Civil-Military Relations in War College Curricula

This article accepts the norms related to civil-military relations that Don Snider et al. propose in this special issue as being the appropriate norms for professional military officers. It then reviews the curricula of the six war colleges to see what they are currently teaching about civil-militar...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Armed forces and society 2001, Vol.27 (2), p.273-294
Main Author: STIEHM, JUDITH HICKS
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Armed forces
Civil-military relations
Colleges
Curricula
Curriculum
Education
Ethics
Military
Military Civilian Relations
Military Officers
Military schools
Norms
Social Control
Social factors
Student Attitudes
U.S.A
War college
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Summary:This article accepts the norms related to civil-military relations that Don Snider et al. propose in this special issue as being the appropriate norms for professional military officers. It then reviews the curricula of the six war colleges to see what they are currently teaching about civil-military relations and about civilian society. Next, it examines the views about those relations that war college students report themselves as actually holding. Some of these, i.e., findings related to officers' views about not obeying directives they believe "unethical but legal" and their willingness to obey "unwise" commands may seem to contradict the norm of civilian control. Others that are related to officer responsibility to "advocate" and to "insist" on some policy matters also seem to contradict these norms. The article concludes with some recommendations for curriculum revision.
ISSN:0095-327X
1556-0848
DOI:10.1177/0095327X0102700206