Civil-Military Relations in Postcommunist Europe: Assessing the Transition

This article argues that the relative homogeneity of communist civil-military relations postcommunist Europe has been replaced by significant diversity. Those states that have joined NATO and the EU have consolidated democratic civilian control of their militaries, re-oriented their defence policies towards peacekeeping and intervention operations beyond their borders and are fashioning new military-society relationships. In contrast, in Russia, Ukraine and most of the other former Soviet republics the military has become part of the nexus of semi-or outright authoritarian presidential rule, while severe economic and social problems are resulting in a dramatic downgrading of the military's professional and operational competence and severely inhibiting the prospects for meaningful military reform. In the countries of the former Yugoslavia, civil-military reform is gathering pace, but continues to struggle with twin legacies of war and authoritarianism.