The Study of the Military. Models for the Military Profession

Abstract

The classic approach to the consideration of the military as a social phenomenon is no different from the one applied to every other sector of social life. Classic sociology has a total and comprehensive conception of “society,” and within the classics we find a general analysis of the various social institutions as considered not only in their peculiarities but mainly in their connections with the general society. The military is one of the many, and basic, institutions considered by classic sociologists according to the various sociological schools, and its features are seen as a distinct set of behaviors, rules, norms, and values coordinated around a defensive or offensive goal (or both) defined by a given society (but generally typical of every society) in their relationships with other, external, societies. The military is considered and explained within the different sociological theories, so that we have a positivistic explanation of the role of the military as a basic feature of the human society since its origins-as in Comte-or an evolutionary consideration of the military structure as a first stage in the society evolution-as in Spencer. In Weber a not only deeper but also much more articulated analysis of the structure and evolution of the military can be found, where some basic concepts for description and explanation of structural features and processes are given. Concepts like discipline, obedience to formal norms, formal authority, rationale division of roles and attributes, competence, and loyalty to an impersonal legitimate power, in a word, the typical bureaucratic organization, are all tools provided by Weber in the consideration of the military as a social institution and applied to the understanding of a general process such as rationalization and bureaucratization of Western society. With a development similar to that of many other specialized fields, the military is also considered by sociologists first within the framework of a general conception of society, and subsequent research topics that spawned military sociology are originally linked to the classic tradition of general sociology. But military sociology of today does not rely on the classics, but on a second generation of general sociologists who at a certain time in their lives began to define the military social field as a peculiar environment, thus acting as “founding fathers” of this discipline. To maintain this distinction, we define a “modern” sociological tradition, which can appear to be a terminological as well as a conceptual contradiction. This new tradition begins with the possibility of conducting social research in the armed forces and with the correlate possibility of defining the true first lines of a theoretical framework on which to base a new and autonomous sociological discipline.