Political Management of the Military in Latin America

摘要

Latin American political leaders have had considerable success at subordinating their militaries to civilian rule, but they have done so without a fundamental knowledge of or interest in defense affairs. But, our own definitions of civilian control, which almost uniformly stipulate that civilians must be well versed on defense if they are to lead, preclude us from comprehending these positive trends. The definitions, which are normative and based largely on standards imported from North America and Western Europe, are exacting, and they erect hurdles that Latin America not only has not cleared but cannot clear. Consequently, a great disjuncture exists between what we posit must happen to achieve civilian control and what actually happened. If we were to hypothesize that a central pillar of civilian control hinged on the ability of civilian politicians and their appointed officials to show they could lead informatively on defense, we would be left with a null set: no Latin American states would qualify because there has never been the kind of permanent security-threat environment that warrants investing the resources and talent necessary to create sophisticated war machines nor to equip civilian overseers with an understanding of how they work.