The Continuing Relevance of Morris Janowitz’s The Professional Soldier for the Education of Officers

• Date: 01 October 2021
• DOI: 10.1177/0095327X20960480
• Author: Hugh Liebert,Suzanne C. Nielsen
• Published date: 01 October 2021
• Subject Matter: Articles

2021, Vol. 47(4) 732 –749

The Continuing

Relevance of Morris

Janowitz’s The Professional

Soldier for the Education

of Officers

Suzanne C. Nielsen

1

and Hugh Liebert

1

Abstract

In the current strategic environment, Morris Janowitz’s The Professional Soldier

deserves renewed emphasis, especially from the military’s senior leaders who are

responsible for the education and development of the country’s officer corps.

Janowitz’s work is an especially valuable guide to the education of officers today

because of his focus on the need for military officers to understand the political

impact of military posture and military operations. The education of U.S. military

officers to meet the country’s national security needs in the 21st century must go

beyond Huntington’s formulation of expertise to an appreciation, in Janowitz’s

terms, of “the political and social impact of the military establishment on interna-

tional security affairs” across the spectrum of conflict. Janowitz’s formulation is the

better guide because military means serve political purposes, and ultimately, a

country’s strategic success will be judged in political terms.

Keywords

civil–military relations, professionalism/leadership, political science, milit ary

effectiveness

1

Department of Social Sciences, U.S. Military Academy, West Point, NY, USA

Corresponding Author:

Hugh Liebert, Department of Social Sciences, U.S. Military Academy, West Point, NY 10996, USA.

Email: hugh.liebert@westpoint.edu

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ªThe Author(s) 2020

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DOI: 10.1177/0095327X20960480

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Article

Nielsen and Liebert 733

“The United States is developing a reputation much like Germany had in the 20th

century of being tactically and operationally superb but strategically inept.”

—Bartholomees (2012, p. 91)

Military operations undertaken by the United States since the terrorist attacks of

September 2001—in Afghanistan, Iraq, and Libya, among other locations—have

been more costly and less successful strategically than anticipated or desired.

1

The

reasons for these less than optimal results are undoubtedly numerous and complex.

The goals of U.S. military operations have been intrinsically difficult to achieve.

2

Decisions made by the country’s elected political leaders, the workings of the

interagency process, and the actions of multiple departments and agencies of the

U.S. government have also contributed to strategic shortcomings. So has the U.S.

military. There is now in the military’s ranks an important opportunity for self-

assessment.

To guide their introspection, leaders of today’s military institutions would do well

to consult the foundational literature on U.S. civil–military relations. For almost 6

decades now, two works have been touchstones within this field: Samuel Hunting-

ton’s The Soldier and the State, published in 1957, and Morris Janowitz’s The

Professional Soldier, published in 1960.

3

While both works played an important

role in advancing the study of American civil–military relations and of the military

as a profession, Huntington’s has arguably b een the more influential within the

discipline of political science and within the military’s own educational institutions.

4

Janowitz’s work has had a greater influence in the field of sociology and has

provoked more efforts to replicate the findings in the original work (Janowitz,

1982, p. 520). In the current strategic environment, The Professional Soldier

deserves renewed emphasis beyond the audiences who have traditionally given it

pride of place, especially among the military’s senior leaders who are responsible for

the education and development of the country’s officer corps.

We argue here that Janowitz’s work is an especially valuable guide to the edu-

cation of officers today because of his focus on the need for military officers to

understand the political impact of military posture—at home and around the world—

as well as the political impact of military operations. The education of U.S. military

officers to meet the country’s national security needs in the 21st century must go

beyond Huntington’s formulation of expertise as “the direction, operation, and con-

trol of a human organization whose primary function is the application of violence”

to an appreciation, in Janowitz’s terms, of “the political and social impact of the

military establishment on international security affairs” across the spectrum of con-

flict (Huntington, 1957, p. 11; Janowitz, 1960, p. 420).

5

Janowitz’s formulation is

the better guide because military means serve political purposes, and ultimately, a

country’s strategic success will be judged in political terms.

6

We will start by defining strategic success before briefly discussing the strengths

and limitations of Huntington’s The Soldier and the State with a view to educating

strategically minded military officers. The greatest flaw in this book, recognized by

2Armed Forces & Society XX(X)