Partisan Dimensions of Confidence in the U.S. Military, 1973–2016

• Author: David T. Burbach
• Date: 01 April 2019
• DOI: 10.1177/0095327X17747205
• Published date: 01 April 2019
• Subject Matter: Articles

Article
Armed Forces & Society
2019, Vol. 45(2) 211-233
Partisan Dimensions of
ª The Author(s) 2018
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Confidence in the U.S.
DOI: 10.1177/0095327X17747205
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Military, 1973–2016
David T. Burbach1
Abstract
Americans express more confidence in their military than any other institution. The
components and causes of confidence have been little studied, especially as a par-
tisan phenomenon. This study assesses trends in how partisanship and ideology
affect confidence in the military. Multivariate analysis of General Social Survey and
Harris Poll data shows that while confidence has increased for all demographic and
political subgroups, partisanship and ideology play larger roles than commonly
recognized. Democrats and Republicans are more confident than independents, but
Republican confidence increased sharply over the last 20 years. Party ID is now the
best predictor of one’s confidence in the military. Conservative ideology has little
effect, but liberalism reduces confidence, splitting Democrats. The pattern is not
only “Republicanization,” however; partisans on both sides are more confident when
their party holds the White House.
Keywords
civil–military relations, political science, confidence in the military, public opinion,
partisanship, confidence in institutions
Americans are frequently told that the U.S. military is the most respected or most
trusted institution in the nation. Such claims draw on opinion surveys that for more
than 20 years have found that the military receives more confidence from the public
than any other American institution (Gallup, Inc., 2016; Harris Interactive, 2012).
1 U.S. Naval War College, Newport, RI, USA
Corresponding Author:
David T. Burbach, U.S. Naval War College, 686 Cushing Road, Newport, RI 02841-1213, USA.
Email: david.burbach@usnwc.edu

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Armed Forces & Society 45(2)
The 2016 Gallup survey, for example, found 73% of respondents had a “great deal”
or “quite a lot” of confidence in the military compared to 56% for police, 18% for
“big business,” and only 9% for the U.S. Congress. The military is the only major
institution to receive higher confidence today than it did in 1980. The public’s
confidence is no doubt a source of pride for military leaders, but the measure’s
importance extends further. That exceptional confidence may translate into political
influence for the military, may increase reliance in the military over other govern-
mental capabilities, or buttress public support for former military officers serving as
Cabinet secretaries or elected officials (Golby, Feaver, & Dropp, 2017). Confidence
surveys have been described as a potential “barometer” for civil–military relations—
if so, it would appear all is well, but that would be less clear if confidence instead is a
weather vane moved by political winds.
Despite frequent citations of the military’s high confidence, the measure has
received little scholarly attention. Only one quantitative study, using data only
through the year 2000, has analyzed long-term confidence in the military (King &
Karabell, 2003). The most commonly proposed cause of confidence is the military’s
record of operational success, but that claim has not been rigorously tested. Indeed,
if war outcomes are what matter, it is surprising that confidence is higher today than
pre-9/11, since a majority of Americans consider the Iraq and Afghan campaigns
unsuccessful (Burbach 2017; Pew Research Center, 2014). A worrying development is
the opening of a wide partisan confidence gap; Republicans have become far more
confident than Democrats. If high confidence reflects politicization rather than the
military’s competence, that would have disquieting implications for civil–military relations.
This study expands our understanding of confidence in the U.S. military by
analyzing trends in the effect of political partisanship and ideology. The findings
confirm the hypothesis that there is an important political component of confidence.
Republican confidence spiked after 9/11, even more so for strong Republicans,
while Democratic confidence is only slightly above pre-2001 levels. The pattern
is more complex than just “Republicanization,” however. Affiliates of both parties
consistently show higher confidence than independents, for example. Liberal ideo-
logues express significantly lower confidence than nonliberals, but conservatism has
little effect independent of Republican identification. An important finding is that
partisans on both sides appear more confident in the military when their own party
holds the White House, particularly so in the last 20 years. In 2005, for example,
Bush’s approval alone can explain most of the variance in confidence in a Harris
poll. In addition to partisan effects, demographic differences have persisted. Women
and non-Whites have been somewhat less confident than White males. College
graduates have been less confident than noncollege respondents, though the educa-
tion gap is now smaller than the partisan gap.
The argument proceeds as follows. First, the state of knowledge about confidence
in the military is discussed, particularly our limited understanding of its political
dimensions. Then, hypotheses relating to the politicization of confidence are offered,
and the quantitative approach is described. Confidence is then analyzed using

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Burbach
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multivariate regressions of all General Social Survey (GSS) responses from 1973 to
2016, as well as regressions using selected Harris surveys. Results show the steadily
increasing importance of respondents’ political orientation in determining confi-
dence. Finally, several substantive implications are considered along with metho-
dological considerations for future studies of confidence.
Confidence in the American Military
High confidence in the U.S. military is notable because it stands as such an exception
to other American institutions. Most public and private institutions suffered a sharp
Watergate-era loss of confidence and continued to trend down ever since (Gallup
Inc., 2016; Smith & Son, 2013; Twenge, Campbell, & Carter, 2014). The military
lost confidence with other institutions in the wake of Vietnam but unlike the rest,
since 1980 confidence in the military has steadily climbed. The 1970s “crisis of
confidence” in institutions was not limited to the United States; institutional confi-
dence plunged and never recovered in most Western nations. Proposed explanations
range from the failure to solve specific economic and social problems to the rise of
antihierarchical personal values (Hibbing & Theiss-Morse, 1995; Lipset, 1987;
Nannestad, 2008; Nye, Zelikow, & King, 1997).
Military leaders and civilian politicians point to that high confidence as evidence
of the military’s institutional strength. Leaving office, President Obama (2017) said
one of the greatest tasks for the military would be “retaining the high confidence” of
the American people. Civil–military relations scholars agree the public’s excep-
tional esteem could be an indicator of healthy civil–military relations but also warn
it might be a highly superficial one (Gronke & Feaver, 2001). The topline confidence
number conveys limited information by itself; it does not reveal who is confident or
what individuals mean by “confidence.” Surveys by the Triangle Institute in 1999
and Hoover Institute in 2013 found that individuals’ high confidence can coexist
with disagreement and even distrust toward the military (Gronke & Feaver, 2001;
Schake & Mattis, 2016; Wittes & Poplin, 2016). Rosa Brooks (2016a) described that
situation as a paradox of “awe and mistrust.” Other scholars have expressed concern
that the confidence gap encourages the assignment of ever-broader tasks to the
military (R. Brooks, 2016b) and could encourage dangerous feelings of superiority
among military officers (Dunlap, 1992).
The most often proposed explanation for high confidence is the military’s organi-
zational performance, or as Gronke and Feaver (2001, p 133) put it, that “the military
has demonstrated success at what it does.” That idea is intuitively appealing, as there
appears to be a straightforward story of low confidence after Vietnam, then steadily
increasing confidence with low-casualty victories in Grenada, Panama, the 1991 Gulf
War, and Kosovo (Gronke & Feaver, 2001; King & Karabell, 2003). External perfor-
mance is a less satisfying explanation today, given that confidence is higher than pre-
9/11 levels despite recent wars being perceived as failures (Burbach 2017). Internal
professional accomplishments have also been suggested as a source of confidence,

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including success in fighting drug abuse, integrating minorities and women (Gronke &
Feaver, 2001; King & Karabell, 2003), or personal integrity demonstrated by service
members (Hill, Wong, & Gerras, 2013). Rather different is the “patriotism-lite” phe-
nomenon proposed by Moskos (2003), recently amplified by Fallows (2015): With the
end of the draft and drawdown of the force, most citizens are unfamiliar with the
military, yet feel guilt over the highly unequal burden of service. People therefore
compensate with superficial rituals of support like saying “thank you for your
service”, and perhaps by telling pollsters they feel “very confident.”
Relatively little has been written about the political context of confidence. The
organizational performance argument fits a Huntingtonian vision of apolitical civil–
military relations—that is, the military is...