TRANSITION AND CIVIL-MILITARY RELATIONS IN POLAND AND RUSSIA

Many of the dramatic changes in the former East bloc have undermined t he material status and professional ethos of the armed forces in post- communist states. Existing theories of civil-military relations would have predicted that by now the military would have overthrown civilian governments and seized power. While this has not happened to date, th ere have been significant changes in civil-military relations which wi ll affect the nature of the regimes which are being consolidated. The author provides a theoretical framework for understanding how democrat ization is affecting military behavior. She compares and contrasts dev elopments in two countries: Poland and Russia, and suggests that chang es in the nature of the civil-military relationship in the latter pose a serious threat to democratic consolidation. Elsevier Science Ltd. C opyright (C) 1996 The Regents of the University of California