Reviews for The Man on Horseback

The average rating for The Man on Horseback based on 2 reviews is 4 stars.

Review # 1 was written on 2020-04-01 00:00:00 Scott Lawrence The frequent outbursts of successful and unsuccessful military uprisings in Central and South America, the Middle East, the new African States, Asia and some European countries since the termination of World War II have revealed that military intervention in modern political systems is a standard rather than an exclusion. "Independent political activity by the armed forces is therefore", as says Finer, "frequent, widespread and of long standing". Military intervention in politics, according to Finer, must be perceived, as a general phenomenon: it can be shown to broaden to developed societies, plus to developing countries. However, though Military intervention is a general phenomenon, this phenomenon takes various forms. The forms can be described, following Finer, as influence, blackmail, displacement, and supplantment. At the lowest two levels political action of any military organisation will not be different from any other pressure group, i.e., influencing the decision-makers. The activity of the military will include lobbying within the policy-making process on question of weaponry procurement. Where the military wants a shift of policy, particularly in foreign affairs or territorial matters, it may resort to blackmail activities. It may employ various kinds of threat, the threat of resignation, in particular, to show the civilian authorities that their proposed line of action will be impossible to implement. Before World War I, for instance, more than a few British officers opposed the Liberal Government's strategy toward Ireland with the intimidation to resign. Displacement occurs when the military unswervingly intervenes in politics to generate conditions for an alteration of civilian government or even dictate what type of civilian government will be allowed to function. Supplantment is direct military rule. The military removes the civilian government, abolishes parties and take the government over. However, what form the military intervention will assume in practice is dependent upon two principal factors: nature of the military and societal factors. Broadly speaking, the military is a branch of the bureaucracy. It performs specialised functions and, like others, makes demands of financial resources of the state. Like all administrators, the chiefs of the military service are not simply concerned with the implementation of the decisions of the political executive. They are heavily involved in decision-making. The military occupies an idiosyncratic position in the power-structure of the state because it exercises an inimitable function and possesses arms, the chief instruments of coercive power which no one else possesses. As a result of this matchless function the armed forces develop, in the words of Finer, certain "characteristic features which distinguish them from other groups in all political systems". The nature of the tasks performed by the armed forces, require specialised training. They often have a different type of education, which imbue them with certain values that may not be held by any other comparable groups, e.g. the police. Generally,the army is "the embodiment of national interest"; the members of the armed forces must have personal courage, endurance and readiness for self-sacrifice. In the first place, the armed forces are more strongly organised than other powerful civilian groupings. They have a highly centralised command, a strict hierarchy and discipline and obedience to higher command. Secondly, the armed forces are trained to fight wars, which occur occasionally and may indeed never take place. The military is to be prepared for an eventuality. In order to achieve the state of readiness, as Finer notes, �the military always feels unprepared and continuously makes demand for more resources�. Thirdly, the military emphasises more on the confIictual nature of international society and less on cooperation among nations. This conception of society explains why the top brass of' the armed forces always demand that "the nation be prepared, not just from a material, but from a psychological point of view". Consequently, the military may support government policies which, it believes will reinforce moral fibre of the nation and oppose policies which are likely to destabilize it. The military feels it has a unique duty of caring for national interest and therefore has a duty to look into the possible consequences of government policies on the "morale of the nation". Thus, in all political systems the military possesses certain advantageous characteristics vis-a-vis other and civilian groupings which, says Finer, allow the military to intervene in politics. But what type of intervention� direct or indirect- will take place depends on the nature of the military itself and the nature of the political system. These specific features of the military plus its monopoly possession of arms make the military prone to intervene in politics in all political systems. What type of intervention will take place depends on the combination of these characteristics with particular features of the polity. Finer identifies four elements, as essential in this respect: the degree of military's professionalism, the extent of legitimacy of the political system, the level of socio-economic development, and the prevailing ideology in the polity. First, a "high degree of professionlisation fosters military intervention" as it will affect the prestige of the military in society and will affect the degree of pride in its own values and attitudes as distinct and separate from the rest of the society. In modern states, particularly in liberal democracies, the military is highly professionalised. Its claim to be outside party politics and its belief in its right and duty to intervene in politics in the name of the nation reflects the professional status of the military. Second, the greater the legitimacy of the political system, the less the probability of military intervention. Generally, the military lacks the basis of legitimacy, which the civilian governments possess. Where the legitimacy of the political system is low, periodic outbreaks of civil disorder may occur. And the army may be called to play a part in internal political life, such as in China during the Cultural Revolution in the mid-1960's and Pro-democracy Movement in 1989 as well as in India on several occasions since 1975. Third, the high level of socio-economic development and the consequent complexity of the political, social and economic system set limits to the methods used by the military and the level to which intervention is pressed. In such societies less explicit forms of military intervention are found, e.g. lobbying and other involvement in policy-making through the interpenetration of civilian and army personnel in defence and other organisations. There has been far more military intervention in Third World countries than in developed societies. Finally, there is the important element of the prevailing ideology of the polity. If the values held by the military differ sharply from the prevailing ideologies, it is likely that military intervention will increase. The military is generally "conservative", if not "reactionary". Certainly on a majority of occasions the military seems to support the stability as it derives benefits from the status quo. The class composition of the officers (predominantly rural and urban middle class) strengthens their conservatism. Consequently, conflicts between the military and the civilian government may occur where the latter emphasizes democratic participation and egalitarian ends. To sum up Finer�s book, military intervention in politics takes place in any political system, but it assumes many forms. The type of intervention, whether trying to influence like any pressure group in society or that of establishing a military regime, will vary according to several criteria: the degree of professionalisation of the military and the nature of the political system, the level of socio-economic development, the extent of support which the civilian regime and government enjoy in the population, and the tension between the values universally held by the military and the values which are evenly spread throughout the society. In short, in developed societies in the West, political consensus and its degree of organisation are so high that the government's need for military support to maintain itself is at a minimum; and as a result of long habituation to the situation both the public and the armed forces have developed an almost unquestioning belief in the "principle of civil supremacy". The military seems to remain content with influencing policy-making in these countries through the constitutional channels open to them. Yet occasions may arise when the military�s propensity to intervene in the political process in forms other than mere "influence" may increase. Situations may arise when the organised public opinion is bitterly polarised. In such circumstances the legitimacy of any government is reduced because if it chooses to rely on one organised sector of opinion, it thereby alienates others. An army�police anti-terrorist operation at Heathrow airport in 1974 greatly alarmed Prime Minister Wilson, who realised how easily troops could be turned against the government. The purpose of the exercise, it was explained afterward, was "to accustom the public to the reality of troops deploying through the high street". The seizure of political power by the armed forces and the establishment of military rule may assume several forms. Overt military rule is comparatively rare and short-lived. After the armed forces of a state establish a military dictatorship they usually fabricate some quasi-civilian facade of government behind which they retire as fast as possible. In a number of Latin American countries the army, with traditions going back to the Spanish Conquest, is a conservative force, allied with the upper classes to maintain the social status quo. In the other continents the national army is in many cases a new institution led by the elite of a new middle class. In 1952 Gamal Abdul Nasser, a 34-year old self-educated army officer, overthrew the corrupt regime of King Farouk in a bloodless coup and launched Egypt on the path of internal development and external non-alignment. "Nasserism" sparked off a similar but bloodier revolution in Iraq in 1958, inspired reforms in Syria, produced a ferment throughout the Arab world, disturbing the remaining feudal or semi-feudal regimes. Throughout the developing world reformist military leaders have sought to stimulate development through organization, social mobilization, and a vigorous assertion of governmental power and economic activity." The military in Latin America had been traditionally the protector of the landed upper class. However, as the military became more professional and bureaucratized, and as its need for managerial and scientific skills grew, a change in the class composition of recruits took place. The young army officers, particularly since the Second World War, have been coming from the middle-class, drawn initially from the rural or small-town upper middle class and subsequently from the urban middle class. Chile provides an interesting study, according to Finer. For about three years the armed forces of Chile seemed to have supported President Allende's Popular Unity Government, which included communists and socialists. But the Chilean armed forces were not homogeneous. Alongside democratic elements there were many reactionaries, especially among the commanding officers. As the revolutionary changes in Chile were deepening the reactionary tendencies in the army were being intensified. The Popular Unity Government did nothing to resist these tendencies. In the summer of 1973, the right reactionary forces managed to remove from the command posts of the' army all the officers loyal to the Government. And then, on September 11, 1973, backed by CIA, General Pinochet staged a coup, murdered President Allende, killed thousands of people, and established a military government which, as wrote Peter Strafford, was "a particularly authoritarian and, at times, brutal form of government." Though the military claims to be outside party politics it may intervene in politics, without however assuming political power. This direct intervention may take the form of exerting pressure in order to achieve a particular political goal; the military may create the conditions for a change of civilian government or even dictate what type of civilian government will be allowed. to function. The military seeks to achieve it by either revolt or threat of violence. The military plays this role in any type of political system. To quote Finer: �Direct interference by the military in politics, but falling short of the assumption of power by the military, may occur in any type of political system�. It has occurred and still does, not only in the Third World countries but in the industrialised Western and Northern countries also. Such intrusion took place in Germany through the years of the Weimar Republic, Japan between the two World Wars, in Greece in 1967, in France during the Third and Fourth Republics, and recently in Portugal and Spain. The Man on Horseback is 'old school' in 'new clothes.' In the contemporary epoch of rehabilitated concentration in civil-military relations, it is imperative to revert to preceding works such as this, concerning a topic, as important as this one.

Review # 2 was written on 2016-02-01 00:00:00 Trey Mitchell The book is very much a product of its time period, but some (but limited) applications to today's information age. Much of the book consists of definitions to terms that Samuel uses in later passages. The irony is that Samuel doesn't seem to incorporate some of the principles regarding the disposition of the military to intervene into the actual interventions examined. He emphasizes the political culture of a country and dispositions seem to be an afterthought - despite spending a good deal of time discussing them. One key idea he presents, that I believe has much applicability today, is the mobility of ideas within a society being a reflection of the level of political culture. In today's information age, ideas can have a huge amount of mobility. The other part of the book that's difficult is the lack of context Samuel provides regarding many of his examples - he's a smart guy and has a breadth and depth of understanding much deeper than mine, so it was hard to understand what he was talking about at time. That all said, the text provided an interesting take on the analysis and circumstances of military interventions and a legitimate critique of Huntington's work. That said...it addressed military intervention...not necessarily the role of the military in politics or civil-military relations...