously abandoned in favor of a solidarity defined in military terms. The classical incompatibility theorem of military force and modern society was not only violently shattered several times in the twentieth century (above all by the fact of two world wars) and thrown overboard by social science research,

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but it was also repeatedly taken out of the ‘treasure chest of the past’ by social scientists and—albeit in a modified form—brought to new life. The incompatibility theorem reached a new heyday in the final decade of the last century, particularly in connection with the theorem that democracies—at least when dealing with other democracies—have a structural tendency towards peaceful conflict resolution and only envisage military force as a last resort for self-defense in the event of an attack. In many cases, even in connection with the end of the East-West conflict and the radical changes in the size, structure, organization and function of armed forces that accompanied it, the onset of a peaceful new era was proclaimed. An increasingly networked and interdependent global society appeared to be a society oriented towards peace or a peaceful reconciliation of interests, one in which military organizations increasingly lost their social significance. Late modernity, unlike modernity itself, appeared as an attempt to find a definitive way out of the spiral of military force and violence. Today, such social analyses may sound somewhat strange and utopian. In view of the large number of new outbreaks of violence and armed conflicts in global society, it appears more fitting to ask whether the socio-political developments that gradually led from modernity to late modernity in fact resulted in military force losing its meaning and function. Or is the opposite true, namely that late modernity itself is characterized by an increase in the importance and function of military force in global society? The empirical findings about this question can be briefly outlined as follows: Neither in modern Western democratic societies nor in the less or not at all democratically structured societies of the late twentieth century had there been an abating of military force or an abolition of military apparatuses. Although a general reduction in troops, formations or budget expenditures for military purposes could be observed in many countries in the 1990s, this trend has changed in recent years in favor of higher defense and military expenditures in many cases. Moreover, the transformation of many armed forces in Western democratic societies from systems of general compulsory military service (Werkner 2004) to new, highly specialized professional or voluntary armies (Malešiˇc 2003) should by no means be seen as a step that structurally amounts to peace promotion or war prevention. The armed forces of the early twenty-first century may be ‘leaner’ in a certain sense than during the Cold War, but a purely numerical reduction in troop strength and armament material does not automatically make military organizations structurally more peace-oriented or less war-oriented. Anyone who seriously reflects on the significance and function of armed conflict or the use of force in

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the societies of the twenty-first century would do well to abandon all such simple and superficial clichés. The empirical findings—as briefly outlined above—can in fact be supplemented in a further respect: The (often postulated) peaceableness and military critique of modern Western democracies has for some years been shifting in the direction of a generally increased social acceptance of military operations and the use of force (Everts 2002; Peters and Wagner 2011). The terminology upon which the new social legitimation strategies for military action are based rather encompasses an enormously broad spectrum (Greenwood 1993: 34–40; Forsythe 1992: 385–395; Malanczuk 1993). The entire conception of ‘military security’ in late modernity or global society tends toward a policy of so-called ‘peace stabilization’ or ‘war prevention’ through the limited deployment of military means of force; i.e., security and defense appear in the guise of a ‘rational’ policy of peace ‘by military means’ and hence remain fully within the tradition of modernity.

References Born, Hans (2003): Democratic Control of Armed Forces. Issues, Problems and Agenda. In: Caforio, Giuseppe (Ed.): Handbook of the Sociology of the Military. New York: Kluwer Academic, 151–165. Born, Hans (2006): Civil-Military Relations in Europe. Learning from Crisis and Institutional Change. London: Routledge. Burk, James (2002): Theories of Democratic Civil-Military Relations. In: Armed Forces & Society, vol. 29, no. 1, 7–29. Chernoff, Fred (1995): After Bipolarity. The Vanishing Threat, Theories of Cooperation, and the Future of the Atlantic Alliance. Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press. Demont-Biaggi, Florian (Ed.) (2017): The Nature of Peace and the Morality of Armed Conflict. Basingstoke-New York: Palgrave Macmillan. Doorn, Jacques van (Ed.) (1969): Military Profession and Military Regimes. The HagueParis: Mouton. Doorn, Jacques van/Harries-Jenkins, Gwyn (Eds.) (1976): The Military and the Problem of Legitimacy. Beverly Hills: Sage Publications. Doyle, Michael W. (1992): Empires. Ithaca: Cornell University Press. Everts, Philip P. (2002): Democracy and Military Force. Basingstoke-London: Palgrave. Feaver, Peter (1999): Civil-Military Relations. In: Annual Review of Political Science, no. 2, 211–241. Forsythe, David P. (1992): Democracy, War, and Covert Action. In: Journal of Peace Research vol. 4, 385–395. Forster, Anthony (2006): Armed Forces and Societies: Changing Roles and Legitimacy. In: Forster, Anthony: Armed Forces and Society in Europe. London: Palgrave Macmillan, 74–99.

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Greenwood, Christopher (1993): Is there a right of Humanitarian Intervention? In: The World Today, vol. 49, no. 2, 34–40. Habermas, Jürgen (1973): Legitimationsprobleme im Spätkapitalismus. Frankfurt/Main: Suhrkamp. Habermas, Jürgen (1976): Legitimationsprobleme im modernen Staat. In: Kielmansegg, Peter (Ed.): Legitimationsprobleme politischer Systeme. Opladen: PVS-Sonderheft (Politische Vierteljahresschrift) 7, 39–61. Harries-Jenkins, Gwyn (Ed.) (1982): Armed Forces and the Welfare Societies. Challenges in the 1980s. Britain, the Netherlands, Germany, Sweden and the United States. London: Palgrave Macmillan. Harries-Jenkins, Gwyn/Kuhlmann, Jürgen/Rössler, Tjarck (1982): The Limits of Conscription. In: Harries-Jenkins, Gwyn (Ed.): Armed Forces and the Welfare Societies. Challenges in the 1980s. Britain, the Netherlands, Germany, Sweden and the United States. London: Palgrave Macmillan, 96–123. Hagen, Ulrich vom (2005): Zivil-militärische Beziehungen. In: Leonhard, Nina/Werkner, Ines-Jacqueline (Eds.) (2005): Militärsoziologie – Eine Einführung. Wiesbaden: VS Verlag für Sozialwissenschaften, 68–90. Hensel, Howard M. (Ed.) (2016): The Legitimate Use of Military Force: The Just War Tradition and the Costomary Law of Armed Conflict. London-New York: Routledge. Huntington, Samuel P. (1957): The Soldier and the State. The Theory and Politics of CivilMilitary Relations. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press. Janowitz, Morris (1960): The Professional Soldier. A Social and Political Portrait. London: Collier-Macmillan. Kaldor, Mary (2007): New and Old Wars: Organised Violence in a Global Era. 2nd edition. Stanford: Stanford University Press. Kamp, Karl-Heinz (1990): Akzeptanzprobleme nuklearer Abschreckung in Europa. In: Beiträge zur Konfliktforschung, no. 1, 27–41. Kernic, Franz (1997): Demokratie und Wehrsystem. Aufsätze zum Verhältnis von Gesellschaft, politischem System und Heer in Österreich. Frankfurt/Main: Peter Lang. Kuhlmann, Jürgen/Callaghan, Jean (Eds.) (2000): Military and Society in the 21st Century Europe. Münster-Hamburg-London: Lit. Kuhlmann, Jürgen/Dandeker, Christopher (Eds.) (1992): Armed Forces After the Cold War. In: Forum International (Sozialwissenschaftliches Institut der Bundeswehr, München), vol. 13. Kuhlmann, Jürgen/Segal, David R. (Eds.) (1994): Armed Forces at the Dawn of the Third Millennium. Strausberg: SOWI-Forum International, no. 16. Kümmel, Gerhard (2006): Militärische Aufträge und die Legitimation der Streitkräfte. In: Gareis, Sven B./Klein, Paul (Eds.): Handbuch Militär und Sozialwissenschaften. 2., aktualisierte und erweiterte Auflage, Wiesbaden: VS Verlag für Sozialwissenschaften, 104– 111. Lippert, Ekkehard (1986): Social Change and the Deinstitutionalization of the Military. In: Defense Analysis, vol. 2, 250–252. Listhaug, Ola (1986): War and Defence Attitude: A First Look at Survey Data from 14 Countries. In: Journal of Peace Research, vol. 23, no. 1, 69–76. Malanczuk, Peter (1993): Humanitarian Intervention and the Legitimacy of the Use of Force. Amsterdam: Het Spinhuis.

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Malešiˇc, Marjan (2003): Conscription vs. All-Volunteer Forces in Europe. Baden-Baden: Nomos. Mandel, Robert (1991): Public Opinion and Superpower Strategic Arms. In. Armed Forces and Society, vol. 17., no. 3, 409–427. Montgomery, Field-Marshal Sir Bernard (1945): Lecture on ‘Military Leadership’, printed for private circulation in the British Army of the Rhine, November 1945 (quoted by Rosenroll, G.M. de (1973): Significant Morale Factors in an Unified Armed Force following a Prolonged Period of Peacetime, Seaford House Papers). Moskos, Charles C. (1992): Armed Forces in a Warless Society. In: Kuhlmann, Jürgen/Dandeker, Christopher (Eds.) (1992): Armed Forces After the Cold War. In: Forum International (Sozialwissenschaftliches Institut der Bundeswehr, München), vol. 13, 1– 10. Münkler, Herfried (2002): Die neuen Kriege. 2nd edition. Reinbek bei Hamburg: Rowohlt. Münkler, Herfried (2005): Imperien. Die Logik der Weltherrschaft – vom Alten Rom bis zu den Vereinigten Staaten. Berlin. Rowohlt. Oliver, Fritz T./Teitler, Ger (1982): Democracy and the Armed Forces. The Dutch Experience. In: Harries-Jenkins, Gwyn (Ed.): Armed Forces and the Welfare Societies: Challenges in the 1980s. Britain, the Netherlands, Germany, Sweden and the United States. London: Palgrave Macmillan, 54–95. Peters, Dirk/Wagner, Wolfgang (2011): Between Military Efficiency and Democratic Legitimacy: Mapping Parliamentary War Powers in Contemporary Democracies, 1989–2004. In: Parliamentary Affairs, vol. 64, no. 1, 175–192. Rosenroll, G.M. de (1973): Significant Morale Factors in an Unified Armed Force following a Prolonged Period of Peacetime (Seaford House Papers). Stallberg, Friedrich W. (1975): Herrschaft und Legitimität. Untersuchungen zu Anwendung und Anwendbarkeit zentraler Kategorien Max Webers. Meisenheim am Glan: Verlag Anton Haid. Sternberger, Dolf (1967): Max Webers Lehre von der Legitimität. Eine kritische Betrachtung. In: Röhrich, Wilfried (Ed.): Macht und Ohnmacht des Politischen. Köln: Kiepenheuer und Witsch, 111–126. Vogt, Wolfgang R. (1986): Militär als Gegenkultur. Streitkräfte im Wandel der Gesellschaft (I). Opladen: Leske+Budrich. Weber, Max (2019): Economy and Society. A New Translation. Edited and translated by Keith Tribe. Cambridge, MA-London: Harvard University Press. Werkner, Ines-Jacqueline (2004): Die Wehrpflicht und ihre Hintergründe. Sozialwissenschaftliche Beiträge zur aktuellen Debatte. Wiesbaden: VS Verlag für Sozialwissenschaften. Wiatr, Jerzy J. (1969): Social Prestige of the Military. In: Doorn, Jacques van (Ed.) (1969): Military Profession and Military Regimes. The Hague-Paris: Mouton, 73–81. Winckelmann, Johannes (1952): Legitimität und Legalität in Max Webers Herrschaftssoziologie. Tübingen: Mohr.

6

The Concept of Modern ‘Rational’ Security Policy

Modern security policy lays a claim to be rational. Special emphasis is placed on the calculability and predictability of security policy, although to all extents and purposes the term is but traditional military and war policy under a different name. Contemporary security policy still defines itself first and foremost in a military sense, which is why the term ‘military security policy’ can basically be used. However, the strong emphasis on the concept of security at the same time raises the issue of its content in relation to international politics, or put more specifically, one must ask how much security there is in the dominant concept of international relations today (Buzan et al. 1998)? However, this approach already takes us a step away from the traditionally prevailing concept in which security is regarded as an objective and in which the real question must concentrate on the possible means of achieving this goal. The first approach mentioned above encourages a search for radical changes, dangers and risks, discontinuities in continuity, the irrational in rational policy, the unpredictable in the rational cost–benefit calculation upon which basis the degree of security/insecurity in modern societies can be judged and consideration given social strategies for coping with uncertainties (Giessmann 1993). In contrast, the more traditional second approach suggests developing constructions and structures with the aim of achieving the goal of security, i.e., the chief concern here is the strategies of modern security policy. The entire contemporary debate surrounding a new security architecture for one or all continents focuses precisely on this second approach and seeks to come closer to the goal of security by means of new security strategies (expansion of alliance systems, new institutions, new military pacts etc.). The new enemy is then defined to include both a newly defined ‘outside’ as well as factors such as unpredictability, non-amenability to planning and instability. However, while the former (the enemy that can be localized) can be included in a rational concept, © The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Fachmedien Wiesbaden GmbH, part of Springer Nature 2023 F. Kernic, War, Peace and the Military, Militär und Sozialwissenschaften/ The Military and Social Research 56, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-658-40521-2_6

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the latter cannot. Therein lies the main problem of modern security policy, which presents itself as a rational policy. A comprehensive paradigm analysis must take the first path and therefore disengage itself from all strategic concepts (and the underlying assumptions) in order to examine the irrationality of rational security policy. Shifts in terminology, for example, away from ‘national interest’ to ‘national security’ or from ‘war’ to a ‘special operation’ or ‘humanitarian intervention with military means’ are of little substantive-scientific value, as they are mere labels for variants in the game of security strategy. The real issue that is at stake here is rooted in the question of how safe contemporary global society (Jacobs and Jäger 2000) is, namely the discovery of uncertainties in modern security policy (Der Derian 1993). These are not completely unknown to modern social sciences; modern game theory for example presented and subjected to comprehensive discussion the problem of in determinability on the basis of the so-called prisoner’s dilemma (Rapoport and Chammah 1965; Brams 1985; Schelling 2005; Hurwitz 1989; Ashley 1983). The discourse that is sought here can start by considering the security policy concept that has been at the heart of strategic thought since the end of World War II: the theory of nuclear deterrence (Freedman 1981; Glucksmann 1984; Powell 1990; Green 1966). This is considered to be a typical expression of rational security policy and is to the present day frequently regarded as the guarantee of world peace. This nuclear deterrent is frequently given sole credit for there having been no new world war (especially in view of the East-West confrontation in the period 1945 to 1989). The following analysis will therefore start with a closer look at the paradigms upon which this theory is based. In this way, it can be revealed that the rationality of modern security is itself questionable. The question will be whether the irrationality of violence can be overcome by the rationality of security policy. This question, however, immediately lays bare the limits of all modern military strategic undertakings. Even modern warfare continues to have elements of incalculability and unpredictability. Despite the use of cutting-edge technologies, the technologization of modern weapons systems and the professionalization of modern armies has failed to achieve absolute control and the ability to steer modern wars and the application of military force with precision. This in turn, leads to new uncertainties, and in so far as security is still primarily conceived of in military categories, radicalizes the security dilemma of modern societies. The end of the distance to the other in a ‘risk society’ at the same time highlights an omnipresence of military force and the predominance of the logic of military thought, which has its objective and trains its sights upon victory over the other.

6.1 The Theory of Deterrence as a Rational Concept of Security Policy?

6.1

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The Theory of Deterrence as a Rational Concept of Security Policy?

For centuries, the idea of deterring the other who is regarded as the enemy has played a major role in relations between states or political groups. In essence, the concept of deterrence is based on keeping the peace in the sense of an absence of war, for which reason it is frequently viewed as a concept for preventing war. As a ‘theory of deterrence’ (Quackenbush 2011; Paul et al. 2009; Quackenbush and Zagare 2016) it creates the impression of rationality, because it is completely based on a goal-means-ratio. The goal is to “deter a potential aggressor from either starting a war or to punish them for such an attempt by threatening the use of force” (United Nations 1985: 14). The risks and costs for a potential aggressor should therefore be disproportionate to the gains that might be achieved. The concept of deterrence as a concept for preventing war goes back to the traditional idea that sufficient military strength is the best means for deterrence. This view is based upon a very specific concept of war and peace, according to which peace prevails only when a collective system has a superior strength so that the other who would like to sow unrest does not even get a chance to do so. The theory of deterrence is therefore based upon a specific interpretation of the relationship between self and the other understood as a relationship between ‘potential enemies’, or more precisely as a relationship between ego (which can be defined as aggressive or non-aggressive) and an other as a ‘potential enemy’ (because this is always defined aggressively). Once again, the traditional dictum Si vis pacem, para bellum is incorporated into a concept for structuring the relationship between self and the other. The impulse of the other toward strife and war, toward the application of force is best subdued by placing oneself in a position of strength, so that the weaker party is persuaded out of fear not to cause strife. Although such a concept of deterrence or prevention had a certain social function even in the early civilizations, deterrence in the modern sense has only come into being since the start of the nuclear age. Previously, deterrence had already been achieved when a state’s defensive capability was evidently strong enough to successfully repel military attacks upon its territory (deterrence by virtue of one’s own invulnerability). Due to the enormous proliferation of nuclear weapons, the accumulation of arsenals and growth in the destructive capabilities of conventional weapons in the second half of the twentieth century this situation has changed decisively. The offensive potential of strategic nuclear weapons by far outweighs any defense. As a result, war—at least in the sense of a nuclear war—has simultaneously lost its function as a political instrument for achieving certain goals. Nuclear war has

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thus become an event to be avoided under all circumstances as it constitutes a profound threat to one’s own existence—and in a global sense to the existence of all humanity. After World War II, the concept of nuclear deterrence became the most significant element of the security policy strategy of both great powers in the East-West conflict (Jacobsen 1990; Stein 1989; Smoke 1993; George et al. 1971). During this period, one chief aspect of the concept of deterrence was an assured secondstrike capability. This key aspect of the nuclear deterrence concept applied by the USA and USSR during the Cold War period was based on the idea that not even the slightest attempt of an attack would be worthwhile, as it would immediately be followed by a punitive response (retaliatory strike), which would threaten the aggressor’s very survival. A further component of this strategy was that the aggressor could not escape this penalty for attacking or unsuccessfully going to war, not retroactively either, by ceasing combat operations. As a result, neither of the two sides could gain an advantage by deciding to attack, on the contrary, in the case of an attack each had to expect the prompt occurrence of the crushing consequences. Of course, it was only the two superpowers that had the mutual capability to carry out a second strike. The logic of any concept of deterrence necessitates that war prevention is only ever achieved in the relationship between the respective nuclear powers or their alliance systems (during the East-West conflict, NATO and the Warsaw Pact). In this way the concept of deterrence always applies to specific conflicts only, primarily bipolar conflicts, and is thus of only limited scope. The period from 1945 to 1989 showed very clearly that conflicts between states that did not belong to an alliance were excluded from the deterrent effect, as were inner-state conflicts or disputes and military conflicts within the alliances. Because it is centered on a bilateral conflict, the concept of deterrence is accorded the function of a conflict regulator in which the threat of a specific measure acts as the means of conflict regulation. A state, which believes it is under threat from another, seeks to prevent the other state from carrying out the feared action by conditionally holding out the prospect of disproportionate harm. This counter-threat is combined with the promise to refrain from this action, if the other state conducts itself in the manner suggested and refrains from the course of action that is regarded as threatening. (Wettig 1979: 6 f.)

The concept of deterrence is based on the theoretical premise implicit in the costbenefit question. The costs of any action being considered should be many times higher than the greatest possible gain from the action. As a result, the entire

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concept is based on the theoretical premise that states or groups of states conduct their foreign policy according to rational and uniform criteria of utility (ibid. 10–12). The weighing up of utility enjoys absolute priority. Issues such as the importance of emotional factors for state behavior are ruled out from the outset. According to Patrick Morgan (1977), it is possible to distinguish between two different types of deterrence: 1) Direct deterrence (immediate deterrence): In this case clear threats are issued; there is an unequivocal proclamation of a threat in response to an actual action that is regarded as threatening. 2) General deterrence (preventative or structural deterrence): In this case, there is no real exchange of concrete threats, but from the outset there exists a credible counter-threat to a specific threat scenario. The deterrence policy in the East-West relationship after World War II was based upon the logic of general deterrence, which had the advantage over direct deterrence in that it exerted a comprehensive preventative effect and thus did not tend to trigger a spiral of threats and counter-threats. This general deterrence was predicated upon the capability to launch a second strike. Yet this in turn raised the question of the relationship of the West European allies to the USA, as the deterrent that was supposed to prevent a Soviet attack was the threat of a strategic nuclear counter-strike by the USA. The core problem was concern as to whether the USA would carry out such a strike in the knowledge that it could possibly result in Soviet retaliation and the destruction of the American homeland. With these questions in mind, Carl Friedrich von Weizsäcker arrived at a definition of ‘deterrence by means of incalculable risk’, which in his view constituted Western Europe’s real protection from the USSR and the Warsaw Pact Organization (Weizsäcker 1971, 1976). In analyzing the theoretical implications of the concepts of nuclear deterrence, however, weighty objections were articulated in the 1960s and 1970s against the premise of rationality, which assumed a rational weighing up of benefits for each step of a state’s decision-making process. The chief objections were concerned with the following areas: Firstly, foreign policy behavior of states is determined less by a rational cost– benefit calculation than by the ability to adapt behavior to the limits of human rationality. Decisions are instead motivated by short-term considerations predicated upon a momentary situation (Wettig 1979: 20). In addition to this, specific irrational urges can result in the loss of rationality, leading to the danger that a

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direct (or immediate) deterrence does not lead to a rational weighing up of costs and benefits, but instead triggers an emotional reaction. Secondly, the criteria against which benefits and harm are measured may differ. Therefore, not every foreign policy player automatically acts according to the same concept of benefit or harm. Thirdly, the specific perception of the respective players is completely ignored. These objections led to the insight that the logic of deterrence is not totally rational (Luke 1989: 207–229; Aron 1965; Hardin et al. 1985). As soon as one side refuses to be deterred, i.e., decides to commit an act of aggression, the cost– benefit calculation has lost its meaning. This weak point in deterrence theory’s logic manifests itself most clearly in relation to the question of how a deterrent effect can be achieved through an option that one would not want to use at all. However, this raises yet another question, namely the practicability of deterrence in the first place. How can a state operate with threats, which it cannot afford to execute? The search for answers to this question has produced two major lines of argument: On the one hand, Thomas Schelling (1966) pointed to the demand that each actor must make a commitment to foreclose in future all options, which do not serve the current deterrent purpose. However, this is linked to the assumption that the other side can be persuaded of the irreversibility of this commitment. In this way, the problem is, however, merely pushed to one side, the case of the actual occurrence of a violent conflict is ruled out as being unthinkable. On the other hand, the theoretical analysis drew attention to the vital interest on the part of the state that is under attack to preserve the status quo. For this reason, there has always been an innate predominance of the defensive will, i.e., of the party that is being challenged or attacked (in the mutually symmetrical deterrent relationship). These considerations make it clear that the modern theory of deterrence is to a substantial degree predicated upon axioms of game theory. The premise of rational behavior, which orientates itself exclusively on a cost-benefit calculation has been identified as the chief weakness of this theory (Russett 1983). Scientific attempts to verify the effectiveness of the deterrence concept based on historical experience, revealed a series of historical cases in which deterrence had failed either completely or partially. However, this only became apparent when scholars focused on the exercise of limited military and political threats and not upon strategic deterrence to avoid a nuclear war (Wettig 1979: 25–31). The investigations of George and Smoke (1974) led to a discussion of the problem of deterrence theory’s claim to be a rational concept for preventing war.

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They pointed out that the traditional deterrence theory is essentially a commitment theory (theory of a credible commitment to a contingent threat), and as such deals almost exclusively with the question of how a state could establish “a deterrent to avert threats” (ibid.). At the same time, they suggested that this commitment theory should be complemented by an initiation theory—the question of the conditions under which a threat will be initiated—and by a response theory (strategic actions with which one can effectively respond to enemy deterrent). Due to the enormous destructive capabilities of both nuclear and conventional weapons, the post-1945 concept of deterrence must undoubtedly be regarded as an important security policy concept (Freedman 2004). At the same time, however, it should not be overlooked that this concept—in particular the nuclear deterrence concept—sparked fierce controversy even during the Cold War period. The objections put forward against the concept of deterrence focused mainly upon the following areas: (1) Criticism of the basic assumptions of deterrence theory: One major criticism was directed against the assumption of a permanent reciprocal cooperation between states, i.e., an uninterrupted deterrent interaction of states in the sense of a negotiating process. It was here, for example, that John Erickson (1978: 11–17) applied his criticism of the concept of mutual deterrence. He saw a security policy situation, which made a reliable mutual deterrence impossible. The extent to which the Western side restricted itself solely to the prevention of war by means of deterrence (i.e., to a goal that can be primarily achieved by negotiation with the other side) contrasted with the opposing side (Warsaw Pact Organization) preparing for a potential war, thus violating the requirements of deterrence (i.e., contemplating the unthinkable case of a failure of deterrence). From this, he concluded that the West should “not build upon an uncertain premise and practice deterrence as an alternative strategy” (Wettig 1979: 36) but must also consider the contingency of actually waging war. (2) Criticism of the aggressiveness of deterrence (‘theory of escalation’): In this respect, criticism was directed against the premises of the deterrence concept that military force would only be used in response to an enemy attack. Consequently, wars would not only be prevented, but situations would already be avoided in which the interests of the two states or groups of states might be diametrically opposed. Scholars such as Kenneth Boulding (1962), David Singer, Anatol Rapoport, Charles Osgood and Erich Fromm clearly cast doubt upon the assumption that a threat is defused by a corresponding counter-threat. On the contrary, they claimed that it was this process and

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the associated arms race that generated mutual fear and hatred in the first place. They considered this concept of deterrence to be aggressive in itself, regarding it as the basis for the arms race. This they believed triggered an escalation of aggressiveness and destructive power—a lethal spiral, which carried within it a new threat of an unforeseen magnitude. This analysis called attention to the central issue of the threat to peace arising from all reciprocal arms build-ups. One basic theory is that a threat— irrespective of whether it is clearly expressed or not—exacerbates conflicts, triggering a process, which takes on a life of its own due to the production of mutually reinforcing hostilities. (3) Criticism of the assumption that deterrence prevents war: The purpose of every concept of deterrence is to prevent war, however, should this not succeed, the concept can be deemed to have failed. It is upon this assumption that the theory of deterrence has been predicated to the present day, and the fact that there has indeed been no direct military confrontation between the superpowers or the two bloc systems has repeatedly been cited as proof its correctness. However, it was precisely this assumption that was already challenged by Carl Friedrich von Weizsäcker (1981) in the 1980s. He viewed the arms race as a factor, which automatically increases the risk of war and emphasized the moral and political irresponsibility of basing one’s own security on a mutual capability for total destruction without thinking of any alternative in the event that deterrence should fail (ibid.). It appears that with the end of the Cold War the discussion of nuclear deterrence as (ultimately) the central security concept in modern world politics has almost been stilled, if one excludes the debates among experts (Bredthauer 1984; Eberwein and Nienstedt 1984; Senghaas 1969, 1983) or the most recent public concerns related to the Russian invasion of the Ukraine in 2022. At the same time, the search for alternatives to nuclear deterrence within the social sciences had already resulted in a host of new approaches in the 1980s, especially within the discipline of peace and conflict studies. In this connection, attention was called to efforts to establish a collective security system, to restructure the armed forces to provide purely defensive capabilities, and to develop defense systems for the protection of one’s own territory etc. (Johannsen and Lutz 1988; Dünne 1988). Furthermore, consideration was also given to the concept of ‘common security’, which is predicated upon the rational action of identifying common interests to prevent war, but which has, since the end of the East-West conflict,

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itself slithered into a crisis, because a comprehensive prevention of war is certainly no longer the unquestionable and incontrovertible foundation of a global common interest (Bahr and Lutz 1986). The political debate surrounding the possibilities and opportunities for a policy of nuclear deterrence has for some time been dominated by two aspects: one, the dilemma on which such a policy is based; two, the temptation of securing peace on the basis of a historically unprecedented willingness to take risks (Amme 1988; Laird-Jacobs 1989; Bletz and Praaning 1986). Henry Kissinger already drew attention to this problem in 1960, when he wrote: The problem of deterrence is novel in the history of military policy. In the past, the military establishment was asked to prepare for war. Its test was combat, its vindication, victory. In the nuclear age, however, victory has lost its traditional significance. The outbreak of war is increasingly considered the worst catastrophe. Henceforth, the adequacy of any military establishment will be tested by its ability to preserve the peace. (Kissinger 1960: 11 f.)

In the 1980s, the political discussion concerning nuclear deterrence in the USA ultimately led to a public debate and controversy surrounding the Strategic Defense Initiative (SDI) promoted by President Ronald Reagan, which, by further escalating the arms spiral, was supposed to lead from a policy of mutual assured destruction to a strategy of mutual assured survival (Engels and DietrichSwidersky 1984). Objections to the idea of SDI came chiefly from the sciences themselves, partially fueled by skepticism regarding the technological feasibility of the space-based missile defense system, partly by doubts about the financial feasibility of the entire project, but in the final analysis, also by reservations concerning the possibly higher risk of nuclear war. Although the plans for the SDI disappeared from the American defense agenda in the early 1990s as the political disintegration of the Soviet Union took its course, the project has received new impetus, at least since 1995, when Congress released budget funds for SDI-related research and development. The Damocles sword of nuclear armaments has by no means disappeared with the end of the Cold War; only the dangers have changed, leading to new uncertainties. This is because today numerous states possess nuclear weapons and many states are (or would theoretically be) able to build such weapons (Kaiser 1988). The danger of an ‘unintended nuclear war’ repeatedly surfaces in this connection (Frei 1983). This has also become true for the political developments of the beginning twenty-first century in a global geopolitical environment, which is characterized by an increased number of nuclear power states.

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Notwithstanding all the rationality of strategic concepts, politics always include a certain factor of incalculability and unpredictability. A human error, a misinterpretation of the other’s actions or intentions or merely communication problems cannot be excluded from human thought. The apparent rationality of strategic concepts thus requires—as nuclear armaments themselves illustrate— an additional corrective, which in turn undermines its rationality. Therein lies the actual dilemma of a nuclear arms build-up: As its basic rationality is by no means completely and absolutely convincing, each step toward an additional arms buildup brings with it a new uncertainty, which in turn calls for new steps of arms control, arms limitation or even disarmament. The growing fear of the excessive risks that accompany the military build-up is thus simultaneously the engine for arms control and disarmament efforts. These are of interest not just to pacifists, but also to the military, which sees in them a possibility for again making military potential and relative strengths predictable, and thus in their eyes controllable. In this sense, arms control and disarmament measures should be seen in a dual light. On the one hand, they are taken as political or military actions with a view to reducing the threat of war—even if only with regard to preventing an unintended war arising from a misconception (this is the aim above all of confidence and security-building measures). On the other, in military terms, they also help to establish the predictability of military force constellations, and thus may even promote the application of military force on a lower rung of the escalation ladder in specific cases or in certain regions of the world. Thus, the military understands arms control as a type of arena, as a ‘battlefield’ upon which victory in a future war must be prepared along the same lines as one prepares for a ‘real’ battle. The need to see everything from a war perspective (based on the binary code friend/enemy and a worst-case thinking) is a law of military logic.

6.2

The Rationality of Security Policy as an Antidote to the Irrationality of Violence?

It is conspicuous that both advocates and opponents of a theory of nuclear deterrence and a military build-up appeal to reason and point to the rationality of their respective line of argument (Bertram 1981; Kenny 1985). These parallels end when it comes to the question of peace or war. The contrasting of war as irrational and peace as rational is by no means universally accepted. For Kant, peace is ultimately a dictate of reason, while, for example, Machiavelli’s political wisdom certainly accepts war as an instrument of rational politics. According to this concept, a leader who wages war at the right time acts rationally, while one

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who fails to do so at the right time acts irrationally. For Krippendorff (1985), war itself is an expression of human irrationality; he regards both the state and war as products of a ‘logic of political folly’. To the present day, the philosophical and social science discourse on the problem of the rationality or irrationality of war finds itself caught in this basic dilemma, even if the contemporary political science debate concentrates largely on the issue of the rationality of contemporary security policy. In this way, security has become an issue for contemporary practical politics and political science and sociological theory alike, notwithstanding the fact that in terms of content the concept of security had originally been linked predominantly with internal policing tasks or with economic questions and the semantic field of the concept was only gradually expanded to include military force (Roché 1998; Fröhlich 1993). The idea of a rational policy increasingly came to captivate political and social sciences in the years after World War II (Dennert 1970). Modern social sciences therefore concentrated their focus on emphasizing the rationality of military force. If it is possible to speak of a rationality of war or security policy, the concept of rationality must also be depicted in a modern scientific theory of war or security policy. Attempts by modern social sciences have thus tended increasingly to utilize the natural sciences approach (especially mathematical and statistical methods) in order to throw light upon this rationality. Rationality or rational behavior is defined as the act or process of choosing the best and most favorable action from within a given set of actions (Kuhn 1974). Traditional research into the causes of war within the modern social and economic sciences may be regarded as an example of how a comprehensive mathematical model of war is developed (Yoder 1986; Blainey 1973; Small and Singer 1970). The classical model of security is based upon this kind of approach and borrows a concept from traditional physics, the ratio of forces. The idea of a determinable ratio of forces assumes that individual forces can be measured and determined. The realist approach in modern political theory is based solely upon this model, which points to the criteria according to which forces can be mathematically measured and compared (Zelger 1975). Traditional understanding seeks these criteria in a combination of a polity’s general economic situation, the status of its military armaments, its potential for asserting foreign policy interests and domestic political stability. The very concept of ‘stability’ again illustrates the special extent to which security policy thinking depends upon scientific paradigms. Thought is structured according to the binary code of strength/weakness thus encouraging a concept of power (power politics). Power can be defined as

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influence and control exercised by one nation over others. Power is both the means used and the goals sought by states in political, military, economic, and social competition with one another. Although not every state action is motivated by power considerations, those directly related to enhancing or defending national interest are always deeply involved in power politics. […] The exercise of power takes many forms, including persuasion, ideological and psychological warfare, economic coercion, moral suasion, cultural imperialism, legally recognized measures short of war, and, ultimately, war. (Ziring et al. 1995: 19)

The influence of economic thought again becomes apparent here, even though power is conceptualized differently than in the early economic theory of Adam Smith, who equated wealth with power without directly attributing this wealth to political or military power. Political economy and modern macro-economic theory are both familiar with the idea of a field of forces or an interdependence of forces (a relationship, philosophically speaking), with the analysis of the structure of this relationship or system proceeding from two different perspectives. One concept (the neo-classical approach) emphasizes market equilibrium and, based on a philosophical idea of harmony, points to the unavoidability of such equilibrium. The opposite perspective emphasizes market disequilibrium, the competition or conflict, which is simultaneously viewed as a key impetus for economic (and thus societal) development and change (Pichler 1998). In the concepts of modern political theory concerning the relationship between politics and war, this thought can be found in the following perspectives or concepts: Stability and peace must either be established by a balance of power, or by an enormous superiority in competition with other forces or states, i.e., monopoly power. Economic rivalry and the differing economic status and strength of the societies or states can cause the eruption or the prevention of military conflicts (what counts is the extent to which the forces differ); political instability can have both positive welfare effects and trigger disastrous economic crises (Gupta 1990). The main difficulty of all economic theory approaches to explaining societal phenomena is that it is not the harmony of a balance of forces that is regarded as the actual driver of historical development. But disequilibrium is seen as the decisive factor for economic growth and social life worlds, specifically the impacts that political instability, conflicts and diverging living conditions or differing economic systems have upon the entire global economic system or society. The background to the idea of disequilibrium and uncertainty as the forces that drive social processes is once again the assumption of bellare or polemos, of conflict as the true engine of historical progress. This perspective suggests that history

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should be seen as a succession of different stages of societal and economic development. The realist school of modern political science adopts this formula and elaborates a view of history as a succession of different developmental stages of the international political system. Henry Kissinger, for example, saw the development of the new world order from this kind of perspective: Almost as if according to some natural law, in every century there seems to emerge a country with the power, the will, and the intellectual and moral impetus to shape the entire international system in accordance with its own values. In the seventeenth century, France under Cardinal Richelieu introduced the modern approach to international relations, based on the nation-state and motivated by national interest as its ultimate purpose. In the eighteenth century, Great Britain elaborated the concept of the balance of power, which dominated European diplomacy for the next 200 years. In the nineteenth century, Metternich’s Austria reconstructured the Concert of Europe and Bismarck’s Germany dismantled it, reshaping European diplomacy into a cold-blooded game of power politics. (Kissinger 1994)

There can be no doubt that twentieth century security policy thought was dominated by the idea of an equilibrium of forces, a balance of power, which is blown up to be the sole criteria of stability (Pry 1990). This seemingly rational concept, however, exhibits a glaring problem. The quest for a balance of forces is surely not the crucial leitmotif of human or political action in situations where decisions must be made, the concept more likely arises from an analytical view from a distance, based on the experience of the impossibility of creating an all-embracing concentration of power in the field of international relations. This applies just as well to the medieval idea of a global monarchy or a universal empire as it does to modern ideas of an international socialist world society. The guiding principle of a security policy based on equilibrium is secondary, it is only ever developed where a concentration of power cannot be realized in practical politics, at least not at the present time. The strong emphasis on the temporality and changeability or dynamics of any equilibrium marks the crucial disadvantage of this concept vis-à-vis all ideas of a universal concentration of power (Gilpin 1981). This idea of a monopoly essentially therefore loses only little of its attractiveness for political thought; it also remains the true yardstick for all equilibrium theory. At the same time, there is a correlation with the primacy of egology in occidental thought, the focusing of thought on the building of identity, the translation of difference into a unity. Egological thought of a philosophical kind corresponds to political thinking in categories of dissolving diversity into the unity of a monopoly of power or a

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universal empire. In this sense, occidental political thought is unable to resign itself to the idea of permanent multi-polarity as the basis of a peace order. It is not enough to think in terms of the equilibrium of forces, because at heart this contradicts the strategic-military concept of always thinking in terms of a worst-case scenario. The dilemma of this type of security policy is that the military must always seek to shift the balance in its own favor. This is consistent with the tendency following the establishment and expansion of military alliances. In principle, a military alliance can never be strong enough, never have sufficient forces of its own. Of course, alliances can contribute to a sense of security or preventing war (deterring and restraining certain aggressors), but equally they can create international tension, generate uncertainties and encourage the creation of counter alliances. The logic of a balance of power is consistent with the logic of an arms race. One adequate description of the equilibrium of forces since the end of World War II is that of a balance of terror. Thus, the real driver remains egology, the focus of the self upon the destruction or subjugation of the other to gain maximum security for itself. However, recognizing, seeing and following the call of the other is beyond this rationality of absolute security and self-certainty. Accepting the other, listening to him/her, discerning his/her call, turning to face him/her always entails taking uncertainty upon oneself, means taking a risk. The difficulty of a mathematical conceptualization of political equilibrium or constellations of so-called ‘political instability’, and the obvious methodological problems associated with attempts to operationalize political actions on the basis of behavioral assumptions concerning rational actions by individuals and groups, raise grave doubts about the concept of a rational security policy. Theories of rational choice certainly recognize the factors irrationality and unpredictability (Mor and Maoz 1999). The aforementioned prisoner’s dilemma in modern game theory is only the most familiar example of the problem of scientific predictions concerning security policy. But even where such irrationality on the part of military force becomes discernable, the theory of rationality merely infers the need for a greater mobilization of the forces of reason. This raises the following question: Can an irrationality of military force best be countered by greater rationalization of security policy? Adherents of a rational approach answer affirmatively, critics, on the other hand, do not view this attempt as any kind of solution to the problem, which after all, is one pertaining to practical politics (Frei 1977; Küpper and Ortmann 1988). According to Hajo Schmidt (1990), it is not enough simply to note and then censure the irrationality of rational security policy, the irrationality of a rational economic theory, because violence does not separate rationality and irrationality, it virtually brings them together. In his view, violence is therefore the prerequisite

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for and is (usually latently) concomitant to rationality. The idea that the future can be shaped and made available is deeply connected to the idea of security, as that which is approaching always plainly represents the unsafe, the uncertain. With this in mind, Franz X. Kaufmann (1970: 156) says that seizing the future simultaneously develops scope for human action. In this way, human action transforms uncertainties into certainties, possibilities into facts, that which is approaching into the present. The idea of the possibility to shape this future and the societal, the idea of the feasibility and constructability of social orders is also implicitly assumed in all modern concepts of security policy. At the same time, action appears as instrumental-rational action, with the achievement of specific goals (such as security) being the purpose of the action. Modern thought believes in the feasibility of a rational security policy, proceeding from the assumption that systematic and goal-oriented action (based purely on reason) can produce a stable and durable societal order. This explains why security policy is to the present day conceived solely in categories of order and instrumental-rational action. The classical perspective is reflected in Holsti’s statement that, “all governments seek to achieve or defend their objectives through basically similar means, employing threats, rewards, and punishment” (Holsti 1967: VIII). Predicated upon this similarity of actions the international political order (security architecture) is created, resembling a closed building (security system), in which everyone can feel safe and secure in the knowledge that they are part of this order. The concept of security therefore presents itself to the present day with a universalist claim, with the idea of creating a world order. At the same time, it is incidental whether this order is seen as more of an equilibrium of forces or as a general constellation of multi-polar forces or states (state system), as a universal state (empire) or a federation, which are all merely different types of order. On the other hand, security policy is regarded as a goal-oriented or strategic action to affect the creation or construction of such an order (Huntington 1973). Here a whole range of opportunities for action becomes available in terms of practical politics: The establishment and expansion of alliance systems, the conclusion of bilateral and multi-lateral treaties, the creation of new institutions and arrangements to guarantee security etc. In this context, modern security policy is of course familiar with the application of military force as a possibility for action (interventions, military ‘assistance’ for partners, peace-enforcement, war, etc.). Within the overall world order, the question concerning the decision as to which means will have to be used to obtain specific goals and which not, then appears as a rational calculation and decision-making process, which proceeds in a similar manner among all players (Schröder 1984).

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However, this way of thinking completely ignores the perception of the other actor(s) in the game, instead relying upon an assumption of a natural similarity in the decision-making and actions of individuals and social collectives. The idea of diverse rationalities is rejected in as much as the unity of a world system is supposed to provide a guarantee of universal rationalism. Modern security thought with its claim to universality does not permit the thought that differing perceptions lead to diverging rationalities. Therein lies its clear weakness and shortcoming. From this perspective, similar cracks in a seemingly closed rationality become visible. They can be detected in many of the military doctrines of the armed forces; in the concept of a flexible response (Jopp and Meyer 1983), a military forward-defense and in the concepts of space-based seamless missile defense systems or the US preventative defense strategy. The critical point is always the conceptualization of security according to a militaristic formula as a ratio of one’s own power and arms in relation to a threat from a countervailing power (Mutz 1978). In the final analysis, and despite all attempts to evoke a rational security policy, a residual irrationality and uncertainty remains in all these possible courses of action. Even Gurr’s assumption that “the most fundamental human response to the use of force is counter force” (Gurr 1970: 232) cannot really provide absolute certainty for a rational security concept. Modern society even has a special awareness of this moment of uncertainty and irrationality, which is why belief in the actual security provided by traditional security policy has been so deeply shaken in recent decades. This goes hand in hand with a general doubt about the actual feasibility and possibility of shaping human society. The term ‘risk society’, which will be discussed at greater length in the next section, casts an almost symptomatic light on this situation and draws attention to a problem area confronting military force in modern societies, namely, the security paradox or the impossibility of radically maximizing security without simultaneously generating new uncertainties.

6.3

The Military and the Paradox of Security

Significantly, it is institutions, which have to the present day assumed protective functions or to which this task has been ascribed. The traditional separation of the internal/external security aspects of the state has in this respect led to a clear division of tasks between the police and the military. According to the classical formulation of political science, the military performs the social task of ensuring external security, a function, which was additionally, especially in the twentieth

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century, interpreted as one form of this institution’s productivity. Security thus becomes the product of this activity; the application of military force is therefore incorporated into a rational concept of politics and the state (Art and Waltz 1983). This assumption of rationality in the ‘production of security’ by the military, however, collapses as soon as the security paradox comes into sight. Security is namely not guaranteed by institutions of a military kind or by the police, it is instead the result of an overall constellation of societal factors (Kaufmann 1970). In modern societies, this is reflected in an all-encompassing concept of security, which is why modern security policy is understood in a rather more comprehensive sense, i.e., from the interaction of traditional military policy with other areas of politics (such as and in particular, foreign policy, domestic policy, economic policy etc.). Institutionalized security complexes are therefore engaged in interaction with and are interdependent upon other forms of security and other institutions that guarantee security. Moreover, in each society different feelings or perceptions of security or insecurity and specific fears prevail, all of which influence human actions. As this concerns an emotional level of efforts to achieve security, but one which certainly shapes peoples’ everyday actions, a moment that evades calculability and control inserts itself between the security institution with its claim to rationality. For Adalbert Evers and Helga Nowotny, the ‘security paradox’ is that additional external guarantees of security can mean that “the remaining or new uncertainties are tolerated less” (Evers and Nowotny 1987: 61). They attributed this, inter-alia to the fact that “social identities and the associated expectations are at the same time also shaped by successful safeguards. If unexpected cracks and uncertainties then surface in other places, one’s own social identity is then also called into question” (ibid. 62). The focus thus shifts to an interaction of individual and collective expectations of security and the institutionalized security activities provided by social orders. The social structure always remains precarious, simply because there is no absolute security, i.e., gaps between expectations and life-world experiences always arise. This makes the way in which society deals with uncertainty a central topic in the first place. The security paradox is rooted in the discontinuity that is already inherent in security, in the non-linear progress, which makes it possible that the unexpected will burst into the prognoses, that the improbable will become probable, and ultimately that efforts to increase security will lead to less security. This is precisely the problem associated with the concept of modern security with which the modern military struggles. On the one hand, certain societal expectations of security and ideas of order are vested in the military, on the other, the continuous maximization of military potential by no means leads to a stronger sense of security, but instead is able to reduce it.

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Modern security policy proceeds from the assumption that a maximization of military resources (nuclear weapons, new technologies, arms, etc.) will at the same time lead to increased security. The assumed rationality of a security or peace policy based on comprehensive nuclear arms is combined with a firm belief in an institutionalized security guarantee. However, this strategy for overcoming uncertainty is in turn capable of generating new fears and uncertainties. It is evidently impossible to avoid the dynamics of military force with a rational security policy concept. The problem of modern security policy lies in the fact that it has to follow paths, which contribute to reducing social uncertainties. Fear might play a role as a factor for preventing war, but it is not a foundation upon which real security policy can build, because its entire concept of security would then be based upon a factor of uncertainty. The paradox of modern security policy is that fear and uncertainty are key elements in a rational security policy, which aims at reducing uncertainties. The fallacy of such a concept is that it assumes an ability to rationalize fear in a way that will enable the irrationality of fear to be eliminated at a higher level. The philosophical basis of such a concept is by no means new or surprising. It is essentially the same assumption that the best means of preventing war is to make war the foundation for a concept of war prevention, so that the party that wishes peace must arm for war. Even in the guise of modern rationality, modern security policy is not far from this traditional thought. The chief problem with projecting a rational behavior with the aim of achieving security in the contemporary international community of states, is that the current system suggests to each actor that they are at risk of being destroyed and exterminated if they do not participate in the power game and struggle for political domination and spheres of influence. This is ultimately nothing but the fear that eschewing military force will result in one becoming a victim of military force employed by the other (Krippendorff 1973). The dilemma lies in the fundamental hopelessness and aporia of an understanding of security that is based on a calculation of military-political-economic strength, more so as an established military institution with a potentially high destructive potential always represents an enormous risk for those who would be willing to break through the logic of military and strategic thought patterns. The dangers that arise from this dilemma are easy to recognize, although hard to avert in political practice. They are themselves rooted in the rationality of military force, namely there, where military force is confronted with its own insufficiencies, but immediately seeks to offset them by unfolding its destructive capability. The hope of social utopia and modern social theory that military force would ultimately turn against itself, ushering in a new peace, appears unfounded.

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Thus, the face of military force is once again changing, transmuting from a seemingly ultima ratio or means of preventing war during the Cold War to an arena for practical security policy. The globalization of security policy is at the same time leading to a ‘rediscovery of the military’ as a seemingly indispensable instrument, even for modern societies, for minimizing risk, completely irrespective of whether the new threats to the globe are of a military or non-military nature. From the military’s perspective, there is basically no such division at all. At the military level, the question of the destructive impacts of one’s own weapons and one’s own inherent capacity for destruction and annihilation exist only in respect of the potential enemy, not oneself, one’s own population, culture and future. Here, military thought displays a ‘blind spot’, the logic of which includes the possibility of total self-destruction (better dead than different). After all, even talk of security and ‘risk minimization’ is, in the final analysis, concerned with nothing more than focusing upon victory, the possibility of taking over the other to prevent oneself from being taken over by the other.

6.4

At the End of the Distance to the Other: The Omnipresence and Logic of Military Violence

Modern globalization at the same time means the ‘end of distance’ between self and the other. This is the gist of Ulrich Beck’s concept of the modern risk society (Beck 1986), which he saw already well on the way toward another modernity. For Beck, this simultaneously meant an end of the ‘Other’, the end of all our carefully cultivated opportunities for distancing ourselves, is what we have become able to experience with the advent of nuclear contamination. Misery can be marginalized, but that is no longer true of hazards in the age of nuclear technology. It is there that the peculiar and novel political force of those threats lies. Their power is the power of threat, which eliminates all the protective zones and social differentiations of modernity. (ibid. 7)

Certainly, the omnipresence of military force was never as clearly perceptible as during the Cold war period with the Damocles sword of the complete nuclear destruction of the earth. Wars, interventions, the putting down of revolutions—no type of employed military force could ever show the omnipresence of military force as plainly as the possibility of a nuclear strike by modern armed forces at any time. Perhaps therein lies the chance for our age, that the contemporary societal context really does challenge us to rethink the traditional relationship between

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politics, science and the military. The talk of the ‘impossibility of distance’ can take us in two directions. Firstly, it can remind us to reflect upon a responsibility for others, which no longer simply understands the ‘we’ as a constellation of confrontations of ego and alter ego. On the other hand, it can equally lead to a further radicalization of an egology, in which the self recognizes that there is no longer anything outside itself, nothing that is able to distance itself from it. The impossibility of unconnectedness (Unmöglichkeit einer Beziehungslosigkeit) is precisely what characterizes modern society at the collective level. It thus appears as if military force would ultimately turn completely against itself. This can take the form of either total destruction (the possibility continues to exist) or, however, in a new form of emancipation of the genuinely political from military force, a new flourishing of sociality, which in turn evicts the military from the space in our culture that it has carved out for itself over thousands of years. The third path, the one that historical research and traditional thought always has in mind, is that of a simple advance of history, the idea that the course of history always develops from opposites and that conflict or war will thus remain the father of future societal forms. The purpose of the analysis in this chapter is not to end up with a new philosophy of history or a theory of another modernity. Its aim is to ask again how, on the basis of new sociological approaches to interpreting current questions of practical philosophy concerning the relationship of politics and military force, thought can be advanced with a view to ensuring that this political and societal thought does not close the path to a quality of otherness. Ulrich Beck conceptualized the difference between an industrial society and a risk society as a turnaround from the production of wealth (as was the case in modern industrial societies) to the production of risk in contemporary society, in which the risks of modernization were no longer limited to specific localities or groups or even by national boundaries. According to Beck, this brings into being supra-national, non-class-specific global hazards with a new type of social and political dynamism (ibid. 18). Beck also said that as a result of this process, areas became political, which in the past had been regarded as unpolitical, by which he essentially means that these areas and questions now become the focus of a public discussion. This development can be observed very clearly in matters of traditional military and security policy—from the peace movement to NATO’s ‘Double Track’ decision, the question of nuclear weapons, NATO’s strategy discussion, debates about obligatory military service or the use of military force during recent wars and armed conflicts.

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In this sense, the risk society simultaneously effects a change in security awareness and for its part accelerates transformation processes (such as, for example, the disintegration of old communities of interests and the formation of new coalitions and groups with new social concerns). The elimination of recognized threats to security or risks thus presents itself as a social task, which goes beyond the scope of traditional political orders. Undoubtedly, the threat posed by nuclear weapons has for many years constituted a risk, which has troubled people all over the world (although of course with differing degrees of intensity). This type of worry is no longer tied to the borders of nation states or alliances, i.e., it is universal and global, and presents itself in a way that makes traditional political structures and procedures appear inadequate for coping with the tasks and problems facing society. This is what prompts talk of a need for political action, the need to create a new political legal and institutional framework and the need for new, more functional and efficient institutions. At the same time, the hierarchy of values is changing to accord priority to the idea of security, and while this promotes solidarity, the latter is based not upon idealistic assumptions, but merely upon a feeling of fear (ibid. 65 f. and 98–102). One of the chief difficulties of contemporary politics is that while the logic of military-strategic thought is partly being abandoned—for example, in search of a different (i.e., non-military) form of security policy—the same old categories are simultaneously being applied. Accordingly, concepts of ‘civilian defense’ are constructed according to the model of military defense and politicians talk of a ‘strategy’ of non-military security. The central role played by technology in this process at the same time indicates a renewed predominance of technology over the actual political event, the feasibility and construction of social reality is given precedence over allowing room for encounters. Even in these alternative concepts, the idea of security is closely interwoven with the principle of feasibility and controllability of the lifeworld. Beck’s analysis of a disappearance of differences, a world that is moving continuously closer together highlights a key social problem arising from the impossibility of maintaining a distance or ‘distancing’ oneself. This problem has two sides to it: On the one hand, it is no longer even possible to maintain a distance from military force (which here again shows its totalitarian character), i.e., the nuclear arsenal already has me covered, without my perhaps being aware of this. I am not the (military) target, but I am within its radius. Modern military technology is perhaps foreign to me, but ultimately, I have already internalized it. I might consider the Internet to be an anarchic world of alien dimensions if I am unfamiliar with how it was a child of the military spirit and its link with

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modern military strategy, etc. One can therefore speak of the modern human’s lack of distance to military force. Secondly, as people move closer together due to the ever-more complex integration of the most diverse social spheres, a totalization is revealed in which the military blurs exactly those differences and boundaries to whose preservation it has attached so much importance for centuries. If there were only one single military force in this world, it would be left without either function or meaning, with no more borders to defend, and no more differences to others. At same time, one needs to recognize that military force has the capability to reverse at the moment of its own dissolution. It can turn completely inwards and then to construct new differences that it defines as opposites all over again. There are no restrictions to constituting an enemy in either an absolutist world state (empire) or in a completely integrated and interdependent world society. Only the price associated with such paradigms perhaps varies for individual societies. Modern hopes of peace in a completely integrated society full of dependencies ultimately once again lead to hope for a unity and totality in which all opposites have cancelled each other out. In this kind of society, the end of politics does indeed coincide with the end of military force because the totality erases differences. The hope for a structural inability on the part of modern societies to wage war because the dependencies are so great that war can only lead to destruction is, however, also ultimately based on what proves to be a questionable paradigm of thought. This is because the application of military force always involves the intention (or at least the hope) of ‘gain’ or ‘advantage’. Perhaps, however, the crux of modern military force lies in the fact that it can unleash its destructive force without having to achieve an advantage or gain with its effort. It is by no means inconceivable that there is such a thing as a ‘suicidal society’, irrespective of the name that the social sciences would ever give to it. For this type of society, the military would undoubtedly be a suitable weapon of self-destruction. It is understandable that the current debate surrounding a rational security policy cannot avoid having to deal with the development of modern technology. It is equally logical that, following on from the question of technology, that it will ascribe the highest priority to the question of feasibility. This is characteristic of the debates about defense concepts and military strategies, which are merely concerned with questions of technical feasibility and the deployment of new weapons systems and technologies. It is hardly surprising, therefore, that these technological debates and the technologization of military force then provoke a criticism of technology. In the process, however, the character of a comprehensive critique of the military is completely lost. Criticism of technology was not invented by the risk society, it can already be detected in the early days of the technological and

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industrial revolution. At the same time, it is less a skepticism with regard to the basic feasibility of certain human ventures, but with regard to the desirability of all that is feasible or appears feasible. It is at this point that a specifically ethical factor enters into the discourse concerning the role of technology and the modern natural sciences in our modern society. It thus becomes possible to understand why the debate about the rationality of modern security policy has always been accompanied by an ethical discussion. It is in this context that the question of moral complicity on the part of the modern sciences in the destructive consequences of the dropping of the atom bombs in 1945 must be seen. It is continued in the current discussion concerning new war damage, the environmental compatibility of armaments and the military, the future hazards and risks arising from new technologies and the development of new means of war (from chemical to biological weapons). However, answers to these questions are in turn only to be found outside the natural sciences themselves. Ethics is once again called for—and this is confirmed by talk of a new scientific ethos or ‘postmodern ethics’ (Bauman 1993)—where the modern natural and social sciences are unable to provide final answers. The real fallacy of modern rational security thought as conceptualized in strategy is to base future activities to secure or establish peace exclusively upon technology and the modern natural sciences. In this respect, the real problem to which ethics can draw attention ultimately leads to a radical critique of science: Technology is unable to put an end to war, it can only change its course and its destructive impact. Politics are unable to really dissolve the military as long as they share the same foundation. Ultimately, modern science will not be able to subject military force to a radical critique while the main paradigms of this science and scientific thought are themselves militarized. The real risk of contemporary ‘rational’ (scientific) security thought is its military character and logic. The idea of security is always linked to the idea of the formation of collective identities. According to Cartesian metaphysics, the self is only ever certain of itself. It was in this sense that Hobbes saw the chance of increased security if people were to voluntarily accede to a political order, exchanging individual freedom for greater security. The state as such a political order must guarantee the individual a minimum degree of political security, as it is from this that much of its legitimacy is derived. This has been the view of political thought since the early modern period. Advancing globalization and increasing interdependencies between societies, a decline in the status of the nation state in international politics and an increase in federal structures are accompanied by the social phenomenon of progress toward the formation of new collective identities to which

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certain security expectations are linked, which were previously linked to the state (Trotha 1995). The problem with the formation of new collective identities is that these formation processes always indicate upheavals, which themselves give rise to uncertainties, all the more so because they involve certain expectations. A broadening of military alliance agreements or mutual assistance pacts in the direction of an idea of greater security must not automatically lead to a greater degree of security for the individuals in the polity that seeks such changes. Not even the principle of identifying oneself with the strongest party in any given situation can guarantee increased security. Military force always includes a significant factor of uncertainty, as a military organization’s standard of equipment permanently lags that of the general technological state-of-the-art. However, the introduction of new weapons systems and, equally, the implementation of new strategic concepts, make the actual impact that can be expected uncertain, i.e., even with the help of modern simulation the uncertainty regarding the actual impact of a planned application of military force grows. The incalculability of the actual impact of an application of military force in a given situation is a constitutive element of military force. The dilemma of all war planning is that the next war cannot actually be planned, and all planning is based on the experience of past operations and mere speculation (scenarios). Certainty can only be gained where practical application is possible (also in the sense of a trial). The urge for certainty is thus always an urge to apply military force, is always anticipation. The fear of ‘missing out’ or ‘coming too late’ is written into every security or military policy. Therein lies its dynamics because what matters is having a competitive edge. Modernization leaps within the military are the expression of such aspirations. However, they simultaneously increase uncertainties within the military regarding new operations, as they still lack experience-based results. Viewed from this perspective, resistance within the military to technological innovations can even be seen as a factor that reduces the factor of uncertainty, a constraint, while the continuous calls for modernization, more weapons, more soldiers etc. increase the uncertainty factor. In this manner, military force leans toward ongoing operations, or at least to testing new technologies and strategic concepts in what are referred to as small wars. The development of standardized mass production has certainly been influenced to a significant degree by the creation of standing armies (Doorn 1965). By the same token, the technological changes over the last century have also radically changed strategic concepts (Picht 1966). War technology has changed the military’s entire functional structure.

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This became more differentiated, the reciprocal dependencies of the arms of service increased, while the differences to the civilian professions diminished. In the American Civil War 93% of the soldiers carried out purely military functions, while in 1954 this proportion had fallen to 29%. The percentage of activities similar to those in the civil sphere rose accordingly. (Roghmann and Ziegler 1977: 159)

However, with increasing technologization, coordination is no longer carried out through organizational channels, but as dictated by the technology, i.e., the entire complex appears to the individual in the form of objective requirements that are determined by the technical system (ibid. 161). At the same time, advances in war technology have undermined the centralization, i.e., a differentiation within the organization and an increase in the degree of complexity have occurred. Technologization at the same time changes strategic thought. Precision becomes the chief criteria against which feasibility can be measured. For this reason, modern thought tends to see technologization and the development of new technologies as the actual driving force behind historical progress. The same is true of military force itself. In this way, technologization appears to be the decisive factor for the transformation of the military, for the changes in war or the conduct of war and in respect of the strategic concepts and military build-up or preparations for war. This view inevitably leads to a technological determinism. Within political science, it is frequently pointed out that modern wars can no longer be limited to a purely military confrontation. A modern war is simply no longer comparable with a battlefield situation where soldiers must fight each other until one side is victorious and the remainder of the population only learns how the war ended at a later date. Modern war is therefore conducted outside the actual military sphere, it tends to affect the civilian population rather than the soldiers, is directed against the enemy state. Statistics concerning the changed ratios of military to civilian fatalities during wars are frequently used to corroborate this statement (Yoder 1986; Wood 1968). By the same token, however, and this is especially true in the case of the most recent wars, a general attempt is made to demonstrate to the world population that modern wars are primarily directed against military facilities. This is despite the fact (and notwithstanding the fundamental problem of comparing figures or the frequent impossibility of clearly categorizing those who have been killed) that it continues be the case that a far higher percentage of civilian dead can be observed than fallen soldiers. The dangers of modern security policy lie in the possibility of once again transforming proximity to the other into a distance so that the differences are once again magnified into antagonism. An interpretative reading of international politics therefore emphasizes the difference between ‘mere difference’ and a

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difference as an ‘antagonism’. The latter easily leads to a conceptualization according to a binary code of positive/negative, higher/lower and right/wrong: in short, in a dichotomous thought that always does violence to the other. Keen attention is called for above all where formation processes, new identities, are concerned, while at the same time theories of a ‘clash of civilizations’ (Huntington 1996), of the inescapability of a struggle of societal convictions are consolidated to a belief that military strength is the sole guarantee for the survival of self. Such thought claims to have the enormous advantage that it has been proven in countless wars. However, this means that war is continued afresh. The sword is indeed directed against one who reaches for the sword, because he/she has already been captured by military thought and its inherent binary military logic.

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Small, Melvin/Singer, J. David (1970): Patterns in International Warfare, 1816–1965. In: The Annals of the American Academy of Political and Social Science, vol. 391, no. 1, 145– 155. Smoke, Richard (1993): National Security and The Nuclear Dilemma: An Introduction to the American Experience in the Cold War. 3rd edition. Boston: McGraw-Hill. Stein, Jonathan B. (1989): From H-Bomb to Star Wars. The Politics of Strategic Decision Making. Lexington: Lexington Books. Trotha, Trutz von (1995): Ordnungsformen der Gewalt oder Aussichten auf das Ende des staatlichen Gewaltmonopols. In: Nedelmann, Birgitta (Ed.) (1995): Politische Institutionen im Wandel. Kölner Zeitschrift für Soziologie und Sozialpsychologie, Sonderheft 35, 129–166. United Nations (Ed.) (1985): General and Complete Disarmament: Study on Concepts of Security. Report of the Secretary-General, 26 Aug. 1985. Weizsäcker, Carl Friedrich von (1971): Kriegsfolgen und Kriegsverhütung. München: Hanser. Weizsäcker, Carl Friedrich von (1976): Wege in der Gefahr. Eine Studie über Wirtschaft, Gesellschaft und Kriegsverhütung. München: Hanser. Weizsäcker, Carl Friedrich von (1981): Der bedrohte Friede. München-Wien: DeutscherTaschenbuch-Verlag. Wettig, Gerhard (1979): Das Abschreckungskonzept als Theorie der Friedenssicherung: Darstellung, Analyse, Kritik. Köln: Berichte des Bundesinstituts für Ostwissenschaftliche und Internationale Studien, no. 8. Wood, David (1968): Conflict in the Twentieth Century. In: The Adelphi Papers, vol. 48. Yoder, Amos (1986): World Politics and the Causes of War Since 1914. Lanham-New YorkLondon: University Press of America. Zelger, Josef (1975): Konzepte zur Messung der Macht. Berlin: Duncker & Humblot. Ziring, Lawrence/Plano, Jack C./Olton, Roy (1995): International Relations. A Political Dictionary. 5th edition. Santa Barbara: ABC-Clio.

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War, Peace and Military Violence: A Phenomenological Inquiry

War is the father of all things, the king of all and some he shows as gods, others as humans. Some he makes slaves, others free. (Heraclitus, fragment 53)

Consideration of this almost three-thousand-year-old fragment may well enable the reader to divine the significance in the Western tradition of politicalphilosophical thought contained in questions regarding the reason for and meaning behind war and the use of force between men. It is undoubtedly no coincidence that the word polemos, used by Heraclitus, was repeatedly translated in Western thought as war or bellum. Clearly, no other question of human existence is or was of such significance for human social cohabitation as that of violence, war and the use of military force, implying as it does, the possibility of a radical change—an upheaval in the socially constituted structure of morality, law and politics, even the total destruction of humanity. The reader is justified in inquiring, after three thousand years of philosophical interpretation of war, as well as systematic engagement with the interrelationship between politics, law, morality and (military) violence, as to the justification for undertaking a new investigation of this nature. Had not Heraclitus already provided the answer to this question as to the causes of war, the origins of military violence and the use of force? His answer provided in fragment 80 is clear: We must know that war is common to all and strife is justice, and that all things come into being and pass away through strife. But this possible answer can just as easily provide fresh occasion for a question, capable of provoking the ‘labor of thought’: what if war represents the foundation of our prevailing philosophical and political thought, so that any attempt to overcome war using rational thought represents nothing less than a task of Sisyphean proportions? Such thinking and © The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Fachmedien Wiesbaden GmbH, part of Springer Nature 2023 F. Kernic, War, Peace and the Military, Militär und Sozialwissenschaften/ The Military and Social Research 56, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-658-40521-2_7

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questioning points us to a possible aporia: if that were the case, then we would be forced to consider the danger that continuing this train of thought would involve an implicit reproduction of war. Furthermore, how could we even conceive of a school of philosophical and political thought that does not rest on the foundations of war and violence, if it is necessary always to proceed from a thought, a feature of which is that it is based on this very foundation (Kernic 2003a, b)? A fresh theoretical undertaking seeking to interpret the interrelationship between (military) violence, society, (international) politics, and philosophical thought without ending in a justification of violence and war appears to be a hopeless undertaking. Are we left with no possibility other than a resigned acceptance of Heraclitus’s answer: the necessity of accepting and enduring the possibility of war and violence? The Western philosophical tradition has often taken this course: war belongs to being, is a part of nature, and as such represents a status naturalis. It is in this manner that war becomes the ‘father of all things’. Even today, war has the powerful ability to change and reshape our global society and international relations. War, military violence and the use of force are still central to our societies and international system. Regardless of whether we consider ourselves to be living in an era of high modernity or even postmodernity, we must admit that our world/lifeworld (Lebenswelt) or modern society has not managed to put an end to the phenomenon of war. Undoubtedly, we are still confronted with new wars and violent conflicts in many regions around the globe, and we are also constantly creating new narratives of war and justifications for the use of military force. The War on Terror can be regarded as one prominent example marking the beginning of the twenty-first century. Of course, not only an actual experience of warfighting, but also an involvement in and exposure to narratives of war have a tremendous impact on the way we, as human beings, live our lives, perceive our world and others, and act socially and politically. The study of war, the use of force, has been central to many modern disciplines, including international relations, political science, sociology, and peace and conflict studies. Numerous attempts to at least conceive of war and to posit the impossibility of a future war can be found in all modern disciplines and Western political thought since Heraclitus. The impetus for this is in turn war itself: it can be said that nothing gives as much stimulus to the hope of overcoming war as the evidence of war itself. In keeping with the countless other theoretical considerations of war, especially those produced by IR (international relations) theory and modern peace and conflict studies, this investigation must consider the possibility of war as

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being the foundation of and central driving force for any attempt at a fresh conception of the phenomenon of societal violence, especially war. Yet what greater justification for a fresh attempt to conceive of the phenomenon of organized collective violence between men can one think of than the very possibility of war, even in our times? This chapter, therefore, revolves around just two central questions: Why does war remain so central to our society? Which possibilities do we have to lay a new foundation of peace in our contemporary world? In fact, these questions have been raised numerous times in the history of mankind. Nevertheless, they have never lost their importance and urgent pressure on us. One can even argue that today, due to many factors, such as, for example, nuclear capabilities, advanced technologies, increased mobility, and globalization, the necessity for in-depth analysis and reflection is even greater than ever before in history. This study will not follow any of our current mainstream IR or social science theories. It needs to be seen instead as a rather isolated theoretical endeavor based primarily on phenomenological studies (Peperzak 1983a, b, 1993, 1995, 1997; Wyschogrod 1974; Bleijendaal 1984; Burggraeve 1985; Busch 1992; Cohen 1986; Bauman 1993), particularly the phenomenological-philosophical social theory of French philosopher Emmanuel Lévinas (comp. Wild 1969; Durfee 1975; Hand 1989, 1996; Keenan 1999; Krewani 1992; Olivier 1985; Ricoeur et al. 1989, 1996; Schroeder 1996; Strasser 1978). It can be viewed as a post-modern approach to the study of war, military violence and peace in society, which places the emphasis on the relationship between the self and the other (Atterton 1992, 1997; Awerkamp 1977; Beavers 1995; Bello 1997; Bernasconi and Wood 1988; Bernhardt 1996; Dallery and Scott 1989; Descombes 1979; Hand 1989, 1996; Krewani 1992; Ricoeur 1990). In doing so, the aim which it follows is less a new attempt at a comprehensive and systematic theory of peace (or war) than ‘following a trail’ (Spurensuche), i.e., a (phenomenological) search for a trace, a ‘trace of peace,’ leading from the self to the other without them both becoming exhausted, robbing the other of his otherness (Avram 1996; Bello 1997; Bernasconi and Critchley 1991; Bernhardt 1996; Critchley 1992; Dallery and Scott 1989; Hand 1989, 1996; Krewani 1992; Manning 1991; Peperzak 1993; Schroeder 1996). This chapter will start with a phenomenological inquiry into the relationship between the Western ‘logic of the self’ (egology) and the evidence of war. Then it will continue with a philosophical analysis of the phenomenon of war and the relationship between war and being in Western philosophy (again based primarily on the thought of Lévinas). Finally, it will investigate the possibility for a new foundation of peace in our world and society. This final part will revolve round one central idea: the constitution of ‘responsibility’ in the original encounter of

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the self with the other, thus providing the means with which to overcome war (Lévinas 1991).

7.1

Egology, Totality and the Evidence of War

Modern universal philosophical thought frequently takes its starting point as the self, the ‘I think’, the Cartesian Cogito that seals the identity of the self. I am conscious exclusively of myself, but not of the other. The I is the self (I = I); everything else stands ‘in relation’ to this I, which guarantees the indestructible identity of the I with itself. For traditional philosophical thought, the starting point of any relationship is always the self. At the same time, this self-composition of the I provides it with the appearance of certainty and as such, appears as an indubitable ‘fact’ (the Cartesian cogito ergo sum is also a recognition of a fact: the sentence cannot be reached logically or demonstratively): a fundamentum inconcussum. The I or ‘egological subject’ (Frank et al. 1988) appears to provide the secure foundation on which modern philosophical thought and natural science, with all its systems of knowledge and theories, is constructed. The ego provides the positive foundation of all further cognitive activity, the evidently indubitable starting point of all thought. The ‘self-composition of the I’ remains unreflected in this thought, its character as an actus is masked. All that remains is the simple fact of the ego, the subject, which proceeding from itself makes everything else to an object (comp. Hegel 1975; Hegel 1970: 137–177). The strict subject-object division of modern scholarship is simply a consequence of the self-composition of the I and the associated radical separation of the self from others ‘in proceeding from’ the self (Bailhache 1994; Beavers 1995; Derrida 1978). Egology concentrates exclusively on beings, the thing, the object; the relationship is of secondary importance (comp. Moreno 1989). This is conceived of as being only a ‘relationship proceeding from’ (Hegel 1970: 137 f.). The ego becomes (in accordance with Descartes) the only secure foundation for the enactment of its own existence, for the practice of action as well as the theory of knowledge, thus even for philosophical thought. According to Descartes, it is always an I that thinks; (cogito) a simple cogitare without an ego is unthinkable. The ego becomes the locus of the ‘present of the self with itself’ and the last functioning instance of the creation and constitution of meaning (comp. Derrida 1978, 1997). Western philosophy, manifested primarily as ontology, is essentially egology: it continually reduces the other to the self and in doing so establishes the primacy

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of the self. The seizure of the other is at the same time appropriation, with the aim of identifying the other with the self. The transition from the otherness of the world into the identification of the self creates identity. Nothing is outside the self anymore; nothing remains untouched in its original otherness. The mode of the self consists in the possibility of divesting the other of its otherness, abolishing its otherness—that which possesses only difference and is different in relation to the self. Identity abolishes the other; the logic of the ego permits no space for the other outside of the self. Those who choose this ego as the absolute starting point of philosophical thought (in the sense of a foundational assumption) overlook the antecedent state of the I, that of ‘having been thrown into the world’. Egology masks the self’s act of self-establishment and thus decisively curtails the possibilities of philosophical thought. In transforming the self into a superior being from which everything proceeds, philosophical thought assumes the ‘form of a movement’, which proceeds from the self and then returns to itself, after having taken possession of others in the sense of a conception, take over, a subjugation. It is exactly this that represents Descartes’ central philosophical achievement. Yet this accomplishment of thought has its price: thought remains bound to the self and everything outside of this self is understood only in relation to the self (self-reference). The point of departure and return of every cognitive movement is identical. Egology knows the relationship to the other only ever in reference to and in proceeding from the self. This is the source of its shortcoming. The ‘discovery of the I’ is not the result of a reduction of the self to itself, but instead through its relationship to the other. The relationship of the self and the other is paramount to any possibility of thought or language. As a result, this paramount relationship between the self and the other must also be placed in the focus of this investigation. It represents the starting point of philosophical discussion because it presents the possibility of consummating a philosophical thought whilst enduring the difference between beings, which goes beyond itself and does not exhaust itself in the simple egology of the self-certain subject and culminating in a totality of being. The radical emphasis on difference enables traditional philosophical-scientific thought (based on Western ontology) to undergo comprehensive criticism, on the basis of which it is able to create thought that does not raise the ‘experience of totality and war’ to the only admissible type of philosophical evidence. Egology as the only indubitably certain starting point of philosophical thought culminates not only in totality and a closed system, but also in the experience of war.

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The Phenomenon of War

War as a phenomenon, the immediate experience of military violence or the use of force, leaves an entirely specific trace in philosophical thought. Being displays itself to the Western philosophical tradition as war—war as the actual reality, which beings cannot escape, as the herald of an all-encompassing totality and which knows no exterior. War, or so it would appear, is concerned with nothing less than being itself; at stake is existence itself: life and death, being or not being. Thus, during war, the self is thrown back on itself in a manner more vehement than ever before. As a being, an individual in war, one is entirely dependent on oneself, ones very existence is at stake, survival. In war, a being conceives of themselves as someone who has to assert themselves against others, as an I who can only be if it fights against others. War is the ‘culmination of egology’, the absolute involvement of the self with itself (comp. Lévinas 1991). The complete unleashing of military violence reached during war destroys all moral imperatives and robs ethics of its normative power. The normative structure of ethics and its claim to validity is reduced to a single imperative: the maxim ‘kill!’ The absolute precept of war is the destruction and killing of the other, who has been transformed by war into an ‘adversary’ (foe) of the self, who has to be subjugated. The subjugation of the other occurs finally only in the course of their obliteration or complete submission. There is no war without a will to destroy the other, without the intended reduction of the other to the level of a something absorbed in the self. The other who meets the self is reduced to an object during war and in such a way subjugated in advance, because the self aims at subjugating this other in its totality. Yet at this point, a limit of all efforts aimed towards unity and totality becomes clear: the other resists this attempt at absorption; it defends itself against the attempt to subjugate it, against its early death. As long as the struggle continues, the other is always present as an other who, by resisting, repels the self and throws him back on oneself. Only upon the victory over the other, with the end of its independent existence, does the other stop being an other for the self. Only victory enables the bridging of the difference and creates identity. The telos of war is the creation of identity, yet in so doing, war concurrently assumes the difference that it seeks to overcome (Lévinas 1991). The difference that becomes evident in war points to a desire to resist the clutches of an all-encompassing totality, which does not take its starting point and purpose from a self. Every use of violence on the part of a being—and exactly this is the case in war—makes two things clear in structural terms. First is the will on the part of the self to subjugate the other. Second is the will on the

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part of the other to escape this intended subjugation and to assert oneself outside the projected totality, and thus to maintain the difference. War is thus concerned with both the abrogation as well as the maintenance of this difference in equal measure. The violence of war points to an existence not restricted by another existence but rather outside totality and which denies the tendencies of totalization. This denial is suggestive of a space beyond totality, a terrain which eludes an all-embracing totality and which can be referred to as a ‘space of freedom’ as a principal ‘openness’ (Lévinas 1991: 83 f.). The possibility of war—just as of peace—assumes the existence of this space of freedom. Only those beings capable of waging war (those with the principal possibility of working towards the maintenance of difference and to refuse any subjugation by an other) are able to raise themselves to peace. War, just as peace, assumes the existence of beings “structured otherwise than as parts of a totality” (Lévinas 1991: 222). Traditional thought focuses on totality; totality objectivizes by deindividualization. Totality reduces individuals to components of a force field from which a meaning is granted to them. Without this totality, the individuals become lost in an infinity that is denied any meaning. It is thus always thought necessary to sacrifice the uniqueness and individuality of any present for something future, a totality still to be constructed, which determines the objective meaning of the present and individual. This is simultaneously a compositional act of finite disposition, as the actual meaning is always drawn from totality itself seen as an end. The actual or objective sense attached to totality appears as a final act of absolute formation of meaning, from which every being derives its present binding nature. Associated with totality is thus a conceptual orientation towards the future, which alone is accorded the ability to unleash the actual, or objective, meaning of the present. Only in view of this unity and totality is it possible either to anticipate or capture the meaning accorded to the beings as such in every present. The reduction of a being to a pure moment or a force necessitates understanding every meaning in every present as something merely provisional and yet undetermined, but which urgently requires a final fixation. This tendency undergoes radicalization in war-time, the pursuit of a final fixation, an absolutely valid decision. The radical reduction of the self to its self and the total negation of the other in war mobilizes the self in a direction that does not originate from itself. This is the actual dilemma of war: war destroys the identity of the self by robbing it of the others. War is less the death of the other than the ‘death of an original social relationship’, the violent annihilation of the difference between the self and the other. Only in the extinguishing of the difference does the self lose its subjectivity. The thought of the identity of

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the self only has any power as long as the difference exists. With the ‘end of the difference’ intended in war, the self loses its identity. The war captures the self: it is not the self that wages war. War is like death: the I does not invoke it; rather, it takes hold of me without me being granted a chance of resistance. War takes possession of my being and in doing so becomes my being. War makes the supposed subject into an object. In so doing, it proves itself as a concept complementary to that of totality. The concept of totality is exactly the one ascribed by philosophy to being. Thinking of war as being also involves aiming at totality.

7.3

War and Being

Western philosophical thought should be regarded as a perpetual attempt to conceive of war as being anchored in being. Greek mythology saw a sort of life principle in war, which determined the world of the gods and men in equal measure. Even traditional metaphysics, in aspiring to the infinite, the entirely absolute other, represents in essence nothing less than an attempt to present war in this world (of human existence) as something predetermined, and to justify it as natural. The attempts to provide an answer to the question regarding the meaning and cause of war as provided by traditional philosophy are well known: Western ontology is exclusively concerned with conceiving of being as a ‘being unto war’, in which war is the product of the empirical fact of the multiplicity of beings (Lévinas 1991: preface; comp. Lévinas 1998: 4 f.). The act of being and glorification of bellicose activities thus go hand in hand. Being and war belong together—being as the most extreme synchronism of the war (comp. Lissa 1987). The discussion of this situation makes clear, however, that the path taken by traditional philosophy exhibits a central deficiency, which we shall now discuss in greater depth: war does not necessarily follow from the empirical fact of the multiplicity of beings! Just as the difference between the self and the other does not necessarily produce war, so is identity not a guarantor of peace. Viewed from this perspective, war thus appears to be less a societal social phenomenon (which then undergoes a subsequent theoretical justification in political-philosophical thought) but rather a cognitively undertaken and anticipated constitutive act of Western thought. The central questions are obvious: does war rest upon such a cognitive constitutive act? Is (military) violence constituted in philosophical thought? Is the key to our quest for the causes of war to be found in the way in which the relationship between the self and the other is conceived? The objections of traditional philosophical thought to this form of questioning are familiar. They range from the assumption that the experience of violence

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is constitutive for Western philosophical thought, that thought reflects being, to the idealistic positions of autonomy of thought. The phenomenological perspective would suggest a view that embraces this question from the starting point of ‘metaphysical desire’. Again, the center of debate is taken by the original relationship between the self and the other. When Emmanuel Lévinas describes this metaphysical desire as not aspiring to return, and not resting on a previous affinity, he means that a radical return also involves the self-liquidation of the self. This is not a desire in the sense of a simple (psychological) desire, or a quest for submission, control, or possession of the other; rather it represents an orientation, or better a widening, of the view for other things. This desire can be described as a longing for exteriority, a longing for the unlimited, transcendent totality, thus for infinity. Thus, at the same time, it is associated with forcing open the violence of thought. Such a metaphysical desire is rooted in a being’s original experience of sociality, not inscribed in the structure of possession but in the experience of difference. This metaphysical desire is less a desire for the absolute other, as Lévinas would hold, but much more an ‘openness to the mystery’ for the unknown, the other as the unlimited, for which the I is also unable to set any borders. As such a desire, it points to the central relationship between the self and the other, one which never exhausts itself in a totality through submission. The desire first places the self in relation to a being beyond totality or history and presents us with a principal openness. Such openness is always outside totality, just as Lévinas hints (1991: 22 f.): “as though the objective totality did not fill out the true measure of being, as though another concept, the concept of infinity, were needed to express this transcendence with regard to totality, non-encompassable within a totality and as primordial as totality”. Such a desire enables thought beyond violence. Such a desire on the part of the beings clearly contradicts the evidence of war and totality. Yet this challenge is not rooted in contradiction, rather in ‘differentness’: desire does not represent an alternative to philosophical thought based on being-as-war; instead, it represents the principal possibility of a different mode of thought beyond these categories. In the same fashion, any efforts towards overcoming war and totality, just as any hope of a philosophy beyond the conception of being-as-war, must make this its starting point. This metaphysical desire of the other represents the basic requirement for overcoming the concept of being-as-war. This also creates the possibility of a return to the experience of difference and the very original sociality, which enables us to divine the possibility of a space beyond the categories of submission and appropriation. Moreover, such a desire appears to stand in contrast to a specific ‘interest in being’ on the part of all human beings, which almost seems to compel them,

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entirely unconcerned by such a metaphysical desire, to participate in war. The mobilization of men/women for war rests on a clear misunderstanding, which postulates that metaphysical desire can be reduced to the belief that the submission of the other, the abrogation of the difference between the self and the other, once achieved, can produce an opening to the infinite and boundless. Here a hidden thought comes into play, which equates totality and boundlessness, unity and infinity. Such a thought regards the death of an other in war as representing one’s own immortality; the crossing of a border set by the other for the self is then equated with infinity and boundlessness. Does the dimension of infinity and boundlessness also not display itself in war and in a radical interest in being, in that borders lose their meaning, differences cease to exist and the finite nature of the other is contrasted to the infinity of the self? Does this metaphysical desire not have a basic need of struggle, the need to assert one’s self, to triumph over the other, or even better, their death, their annihilation? No, because the death of the other does not erase the borders which they have set, but merely relocates them. The victory is only apparent, provisional in nature. The death of the other, an aim of war, is not able to satisfy the desire of the self. Ultimately, in ceasing to be, the other escapes subjugation to the self. Death has killed the other but the other as not been engulfed in a total nothingness. The other is no longer present as a person, but their presentness continues to exist beyond their death. Death reveals the inability of the self to bring the other to complete submission. Even after the death of the other, a residue of freedom remains, which cannot be subjugated by the self. The identity to which they aspire remains hypothetical and never becomes factual. In dying, the other escapes incorporation into a totality set by the self. An ‘interestedness in being’ (Lévinas 1991), expressed in the struggle of the beings, thus proves itself as a moment inherent to egology, which is capable of mobilizing a number of beings for war, but which does not find satisfaction or fulfilment in war and struggle. The dilemma of the interestedness in being is thus less the fact of war or the contest of the beings; rather it is about the impossibility of reaching its war-aims through war, specifically the aim of subjugating the other. War does not really abolish difference as it is not able to destroy exteriority, the infinity of the differentness of the other. Even in war, the other retains a residual immunity against every strategy aimed at its submission. That which war is supposedly able to achieve, specifically, the absolute identity of the self, identical with an all-embracing totality, emerges as an endless projection of the self, which in opting for war, merely shreds its own identity and individuality.

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Responsibility and the Foundation of Peace

If war is interpreted as a ‘compositional act’ already undertaken in philosophical thought, it is possible to understand why it overshadows human action. From this perspective, morality is of secondary importance and always follows ontology. Indeed, the secondary nature of morality in comparison to ontology means that it loses its function altogether: that of regulating relationships between the self and the multiplicity of others. In wartime, morality plays no part other than providing solace. It is degraded to the last residue of human hope, the last remnant of desire, which hankers after the other, when the actual other is threatened with destruction. The almost total dissolution of morality in war allows us to locate the actual performance of being in politics. As such, politics represents the consummation of reason and its central task is to prevent morality from becoming absurd. A politics of this nature thus becomes the art of predicting war and winning it at all costs. Politics is thus clearly directed against morality with the aim of avoiding sharing the fate of morality, of it becoming absurd. Politics, as Michael Foucault argued (1980: 78–108), thus becomes the reverse of Clausewitz’s famous doctrine, the continuation of war, the stage (or world) in which the self strives to usurp the other. The mocking of morality by the politician is similar to that of the warrior who defeated the other, or who has no aim other than achieving this at all costs (Lévinas 1991: preface). Western philosophy tends to constitute morality on politics as this accords a greater chance of constructing a comprehensive order that can be brought into complete harmony with ontology. A conception of ‘being-as-war’ allows war to become one of the basic principles of this order, from which a final peace (Endfriede) can be derived, and which can only be realized within the (temporary) history of wars. Even Western mythology and theology subscribe to this view, often supplementing it with the caveat that the finality of being will eventually be demonstrated by divine revelation. The revelation of these theologies tends not to break through the totality of this system, serving rather to harden it by ascribing a particular purpose (telos) to it or according to it a specific orientation. In this manner, it remains an ontology of totality, the source of is its essentially violent character. The central question following from this discussion to the possibility of developing a philosophical thought (or theory) which does not conceive of human life as ‘being to war’ and which separates being from war. If it is possible to establish—or even conceive of—such a thought, then hope exists that the unconcludedness beyond the totality of the world and history, a ‘thought of infinity’

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could result in mankind abandoning the link between being and war. A philosophy of different-as-being could be in the position to open itself for peace, with a foundation beyond the orders of the lifeworld and which nevertheless does not belong to a utopia, lacking any relation to the lifeworld. Perhaps this opening to the infinite taking place in the realm of the finite, the thought of ‘different-as-warbeing’, has the potential to give philosophy fresh sustenance—such sustenance has a high significance for the practice of human life. Does war and totality represent the last word or can the bounds be pushed back further to a sphere beyond that of war and totality, in which the situation of totality and war can be penetrated? Without a doubt, developing such a thought involves a radical break with the evidence of totality and war. Lévinas attempted exactly such a break in his attempt to follow the trail of such a situation and glimpsed this in the emanation of the exteriority, or the transcendence in the countenance of the other. When laid out exactly, the concept of “transcendence is expressed by the term infinity” (Lévinas 1991: 25). The idea of the infinite thus transcends thought in an entirely specific sense, in that it conceives of that which always remains outside thought itself. The infinite transcends the thought that thinks it (ibid. 26); in thought infinity itself is necessarily made finite. At the same time, Emmanuel Lévinas points to the fact that the idea of the infinite assumes the separation of the self from the other. Such a separation does not represent a contrast, which would simply by antithetic, mutually conditional. “An absolute transcendence has to be produced as non-integrateable” (Lévinas 1991: 53; comp. Derrida 1997; Derrida 1967: 117–228, Lévinas 1998, 2000). Lévinas points out that only the opening of philosophical thought to infinity, to a sphere beyond the experience of totality and war, enables us to penetrate totality and war. Totality cannot be overcome from the starting point of a mere subjectivism of the self. A revolt of the self against totality proceeding from the I can establish a morality with a claim to unconditionality and universality but is not able to penetrate totality itself, as the I always remains a ‘prisoner of itself’. Emmanuel Lévinas finally returns to the original structure between the self and the other and views this relationship as the only possible foundation of peace. If philosophical thinking puts the emphasis on morality instead of ontology, peace might have a chance. According to his social theory, there is only one chance to escape the dilemma of war: to take on responsibility in the face of the other. The ‘gaze’ itself assumes the focus, the perspective in a double sense. Firstly, there is the view of the other, which hits me and which is present whilst I strive to escape his gaze. Secondly, there is my own gaze: I can see the other and look into his countenance; and in doing so I become aware of my ‘responsibility.’ The gaze of

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the other is capable of penetrating the egology of the self by demonstrating that the self not only sees, but are themselves seen. An original structure reveals itself in the encounter of the self with the other. The other escapes the complete grasp of the self. The self can transform him/her into an object and strive to subjugate, understand, and capture him/her, but the other always remains unobtainable in his/her differentness, even after death. When uncovered by a gaze, the original encounter between the self and the other can reveal a structure capable of helping to establish scholarship, politics and society in a manner that is different to that attempted in modernity. The relationship itself is a relationship of cardinal openness, in which no decision about next steps has yet been taken. If this original relationship is taken as being ethical, then the gaze is simultaneously an ethical address, an appeal, a challenge. The original encounter represents a call to responsibility in which the self and the other understand their position as being a position of responsibility for each other, in which the other is always present as a third party. That means that the others are always present at the same time. This thought does not represent a fixing, rather the non-violent touch of gazes. It represents a finding, in which the self finds him/herself in his/her relationship to the other, ‘self-finding’ in the presence of the other. The self is first able to find him/herself through the presence of the other. Such a way of thinking is different to that of a doctrine of natural law, a universal ethics, or an attempt at determining peace through the definition of a community of values. It presents a new possibility that is of great interest: peace is not to be seen as a construction, or the result of a conflict, instead, it is to be seen as an original mode of relationship between the self and the other. This is more original than the act of contrasting, more original than the ‘antithesis’ to be overcome, or the violent bringing together of things (synthesis). Peace can be understood as receiving a moment of differentness from the other, allowing infinite variety of beings, an enduring of difference in which the self does not nourish itself exclusively from itself, but rather opens itself to receive something other coming from without. The opening of scholarship for such a relationship, for the presence of the other and a differentness (for something not already subjugated and determined) would not just alter the nature of ‘academic knowledge’ but would also reveal scholarship’s concrete responsibility in the lifeworld: scholarship as the location of and effort of a radical opening for differentness and the unknown. The relation of scholarship to ‘life to be performed’ is also present in the ‘responsibility to answer.‘ That which is relatively easy to formulate for scholarship poses a far greater problem for the field of politics, as here, the very existence of the self (modern

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politics insists on this very point) could be at stake. The central social problem of a post-modern thought of ‘alterity’ (Aguilar López 1992; Borsato 1995; Munono 1991; Münster 1995; Muyembe 1991; Plourde 1996; Ponzio 1995) concerning society and politics consists in the question of whether it is able to lead individuals in their relation to each other so that both moments of human being—freedom and security—are guaranteed. It is only easy to speak of an ‘original scene of peace’ as the original location of both political and social justice and the necessity of keeping the original ethical dimension of the gaze from face to face as long as the other is not regarded as an enemy. The division between friend and foe, once determined by the political philosophy of the twentieth century as being the actual characteristic of the political, represents, perhaps, the first step in the direction of war. The ‘arrival of the other’ always represents a disruption of the apparently stable order of the self, a shaking of local assumptions; but this disruption presents the possibility of experiencing peace in a space beyond violence or the threat of war. The preoccupation with peace can thus never be the concern about a self, rather, it must always also be concern about and for the other. In this sense, peace can be viewed as an answer to an appeal from the other, which at the same time is the expression of an ethical responsibility (Avram 1996; Awerkamp 1977; Bello 1997; Davis 1996; Gans 1972; Greef 1970; Henrix 1984; Llewelyn 1995; Petitdemange 1976; Rosmarin 1991; Strasser 1978, 1983).

References Aguilar López, José María (1992): Transcendencia y alteridad. Estudio sobre E. Lévinas. Pamplona: Ediciones Universidad de Navarra. Atterton, Peter (1992): Levinas and the Language of Peace. A Response to Derrida. In: Philosophy Today, vol. 36, no. 1, 59–70. Atterton, Peter (1997): Levinas’s Skeptical Critique of Metaphysics and Anti-humanism. In: Philosophy Today, vol. 41, no. 4, 491–506. Avram, Wes (1996): On the Priority of ‘Ethics’ in the Work of Levinas. In: The Journal of Religious Ethics, vol. 24 (Fall 1996), 261–292. Awerkamp, Don (1977): Emmanuel Levinas: Ethics and Politics. New York: Revisionist Press. Bailhache, Gérard (1994): Le sujet chez Emmanuel Lévinas. Fragilité et subjectivité. Paris: Presses Universitaires de France. Bauman, Zygmunt (1993): Postmodern Ethics. Oxford: BIackwell. Beavers, Anthony F. (1995): Levinas beyond the Horizons of Cartesianism: An Inquiry into the Metaphyiscs of Morals. New York: Peter Lang. Bello Reguera, Gabriel (1997): La construcción ética del otro. Oviedo: Ed. Nobel.

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Bernasconi, Robert/Critchley, Simon (Eds.) (1991): Re-reading Levinas. Bloomington, Indiana: Indiana University Press. Bernasconi, Robert/Wood, David (Eds.) (1988): The Provocation of Levinas: Rethinking the Other. London and New York: Routledge and Kegan Paul. Bernhardt, Uwe (1996): Vom Anderen zum Selben. Für eine anthropologische Lektüre von Emmanuel Lévinas. Bonn. Bleijendaal, H.L.K. (1984): Heidegger en Lévinas. Amsterdam: VU Uitgeverij. Borsato, Battista (1995): L’alterità come etica. Una lettura di Emmanuel Lévinas. Bologna: Dehoniane. Burggraeve, Roger (1985): From Self-Development to Solidarity. An Ethical Reading of Human Desire in its Socio-Political Relevance according to Emmanuel Levinas. Translated by C. Vanhove-Romanik. Leuven: The Center for Metaphysics and Philosophy of God. Busch, Thomas W. (1992): Ethics and Ontology: Levinas and Merleau-Ponty. In: Man and World, vol. 25, 195–202. Cohen, Richard A. (Ed.) (1986): Face to Face with Levinas. Albany: State University of New York Press. Critchley, Simon (1992): The Ethics of Deconstruction: Derrida and Levinas. Oxford: Blackwell. Dallery, Arleen/Scott, Charles E. (Eds.) (1989): The Question of the Other: Essays in Contemporary Continental Philosophy. Albany: State University of New York Press. Davis, Colin (1996): Levinas: An Introduction. Notre Dame, Indiana: University of Notre Dame Press. Derrida, Jacques (1997): Adieu à Emmanuel Lévinas. Paris. Derrida, Jacques (1978): Violence and Metaphysics. In: Derrida, Jacques: Writing and Difference. Translated by Alan Bass. Chicago: Chicago University Press, 79–153. Derrida, Jacques (1967): Violence et métaphysique. Essai sur la pensée d’Emmanuel Lévinas. In: Derrida, Jacques: L’écriture et la difference. Paris: Seuil, 117–228. Descombes, Vincent (1979): La même et l’autre. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Durfee, Harold A. (1975): War, Politics, and Radical Pluralism. In: Philosophy and Phenomenological Research, vol. 35, 549–558. Foucault, Michel (1980): Power/Knowledge. Selected Interviews and other Writings (1972– 1977), edited by Golin Gordon. New York: Vintage. Frank, Manfred/Raulet, Gérard/Reijen, Willem van (Eds.): Die Frage nach dem Subjekt. Frankfurt/Main: 1988. Gans, Steven (1972): Ethics or Ontology. In: Philosophy Today, vol. 16, no. 2, 117–121. Greef, Jan de (1970): Le concept de pouvoir éthique chez Emmanuel Lévinas. En Revue Philosophique de Louvain 68, 507–520. Hand, Seán (Ed.) (1996): Facing the Other. The Ethics of Emanuel Levinas. Richmond: Curzon. Hand, Seán (Ed.) (1989): The Levinas Reader. Oxford: Blackwell. Hegel, Georg Wilhelm Friedrich (1970): Phänomenologie des Geistes (1807). SuhrkampTaschenbuch-Ausgabe, vol. 3. Frankfurt/Main: Suhrkamp. Hegel, Georg Wilhelm Friedrich (1975): Vorlesungen über die Geschichte der Philosopie. Suhrkamp-Taschenbuch-Ausgabe, vol. 18–20. Frankfurt/Main: Suhrkamp.

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Henrix, H.H. (Ed.) (1984): Verantwortung für den anderen und die Frage nach Gott. Zum Werk von Emmanuel Lévinas. Aachen. Keenan, Dennis K. (1999): Death and Responsibility. The Work of Levinas. Albany. Kernic, Franz (2003a): Kritik der militärischen Gewalt. Eine gesellschaftstheoretische Analyse zum Verhältnis von Staat und organisierter kollektiver Gewaltanwendung. Frankfurt/Main: Peter Lang. Kernic, Franz (2003b): Ver-ANTWORT-ung. Wissenschaft, Politik und die Sorge um den Frieden in der postmodernen Gesellschaft. In: Ernst, Werner W.: Aufspaltung und Zerstörung durch disziplinäre Wissenschaften. Schriftenreihe “Interdisziplinäre Forschungen”, vol. 13, edited by Helmut Reinalter. Innsbruck: Studienverlag, 37–53. Krewani, Wolfgang N. (1992): Emmanuel Lévinas. Denker des Anderen. Freiburg-München. Lévinas, Emmanuel (1991): Totality and Infinity. An Essay on Exteriority. Translated by Alphonso Lingis. Dortrecht-Boston-London: Kluwer. Lévinas, Emmanuel (1998): Otherwise Than Being, or, Beyond Essence. Translated by Alphonso Lingis. Pittsburgh: Duquesne University Press. Lévinas, Emmanuel (2000): Entre Nous. Essays on Thinking-of-the-Other. Translated by Michael B. Smith and Barbara Harshav, New York: Columbia University Press. Lissa, Giuseppe (1987): Critica dell’ontologia della guerra e fondazione metafisica della pace in E. Lévinas. In: Giornale Critico Della Filosofia Italiana, 7, 1, 119–174. Llewelyn, John (1995): Emmanuel Levinas. The Genealogy of Ethics. London: Routledge. Manning, Robert John Sheffler (1991): Thinking the Other Without Violence? An Analysis of the Relation Between the Philosophy of Levinas and Feminism. In: The Journal of Speculative Philosophy, vol. 5, 132–143. Moreno Marquez, César A. (1989): La intención comunicativa. Ontología e intersubjetividad en la fenomenología. Sevilla: Thémata. Munono Muyembe, Bernard (1991): Le regard et le visage. De l’altérité chez Jean-Paul Sartre et Emmanuel Lévinas. Berne: Peter Lang. Münster, Arno (Ed.) (1995): La différence comme non-indifférence. Ethique et altérité chez Emmanuel Lévinas. Le séminaire du Collège International de Philosophie. Paris: KIMÉ. Muyembe, Bernard M. (1991): Le regard et le visage. De l’altérité chez Jean-Paul Sartre et Emmanuel Lévinas. Bern: Peter Lang. Olivier, Paul (1985): Ontologie et métaphysique chez Emmanuel Lévinas. En Annales de la Faculté des Lettres et Sciences Humaines de Nice 49, 145–180. Peperzak, Adriaan (Ed.) (1995): Ethics as First Philosophy. New York: Routledge. Peperzak, Adriaan (1997): Beyond: The Philosophy of Emmanuel Levinas. Evanston, IL: Northwestern University Press. Peperzak, Adriaan (1983a): Emmanuel Levinas: Jewish Experience and Philosophy. In: Philosophy Today, vol. 27, no. 4, 297–306. Peperzak, Adriaan (1983b): Phenomenology – Ontology – Metaphysics: Levinas’ Perspective on Husserl and Heidegger. In: Man and World, vol. 16, 113–127. Peperzak, Adriaan (1993): To the Other: An Introduction to the Philosophy of Emmanuel Levinas. West Lafayette, Indiana: Purdue University Press. Petitdemange, Guy (1976): Ethique et transcendance. Sur les chemins d’Emmanuel Lévinas. En Recherches de Science Religieuse 64, 59–94. Plourde, Simone (1996): Emmanuel Lévinas. Altérité et responsabilité. Guide de lecture. Paris.

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Ponzio, Augusto (1995): Responsabilità e alterità in Emmanuel Levinas. Milano, Jaca. Ricoeur, Paul et al. (1989): Répondre d’autrui. Emmanuel Lévinas. Textes réunis par JeanChristophe Aeschlimann. Neuchâtel: Baconnière. Ricoeur, Paul (1996): In Memoriam: Emmanuel Levinas. In: Philosophy Today, vol. 40, no. 3, 331–340. Ricoeur, Paul (1990): Soi-même comme un autre. Paris: Seuil. Rosmarin, Leonard A. (1991): Emmanuel Lévinas. Humaniste de l’autre homme. Toronto: GREF. Schroeder, Brian (1996): Altered Ground: Levinas, History, and Violence. New York: Routledge. Strasser, Stephan (1983): Ethik als Erste Philosophie. In: Waldenfels, Bernhard: Phänomenologie in Frankreich. Frankfurt/Main: Suhrkamp, 218–266. Strasser, Stephan (1978): Jenseits von Sein und Zeit. Eine Einführung in Emmanuel Lévinas’ Philosophie. Den Haag. Wild, John (1969): Introduction. In: Levinas, Emmanuel: Totality and Infinity: An Essay on Exteriority. Translated by Alphonso Lingis. Pittsburgh: Duquesne University Press, 11– 20. Wyschogrod, Edith (1974): Emmanuel Levinas. The Problem of Ethical Metaphysics. The Hague: Martinus Nijhoff.

8

Rethinking Politics and Social Science Beyond the War Paradigm: A Sketch

Numerous new wars, including forms of conventional warfare and the War on Terror, and other recent occurrences of armed conflict and military violence can be seen as presenting observers with a distinct challenge to discuss the question of the status, function and socio-political significance of the military in modern societies of the twenty-first century from a new perspective. Do these new violent conflicts testify to a return of military force in international relations as well as— on a theoretical level—the definitive end of all those twentieth century social theories that assume a structural incompatibility between war and modern or post-modern society? Is it not time to finally call attention to the violent character inherent in modernity, late modernity and in today’s global society—as well as in the world system of states—by clearly pointing out the compatibility between modern social structure and military force? Despite all the pacifist ambitions and hopes of a multitude of twentieth century social science approaches and to the disappointment of all modern social movements that had hoped for an end of war and the withering away of military apparatus in modern democracies, military force still demonstrates its societal presence today. The fact that since the turn of the millennium fierce military conflicts have been taking place can perhaps be seen as a return to realpolitik or power politics beyond utopian desires for peace. Some will perhaps see this as a vital necessity to prepare modern Western democratic societies for a new round of political confrontation, for an ongoing struggle for survival that is continuing in the new millennium. Does this mean that all efforts that strive for a way of political thinking that goes beyond war and violence are ultimately superfluous? Does not everyday societal life prove that it is senseless to chase utopian dreams and in the process be slaughtered as a victim oneself? Obviously, history and today’s political reality seem to speak in favor of new preparations for war, for a state of (military) © The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Fachmedien Wiesbaden GmbH, part of Springer Nature 2023 F. Kernic, War, Peace and the Military, Militär und Sozialwissenschaften/ The Military and Social Research 56, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-658-40521-2_8

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readiness, for a will to fight and at least to defend oneself. Is the idea of peace itself and ‘peaceful thinking’ not already a risk, a danger for the thinker that they themselves will become so caught up in the roundabout ways of thought that they will ultimately become completely unfit for the daily struggle and thus suffer the fate of being destroyed by their own thoughts? Such questions are by no means merely rhetorical; they are in fact questions of practical life, which are already suggested to us by everyday thought without us being able to escape them in the long term. They are, at the same time ‘practical tests’ for all theoretical thought, and thus also for phenomenological and scientific thought, as all these thought processes are, as Husserl emphasized, concerned with the life that ultimately renders. For this reason, these are also the questions that repeatedly need to be re-examined, to be posed again and again with a new sense of urgency. The urgency of these questions lies in the fact that people must grapple with them, i.e., we cannot evade them. Therein lies humanity’s actual bondage: to have to think; people are condemned to philosophical thought. The task of at least ‘thinking about peace’ is already a letting go of war and the use of military force. All who evade this are themselves working on fulfilling their own forecast, are thus preparing the next war. But can there in fact be any escape or are we ultimately really condemned to an incapacity for peace (Lutz 1998)? This question challenges us to re-examine the relationship between society, politics, economic theory and military force and to do so in a way that ensures that a number of key perspectives that are raised by the modern social sciences and economic theory (comp. Doyle 1997; Rupesinghe and Rubio Correa 1994; Wieviorka 1998; Derrida 1978, 1994; Cotta 1985; Michaud 1978; Arendt 1970; Sorel 2004; Trotha 1997; Campbell and Dillon 1993) are picked up and enquiry is made into the possibilities of a ‘perspective beyond war’. This is the task of this final chapter. No new theory will be developed, no final system analysis or summary of structures, the sole guiding factor is the restlessness of philosophical inquiry and thought (Kernic 2003). The answer given by traditional political thought to the above question is well known, as are the conclusions for practical politics. This perspective also receives additional support from the modern natural and social sciences: It appears essential to prepare the next war, to be ready for combat, for peace itself has no future. People therefore need the military, an organization for the purpose of preparing and waging war, for asserting oneself against the other (the potential or actual enemy). In contrast to peace, so this thought posits, war certainly does have a future, although in many cases an expression of deep regret follows in the same breath. A constant ‘self-pitying on the part of the warrior’ is a key feature of military force, which always purports to want nothing more than to maintain or

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bring about peace, but at the same time concentrates exclusively on preparing and waging combat. Thomas Henriksen presents such a thought of the unavoidability of a future war in its purest form: Unfortunately, for the human race, war has a future. History teaches even the reluctant pupil that our past is replete with examples of conflict in every age and virtually every culture. The human impulse toward organized violence seems unaffected by progress in science, medicine, the standard of living or by poverty and misery. (Henriksen 1992: 1)

In this way, the new world order (Jowitt 1991) provides reason for making fresh preparations for war and arming from which proceeds the political dictate to prepare for the next war, which must be won. Thus, in the final analysis, all politics is overshadowed by war. In keeping with the ancient Greek approach, it is astonishment that leads people to philosophy and systematic thought, which is the beginning of science and of philosophy. The astonishment that inspires this phenomenological analysis of ‘political thought beyond war’ also takes as its point of departure the historical perspective, the empirical fact of a type of cyclical recurrence of war and of the evident incapability of human thought to limit or to end war. Military force also has an astonishing capacity to adapt itself to new social conditions and conditions of governance, which is all the more astonishing because military organizations are usually regarded as rigid and rather inflexible. Institutionalization and bureaucratization shape military force in a very specific form, which appears to be barely changeable: centralism, strict hierarchy, insistence of traditional rules and a frequently observed resistance to innovation (Elbe 2018; Burk 1999; Hagen and Tomforde 2005). Military force thus has the appearance of a radically normed order. This goes as far as the imperative to kill in war. Pressure to kill and the risk of one’s own death are the typical characteristics of combat. This is still the case, even when modern sociology points out that soldiers show signs of an inhibition to kill. Many military rituals and organizational forms can be interpreted as defensive mechanisms against the mental stress associated with killing. It is only within these that killing, which is thus certainly not an innate human instinct, is constituted as a norm. A way of thinking that can conceive of peace beyond war, must examine this constitution of the norm of combat, the process of norming and regimentation, because it is only beyond this norm that a space can open up that is different to war.

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The normative character inherent in military force is determined by the facticity of military victory. The strength of military force is not therefore derived from any superordinate values or guiding ideas, but merely from its de facto application, from its deployment, i.e., it creates its own basis. The application of military force makes war the norm. Where human beings employ force against another (or threaten the other with its application), the constitution of military force is consummated from which law and rule are derived. It is only in this constitution of an ego against another that the dynamics of violence evolve which simultaneously unfolds its normative character of its own accord. In other words, those who resort to violence will immediately be swallowed up by violence, i.e., it casts a spell over both the other and the self, norming the relationship. The act of violence itself should be judged as a process of norming. This process of norming is executed on different levels. Institutionalization turns military force into an organization in which military norms and rules are anchored. At the same time, the military develops an egocentrism and an ipsative identity, its own esprit de corps. A specific system of norms with specific values (soldierly virtues) such as courage, chivalry, justice, care for others, camaraderie etc. then becomes the elemental basis of the structure. At the same time, a special solidarity and tie is formed between soldiers (‘pathos of a specific military attitude’) through binary separation according to the code internal/external or own/enemy. Because of this code, a military organization will also turn against any tendency toward domination by civil (or otherwise different) structural or behavioral principles and differently structured norm systems (Bredow 1969: 52). ‘Kill!’ as the supreme norm of military force seeks a totality, the annihilation of the other, the subjugation or killing of the other who presents themselves as the enemy. This gives it an inherent dynamic that reveals a universal and totalitarian character (Lévinas 1991). The imperative of the command to ‘Kill!’ has universal validity and an absolute character. Military force always aims for ‘totality’, it eliminates the difference between ‘Kill the Other!’ and ‘Let yourself be Killed!’—death is the final limit from which totality defines itself. If politics is overshadowed by war, i.e., if and when the political is defined from the perspective of violent conflict, then it aspires to totality to the same degree as military force. In this sense politics and the military complement one another, the collective action is merely interested in victory, the destruction or subjugation of the other who is defined as the opponent. Thus, it is not possible to distinguish between the two forms of action from the point of view of the telos, which is the same for both, but only in respect of the manner of the action. Modern realistic thought in international relations precisely follows this idea: diplomacy, foreign policy, national security and military or defense policy become

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inseparable, because they all have the same aim, merely using different means to achieve it. All that then counts for the political that is defined this way is the achievement of victory. “When victory is not built into the planning, it is seldom achieved” (Henriksen 1992: 15). In the occidental history of ideas, there have been attempts to contain military force since Aristotle, if not earlier. In the modern period, these are first and foremost efforts to statutorily regulate war (ius in bello) and the application of military force (modern international law). Undoubtedly, mass armies have increased the pressure upon the military to justify itself. The total wars of the twentieth century strengthened this pressure so that the idea of subjecting the conduct of violent conflicts to certain rules and restrictions became even more attractive (Howard 1981). At the same time, however, this seems to mark that fateful path that can guarantee a ‘deceptive peace’ only. This peace is little more than a moment of hesitation or delay in war, a mere pause in combat. The ‘principle of war’ runs like a common thread through all modern political ideas as well as scientific thought. The guiding scientific paradigm since the modern period has focused on the self as the sole foundation and the source of all knowledge. The totality of thought rests in this single pole, in the modern subject that knows nothing outside itself. The clash of the faculties is itself war, is the striving for a totality, for the elimination of differences. A pluralism of theories seems to be inadequate and merely temporary. The actual force of the life world is that which strives to eliminate differences, irrespective of whether this takes place in the sphere of human societal life or in philosophical and political thought. Military organization and strategic thought complement one another in this respect. Military force lives from the interaction of martial-strategic thought that aims to achieve victory and establish unity, and practical attempts to establish a total social order based on the model of the military institution, which essentially permits nothing outside itself. In the same way as technology or political thought, the modern social sciences define paradigms, which themselves represent a method of exclusion. The relationship of the self to the other is exclusively conceived in the categories of subjugation and appropriation of the other, or of his exclusion. The modern sciences reproduce this thought in the form of an anthropocentric determinative positivism, which loses sight of the self. The analysis itself becomes a subject of analysis, which however, already defines the subject in a specific direction. The paradigm analysis carried out in this study set out to determine the direction of this paradigm. Peace is a need for the one who already carries the seed of peace within themselves. If we proceed from the assumption of a possible otherness, then we

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can rightly speak of a chance of peace. The possibility of peace lies in opening ourselves to otherness. Opening ourselves is a task of the moment. Even the fact that there have always been wars in human history does not justify further wars. What is called for is an end of the occidental war ethics, an end to the traditional thinking on the part of the political in continuous association with the military, an end of the total support for and blind faith in military force, in a nutshell, an opening to real peace. A reflection upon peace must liberate itself from the chains of war and must also focus on philosophical and scientific thought itself. However, such reflections must not lead to a new egology of the self, as it is practically written into the modern philosophical tradition; it must instead go beyond the mere thought of the other and trace the possibility of an original relationship of understanding. This can, however, no longer be conceived as the appropriation or taking possession of the other, in which the self and the other cancel each other out in a higher totality, but as a process of maintaining the difference. Peace then gains a completely different dimension to the one traditionally ascribed to it as the mere absence of war. It is then much rather a matter of turning away from a dichotomous thought of the opposite and an opening of thought for peace beyond the experience of war and totality. Of course, this raises the question whether such thought can still even be called rational. Occidental rationality pairs itself with war; military force appears to be firmly laced into the corset of Western rationalism. According to this thought, it is rational to want peace, but only in the sense of one’s own superiority and predominance over the other, whereby sight is never lost of war. The risk of a thought beyond war appears too great in the thought of this tradition. The risk of a different thought is avoided due to fear for oneself. In this way, reason itself appears to be chained and bound; it is completely unable to go beyond the self in the direction of the other. The unleashing of reason is therefore the precondition of the possibility of ‘thought beyond war’ (of a being-other-than-war). Only where thought is able to rise above itself and open itself to the unknown and to mystery is peace able to take place. However, the opening of reason does not mean drifting into irrationality. In this sense, it is not the end of philosophical thought that is called for, but only a new unleashed movement of thought, which points beyond reproduction. At the end of this analysis, Kant’s call to ‘Have courage to use your own reason!’ thus needs to be changed slightly in respect of a different way of thought in the political sphere that goes beyond violence and war: Have courage to use your own reason and at the same time allow the other its legitimate otherness or alterity (which only opens itself to you in the encounter with the other and which

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your reason, your thought alone is incapable of engendering)! By acknowledging the other in their otherness the logic of war may in the final analysis also lose its violence and fascination. Only then will the political gain a real chance of freeing itself from a ‘dramatology of war’ (Grawert-May 1987). Politics would then no longer be strategic action in a theatrum belli, but ethical-communicative action in a theatrum pacis. However, the legacy of the twentieth century is a thinking and acting in terms of war and confrontation. The greatest risk of our time is to underestimate the dynamics of the military use of force and its potential for destructiveness.

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Lévinas, Emmanuel (1991): Totality and Infinity. An Essay on Exteriority. Translated by Alphonso Lingis. Dortrecht-Boston-London: Kluwer. Lutz, Dieter S. (1998): Krieg – auf immer und ewig? Ein Essay zur Problematik der Verdrängung der existentiellen Gefahren und zur Friedens-Unfähigkeit des Menschen. Hamburg: Hamburger Informationen zur Friedensforschung und Sicherheitspolitik. Michaud, Yves (1978): Violence et politique. Paris: Gallimard. Rupesinghe, Kumar/Rubio Correa, Marcial (Eds.) (1994): The Culture of Violence. New York: United Nations University. Sorel, Georges (2004): Reflections on Violence. Mineola-New York: Dover Publications. Trotha, Trutz von (Ed.) (1997): Soziologie der Gewalt. Kölner Zeitschrift für Soziologie und Sozialpsychologie, Sonderheft 37. Köln. Wieviorka, Michel (Ed.) (1998): Un nouveau paradigme de la violence? Paris: Editions L’Harmattan.