Livelihood systems of enlisted Ugandan Army soldiers: honour and reform of the UPDF

This article explores the livelihood pathways of serving Ugandan Army soldiers and traces their methods and motivations for enlistment. All were from areas of northern Uganda affected by nearly two decades of violent instability. With the Uganda People's Defence Forces (UPDF) increasing recruitment eligibility requirements and taking other measures to improve professionalism, some soldiers enlisted using false credentials and names, travelled to skirt unofficial ethnic quotas, and joined against their family's wishes. The Army's defence reform process was intended to preclude such problems. The article concludes with reflections on what strategic deception (by both recruits and the Army) may imply for warriors' honour.     

The Changing Pakistan Army Officer Corps

The Pakistan Army elicits many concerns about terrorism, nuclear and the coherence of the state. However, very little is actually known about this institution. This article mobilizes unique data to address one important facet: the Army's geographical recruitment base. We find that the Pakistan Army has been successful at expanding the geographical recruitment base while some groups (namely those who are native to Sindh) remain highly under-represented. We also find that the officer corps is increasingly coming from urban areas. We conclude with a discussion of the implications of these important shifts subject to the limitations of our data.     

The National resistance army (NRA) as a guerrilla force

Africa has had no shortage of guerrilla movements since 1975. However, very few have been successful that have not fought against European colonial rule or white minority regimes. Fundamentally, without external support, these movements have been almost universally failures. One major exception to this rule was the National Resistance Army of Uganda, which overthrew the regime led by General Tito Okello in 1986. What made the National Resistance Army a success and distinct from other guerrilla armies were its sound leadership, its superior organization and its creative strategy.     

Undergraduate disarmament and nonproliferation education: gaps,opportunities, and new approaches

ABSTRACT

Despite living in a nuclear-weapon state, young Americans are generally ill-informed about weapons of mass destruction (WMD) and their means of control. The result is both widespread apathy toward nonproliferation and disarmament decision making among the general public and a looming personnel crisis within government sectors that enact policy in these domains. Considering that 67 percent of high school graduates in the United States go on to pursue a bachelor’s degree, exposing more undergraduates to nonproliferation and disarmament issues could contribute to addressing both of these challenges. The present study analyzes how these issues are already being taught at select US colleges and universities and explores ways to introduce them to more students that align with current priorities in higher education, such as interdisciplinary learning, digital humanities, and data-science learning. It also proposes concrete steps that the WMD policy community can take to help institutions of higher education integrate these topics more broadly into their curricula. The anticipated result is greater support for education in this important issue area across different stakeholders in academia, as well as increased engagement with these critical issues among a more diverse population of young people.     

Civil–military relations and organisational preferences regarding the use of the military in Chinese foreign policy: insights from the debate on MOOTW

ABSTRACT

This article analyses the positions of the Chinese civilian leaders and military elites on Military Operations Other Than War in order to shed light on their preferences about the use of the armed forces in foreign policy between the late 1990s and the early 2010s. Over time, a significant divergence developed between civilians and soldiers until 2011, when the Libyan crisis happened. The study also prompts important considerations about our understanding of civil–military relations in China and future role of the People’s Liberation Army as a tool of statecraft in foreign policy.     

中德警卫人员招募与教育训练比较

德国要人防护局招募警卫人员的理念是“把一名警察变为一名警卫”,而且要求应招者必须经过三到五年的警察培训,并且具备射击、法律、搏击等方面的基础。中国警卫人员招募途径多元,强调严把“入口关”。德国警卫部门在教育训练方面强调“完全贴近实战”。中国警卫部门则采取多种教育训练模式,强调“战训合一”。通过比较研究发现,德国警卫部门在人员招募与教育训练方面有很多先进的理念和做法值得中国警卫部门学习和借鉴。     

新疆少数民族大学生就业问题的社会学解读

少数民族大学生由于受地域环境、语言、民族风俗、思想观念等方面影响,就业形势不容乐观。做好少数民族大学生的就业工作,长远来说关乎新疆长治久安和跨越式发展。本文基于社会学视角,从社会结构、社会制度和社会资本三方面分析了影响新疆少数民族大学生就业难的原因,并提出相关对策,以期为有效解决新疆少数民族大学生就业问题提供借鉴。     

How they joined? Militants and informers in the armed conflict in Donbas

ABSTRACT

The effectiveness of recruitment strategies is crucial for sustainability of any insurgent campaign. This paper identifies eight mechanisms used to encourage overt and covert participation in the armed conflict in Donbas and shows that they varied depending on the type of service expected from a recruit. It relies on the original dataset compiled from studying 798 court cases of insurgents and informers convicted in Ukrainian courts in the period from October 2014 to March 2017. The paper finds that militants were more responsive to contractual or hierarchical mechanisms of recruitment, while informers who provided cover support were more likely to join through ideological appeals or activation of prior social ties.     

Morale and Battlefield Performance at Caporetto, 1917

Abstract

How does morale relate to tactical and operational failure? Is it a cause or an effect? Using the Italian Army at Caporetto as a case study, this article explores the cyclical relationship between battlefield performance and morale. Combining quantitative analysis of army statistics with qualitative analysis of various official and private sources, this article analyses morale before the battle and during its opening phase. Italian morale appears surprisingly resilient and decisions to surrender or desert frequently relied on objective assessment of events rather than demoralisation. In this case it was battlefield defeat which turned disaffection into a full- scale morale crisis.     

Integrating the Services and Harnessing the Military Area Commands

ABSTRACT

The Chinese People’s Liberation Army (PLA) is halfway through a multi-decade modernization process. It has begun a major restructuring effort as it shifts its focus from a traditional continental defensive posture to a more maritime-oriented emphasis. In order to create more balanced joint force, it has adjusted the structure of its highest command organization, the Central Military Commission; abolished the former four General Departments and seven Military Regions; created five new joint Theater Commands and service-level commands for the Army and Rocket Force; and is reducing the size of its active duty force by 300,000 personnel. While seeking to overcome numerous internal obstacles, the PLA continues to develop and improve its capabilities to conduct integrated joint operations to deter a variety of threats to China’s sovereignty and territory and, if deterrence fails, to win informationized local war.     

Shots per casualty: an indicator of combat efficiency for the first Australian task force in South Vietnam

ABSTRACT

In combat, the ratio of shots fired per casualty inflicted can provide a measure of the combat effectiveness of a force. The shots per casualty ratio achieved by the 1st Australian Task Force in Vietnam is shown to change according to factors including marksmanship, tactics and combat type. While, over the course of the campaign, 1ATF fired an increasing number of shots to achieve a casualty, this is explained by improvements in the quality of Viet Cong and People’s Army small arms. Australian Task Force and US Army shots per casualty ratios are briefly compared..     

多民族地区青少年对待欺负问题态度的比较研究

一直以来,欺负行为普遍存在于校园之中,对青少年的身心健康造成了很大的危害。因此,引起了社会各界的广泛关注。本研究利用初中生欺负/受欺负问卷对新疆少数民族和汉族的近500名初中生对待欺负问题的态度进行了调查,分析发现汉族学生对待欺负问题的态度比少数民族学生更积极;对待欺负问题的态度存在性别差异,女生比男生更积极,在对待欺负行为的态度上少数民族学生有极其显著的性别差异;少数民族学生对待欺负问题的态度与年级显著相关,而不同年级汉族学生对待欺负问题的态度差异并不显著。     

Auxiliary Force or National Army? Afghanistan's ‘ANA’ and the Counter-Insurgency Effort, 2002–2006

Afghanistan's fifth effort to form a central army started in 2002, following the fall of the Taleban regime. Mainly run by the US armed forces, the formation of the so-called ‘Afghan National Army’ run into several difficulties, ranging from initially slow recruitment, low educational level of troops and officers, high attrition rates. As the new army began to take shape, it lacked many of the characteristics which had been associated by the promoters with a ‘national’ army. It also showed a low level of commitment and a lax discipline. As of 2006, it looked more like an auxiliary force at the service of the US army and its allies than like a ‘national’ army.     

微型课程视域下的民族地区生物校本课程开发与实践

校本课程是生物课程体系中重要的组成部分。民族地区因偏远落后、师资数量不足,因而生物校本课程开出率过低。微型化的生物校本课程作为民族地区生物课程开发的新模式,以其"短而小"可促进生物教师专业成长,以其"精"可体现民族地区生物校本课程特色,以其"活"保证了民族地区生物校本课程的可持续发展。因此,微型化的校本课程是民族地区生物教师校本研究的新路径。     

新疆少数民族教育政策的发展历程研究

新中国成立以来,党和国家采取了一系列特殊政策和措施,促进民族教育事业快速发展,取得了举世瞩目的成就,为各少数民族培养了数以百万计的各级各类专业人才。本文对新中国成立以来的新疆少数民族教育政策作了分阶段的梳理,总结了民族教育政策的发展变化及特点,并结合当前民族教育政策存在的问题,提出了完善新疆少数民族教育政策的对策建议。     

Keeping the Peace After Partition: Ethnic Minorities,Civil Wars,and the Third Generation Ethnic Security Dilemma

This paper examines partition as a solution to ethnic civil wars and modifies the ethnic security dilemma, suggesting that strong state institutions are more important than demographically separating ethnic groups to achieve an enduring peace. The paper starts with a puzzle: if ethnic separation is required for peace, how do some partitions that leave minorities behind maintain peace? The paper compares post-partition Georgia–Abkhazia, which experienced violence renewal within five years of the partition, with post-partition Moldova–Transnistria, which maintained peace. Both countries had ‘stay-behind’ ethnic minorities. The paper also disaggregates and compares the territories within post-partition Abkhazia, which contain ethnic Georgians: Lower Gali experienced violence while neighboring Upper Gali did not. The paper argues that state institutions create an incentive for ethnic minorities to collaborate with the state, regardless of minority preferences, and this helps maintain peace. However, preferences become important where institutions are weak and members of the ethnic minority have the opportunity to defect; this increases the likelihood of violence. The results build on the ethnic security dilemma by specifying micro-mechanisms and challenging the theory's reliance on intransigent ethnic identities in explaining the causes of post-partition violence.     

Glimpse into an army at its peak: notes on the Somali National Army in the 1960–80s

ABSTRACT

Bagayoko, Hutchful, and Luckham correctly argue that the structures, characteristics, and operating methods of official security institutions in Africa have been somewhat neglected, with a lack of much recent research. The Somali National Army (SNA) sits among these lacunae. Its formal structures can be used as a skeletal starting point and springboard to start to draw the network diagrams that chart informal linkages. This is why recent declassification decisions by U.S. intelligence bodies, coupled with period documents released to the UK National Archives, hold significance in helping us understand early hierarchical SNA arrangements. They show the steady build-up in size of the force, to 1987, to about the time the civil war began to fragment the state.     

民族地区教师专业化发展困境解析

教师队伍建设与发展是民族地区教育发展的关键,而造成当前民族地区教师专业化发展困境的主要原因在于发展认识模糊、动力不足、能力薄弱、方式不当和制度不完善等因素。探索与构建民族地区教师专业化发展模式和发展途径,教育行动研究最为可贵、制度保障最为关键、教研成果转化为教育力最为紧要。     

契合新疆少数民族大学生特点的思政理论教学探析

由于受地域、民族、文化、宗教等因素的影响,新疆少数民族大学生的成长和发展具有特殊性,表现出民族特性鲜明、深受伊斯兰教影响、民族意识强烈、思想单纯、文化素质参差不齐等特点。新疆高校思政理论课教学存在着教学内容、课程组织针对性不强,教学方法僵化、手段单一等问题。只有充分挖掘新疆少数民族文化中的德育资源,贴近生活、深入浅出,完善考核机制、以学生为主体开展研究性教学,增进各民族大学生沟通交流,才能切实提高思政理论课教学的实效性,让学生内心认同、真心信服。