The changing role of the military in Turkish politics: democratization through coup plots?

The exposure of alleged coup plots in 2007 has shaken the guardian role of the Turkish military in politics. What were the conditions that led to the exposure of the coups and what is their significance for the future of Turkish democracy? Drawing on insights from southern Europe, the article argues that failed coup plots can lead to democratic civil–military relations especially if they work simultaneously with other facilitating conditions, such as increasing acceptance of democratic attitudes among officers, consensus among civilians over the role of the military, and the influence of external actors, such as the European Union. The article focuses on such domestic and international factors to analyse the transformation of the Turkish military, the splits within the armed forces and the resulting plots. It argues that one positive outcome of the exposed conspiracies in Turkey has been the enactment of new institutional amendments that would eradicate the remaining powers of the military. Yet, a negative outcome of the coup investigations has been an increase in polarization and hostility. Turkish democracy still lacks mutual trust among significant political groups, which creates unfavourable conditions for democratic consolidation.     

Beyond the fallacy of coup-ism: conceptualizing civilian control of the military in emerging democracies

It is consensus in the democratization literature that civilian control of the military is a necessary ingredient for democracy and democratic consolidation. However, there is considerable disagreement on what civilian control of the military exactly entails and there is a lack of solid theoretical arguments for how weak or absent civilian control affects democratic governance. Furthermore, a considerable portion of the research literature is captured by the fallacy of coup-ism, ignoring the many other forms in which military officers can constrain the authority of democratically elected political leaders to make political decisions and get them implemented. This article addresses these lacunae by providing a new conceptual framework for the analysis of civil–military relations in emerging democracies. From democracy theory it derives a definition of civilian control as a certain distribution of decision-making power between civilian leaders and military officers. Based on this definition, the authors develop a five-dimensional concept of civilian control, discuss the effects of weakly institutionalized civilian control on the quality of democracy and address the chances for democratic consolidation.     

Institutionalised cooperation and policy convergence in European defence: lessons from the relations between France,Germany and the UK

What are the prospects for trilateral concord among Britain, France and Germany in terms of defence policies? Would more institutionalised links among them lead to more convergence of their defence policies? To answer these interrogations, this article investigates the relation between policy convergence and institutionalised cooperation, in particular by studying whether and when one is a prerequisite to the other. First, this article examines the extent to which these countries' defence policies have converged since the end of the cold war based on several indicators: their attitudes towards international forums, their defence budgets, the structure of their armed forces and their willingness to use force. Second, we study each of the bilateral relations between the three states to qualitatively analyse their degree of institutionalisation and the convergence of their defence policies. This article concludes that contrary to the arguments of many discussions, think-tank reports and political actors, there is no evidence that institutionalised cooperation leads to policy convergence as far as defence is concerned.     

Democratically consolidated,externally threatened,and NATO aligned: finding unexpected deficiencies in civilian control

It has long been presumed in the literature that consolidated democracies that face serious external threats or are NATO-aligned should feature strong, civilian control institutions and personnel. This study of Israel, India, Taiwan, Spain and Poland reveals otherwise. Utilizing biographical data compiled by the authors, we researched civilian personnel within each country’s defence ministry – the organizational hub of civil-military relations. Rather than finding evidence of strong civilian control, what we found instead were ministries with serious deficiencies: they did not have effective power; they failed to engage in defence planning or provide strategic guidance to the armed forces; they were led by military personnel and staffed by civilian employees not properly qualified to handle defence affairs. To explain these discrepancies, we argue that long-standing deficits in civilian expertise spur the delegation of ministerial defence positions to more knowledgeable officers. Comparisons are made with benchmark states that have achieved civilian ministerial control.     

组织间不信任与替代性武装力量：拉美国家废除军队的政治逻辑

军队是国家权力的关键指标,也是绝大多数主权国家不可或缺的有机构成,在国内政治与国际关系领域都发挥着重要作用。然而,世界上仍存在少数主动废除军队的国家。引人关注的是,这类案例大多集中在拉美地区。对于这些拉美国家为何废除军队,既有研究主要从小国视角和军政关系视角出发,认为国家规模与国家安全之关联性和去军事化改革是基本逻辑依据。然而对拉美具体案例而言,这些理论范式的解释性仍存在一定欠缺。考察哥斯达黎加和海地案例可知,组织间不信任与替代性武装力量强弱是拉美特定国家废除军队的基本政治逻辑;获得可信的武装力量支持是新政权得以巩固的必要条件。当新政府与既有军队之间出现组织间不信任时,新政府便倾向于谋求用其他武装力量来替代既有军队。同时,替代性武装力量的强弱影响着政府的替代决策。若不存在可信的替代性武装力量,或只存在弱替代性武装力量,那么废除军队并建立或扶植一些原先较弱的武装组织便成为拉美国家政府强化武装力量控制的常见选择。     

Intelligence reform in new democracies: factors supporting or arresting progress

This article examines an important (and most problematic) component of the democratic civil–military relations (CMR) concept (understood in terms of democratic control, effectiveness, and efficiency of the armed forces, police forces, and intelligence agencies). It focuses (1) on the democratization of intelligence, that is finding a proper balance between intelligence effectiveness and transparency, and (2) on what particular factors support or arrest progress in the democratization of intelligence. The article provides supporting examples from Brazil and Romania, two developing democracies that have been undergoing major reforms of their intelligence systems for almost 20 years, in terms of both transparency and effectiveness.