Book (electronic)

Reconsidering American civil-military relations: the military, society, politics, and modern war (2020)

in: Oxford scholarship online

Abstract

The United States professionalized military is subordinated to civilian control. This text looks at that relationship by considering how social media, changing means of warfare, deepening political divisions, and an increasingly unpredicatable operational environment have affected the organization of what is conventionally assumed to be an apolitical profession. Through chapters written by respected civil-military relations scholars, military professionals, and policymakers, the work argues that modern means and methods of warfare, not to mention evolving norms on the use of force, are reshaping the contours of what it means to be 'professional' and what healthy civil-military relations look like in practice.