Wednesday, May 27, 2009
A New War Generation
Eight years after the 9/11 attacks, young America has grown into a new War Generation. Academics are responding; professors are starting to offer more courses in international security issues. The increase in courses is not uniform. In the sample set studied, some of the public universities are stumbling and the liberal arts colleges are struggling to offer relevant courses. However, the private universities in the study hired new faculty and, in some cases, doubled the number of security studies courses.
Thursday, February 21, 2008
Why Study Strategic Literacy?
Americans have long experienced war first hand. Every generation, scores of young citizens and their families learn about international politics the hard way. These citizens soldiers and veterans were people the rest of us could rely on to remind everyone of the hard lessons learned.
Then peace came in the 1990s and my generation grew up with only a few sidelong glances at international politics.
What resulted was a general gap in American strategic literacy. It was a big one.
In the 1990s, academia also turned away from studying and teaching about war and peace. At the undergraduate level, subjects like military history and security studies fell to endangered status throughout the country as senior professors retired, but were not replaced. On some campuses, the only strategic studies courses that survived were in the ROTC programs.
We came into September 11, 2001 with a gap in strategic knowledge among elite college students just when we needed intellectual firepower.
This study is a sample of these elite universities over a fifty year period. If the dear reader would like to skip to the end, please see the conclusion, below.
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FUTURE WORK:
This author's hypothesis for follow up research is: 1) the number of courses on security studies and military history increased but is not up to the 1992 level and 2) student demand, based on enrollment in courses, continues to grow. If any reader is willing, please test this.
*****
All the raw data is available for the sample schools. I would like to thank the Khan Copy Center in Lakikapul, Hyderabad for the help with scanning these copies of course catalogs, course listings, and syllabi. Please contact the author for a copy: leighanne(at)gmail.com
*****
CONCLUSION
In a 1965 study, a valuable new civilian intellectual role in security issues was described: “There has been no planned development and application of intellectual resources; there have been instead an unorganized, free interplay between agencies of government, higher education, private philanthropy, and research groups. As a result of this interplay, intellectuals have become more important in the formulation of national security policy, and have broken the monopoly of the military profession in the field of strategy and the almost exclusive hold which lawyers and businessmen had on political appointments.” [note 1]
It took almost thirty more years for that intellectual role to evolve into a consistent presence in the history and political science undergraduate curriculum. By 1992, strategic studies courses were offered with the greatest frequency throughout the study schools. Then the courses steadily fell in numbers, back to the levels of the 1970s. If current trends continue, the opportunities for elite undergraduate student to gain strategic literacy will again be rare. These are the schools and universities which would produce graduates to promote the professional civilian voice in the field of strategy. If the trend is not reversed, the civilian role in strategy may, again, fall to those who have not been dedicated students to these issues.
[note 1] Lyons, Gene and Louis Morton, School for Strategy: Education and Research in National Security Affairs. New York: Praeger, 1965. p. 297
Then peace came in the 1990s and my generation grew up with only a few sidelong glances at international politics.
What resulted was a general gap in American strategic literacy. It was a big one.
In the 1990s, academia also turned away from studying and teaching about war and peace. At the undergraduate level, subjects like military history and security studies fell to endangered status throughout the country as senior professors retired, but were not replaced. On some campuses, the only strategic studies courses that survived were in the ROTC programs.
We came into September 11, 2001 with a gap in strategic knowledge among elite college students just when we needed intellectual firepower.
This study is a sample of these elite universities over a fifty year period. If the dear reader would like to skip to the end, please see the conclusion, below.
*****
FUTURE WORK:
This author's hypothesis for follow up research is: 1) the number of courses on security studies and military history increased but is not up to the 1992 level and 2) student demand, based on enrollment in courses, continues to grow. If any reader is willing, please test this.
*****
All the raw data is available for the sample schools. I would like to thank the Khan Copy Center in Lakikapul, Hyderabad for the help with scanning these copies of course catalogs, course listings, and syllabi. Please contact the author for a copy: leighanne(at)gmail.com
*****
CONCLUSION
In a 1965 study, a valuable new civilian intellectual role in security issues was described: “There has been no planned development and application of intellectual resources; there have been instead an unorganized, free interplay between agencies of government, higher education, private philanthropy, and research groups. As a result of this interplay, intellectuals have become more important in the formulation of national security policy, and have broken the monopoly of the military profession in the field of strategy and the almost exclusive hold which lawyers and businessmen had on political appointments.” [note 1]
It took almost thirty more years for that intellectual role to evolve into a consistent presence in the history and political science undergraduate curriculum. By 1992, strategic studies courses were offered with the greatest frequency throughout the study schools. Then the courses steadily fell in numbers, back to the levels of the 1970s. If current trends continue, the opportunities for elite undergraduate student to gain strategic literacy will again be rare. These are the schools and universities which would produce graduates to promote the professional civilian voice in the field of strategy. If the trend is not reversed, the civilian role in strategy may, again, fall to those who have not been dedicated students to these issues.
[note 1] Lyons, Gene and Louis Morton, School for Strategy: Education and Research in National Security Affairs. New York: Praeger, 1965. p. 297
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