A book on the relation between the military, public power and society in Latin America receives an international prize

During the award ceremony.
During the award ceremony.
Research
(27/06/2019)

A book by UB professor of Political Science Rafael Martínez and David Pion-Berlin, from the University of California - Riverside, has been awarded as best book of the year by the European Research Group on Military and Society (ERGOMAS). The awarded book, Soldiers, politicians, and civilians. Reforming civil-military relations in democratic Latin America (Cambrdige University Press), analyses the relation between public power and armed forces in several Latin American countries, and introduces the role of each kind of society regarding these relations and its features.

During the award ceremony.
During the award ceremony.
Research
27/06/2019

A book by UB professor of Political Science Rafael Martínez and David Pion-Berlin, from the University of California - Riverside, has been awarded as best book of the year by the European Research Group on Military and Society (ERGOMAS). The awarded book, Soldiers, politicians, and civilians. Reforming civil-military relations in democratic Latin America (Cambrdige University Press), analyses the relation between public power and armed forces in several Latin American countries, and introduces the role of each kind of society regarding these relations and its features.

The study is framed within the field of civil-military relations, which analyses how the public power interacts with the armed forces and includes the study on the conditions under which the military behave exclusively as an administration at the service of public power or, on the contrary, how they can be independent armed forces that do not respect the authority of the public power. The awarded book “provides a new theoretical framework that is transgressor, apart from the public power and armed forces there is a third actor: society”, says Rafael Martínez.

This theoretical framework is developed in six big theme areas, with more than thirty variables, which are later applied to specific cases by the authors: Argentina, Chile, Brazil and Uruguay. “We wanted to test our model in countries that had experienced a military dictatorship because that means the journey is hard for the military: from being political power to simple administration”, notes Rafael Martínez. As part of the study, the authors warned about “the authoritarian attitude of a great part of the Brazilian society”. “We announced the possibility of a government with a high military presence like the current one in the country”, continues the researcher.

The jury of the award stresses that “theoretically and empirically, the book describes and talks about processes that are relevant for the security of the whole South American continent”. Moreover, the proposed model can be used to analyse, for instance, the situation in Eastern Europe countries, Southern Eastern Asian countries, or processes such as the Arabian Springs.

The award Giuseppe Caforio ERGOMAS to the best book is given every two years to the best publication in English by ERGOMAS members. This entity has exceeded in its primal European field and is, together with its North American homonym, The Inter-University Seminar on Armed Forces and Society, the main wold association on security and society.