The Israel Reserve Law: The Duality of Reservists and Transformed Military Autonomy

Abstract

Enacted in 2008, 60 years after Israel Defense Forces was established, the Israeli Reserves Law is a striking expression of the decline of military autonomy in a democratic country. While not aimed at reducing the military’s discretion in regard to the training, deployment, and compensation for reservists, the formal enactment of the Law in effect did so. The legislative process was preceded by a crisis between reservists and the military and was led by several reservists’ organizations who tried to improve the standing and resources allocated to the reserve forces. The article analyzes the impact of these organizations and the coalitions they created with politicians serving in the national parliament, the Knesset. By choosing the legislative option to improve the conditions of service for reservists, they de facto reduced military autonomy since the new Law mandated supervision and monitoring (by civilian institutions) of the service of reservists and extended into the core area of military action, the operational use of force. Thus, the actions of reservists’ organizations turned a bilateral tie between the military and its (reserve) soldiers into a trilateral one, comprising the military, reserve soldiers, and state institutions.

Sustainable Reservists’ Services: The Effect of Resilience on the Intention to Remain in the Active Military Reserve Using a Parallel Mediating Model

“…Reserve soldiers' intentions to stay in the active reserve (FMT) after completing the AAPR training was assessed by three items: Fmt1-"I want to update my military skills and serve Lithuania"; Fmt2-"After completing the training, I intend to continue to be an active personnel reserve soldier, and when called to exercises, I intend to participate in them again"; and Fmt3-"After completing the training, I intend to continue actively contributing to the defense of the country". The items' measurement scales varied in the interval [1][2][3][4][5], where 1 = "Strongly disagree" and 5 = "Strongly agree". The construct values varied in the interval from 5 to 15, where a higher value indicated a positive mindset.…”

“…To measure prosocial motivation, four items from the Grant scale [53] were used: Prm1-"I care that my participation in these trainings to be useful to others"; Prm2-"With my participation, I want to help fellow students to improve as individuals"; Prm3-"I want to make a positive impact on others"; and Prm4-"It is important for me to do good for society". The items' measurement scale varied in the interval [1][2][3][4][5], where 1 = "Strongly disagree" and 5 = "Strongly agree". The construct values varied in the interval from 0 to 40, where a higher value indicated greater resilience.…”

“…Due to the difficult security situation and operational requirements, the leading research in the field of study of reserve forces has been conducted in Israel, the UK, and the US [4][5][6]. These studies mostly focus on the identity of reservists [7][8][9] and questions concerning their attitudes [10].…”

Military Covenants and Contracts in Motion: Reservists as Transmigrants 10 Years Later

“…Empirical examples of protests over breaches of expectations about the deployment of reservists can be found in the UK and Israel (Bury, 2019a;Rein-Sapir & Ben-Ari, 2020). In both countries after returning from deployment in armed hostilities, some reservists joined public demonstrations over their perceived lack of preparation or equipment.…”

Introduction to the Armed Forces & Society Forum on Military Reserves in the “New Wars”

“…With the end of the Cold War and the advent of the so-called "New Wars," the need for reservists, as has become clear, has not disappeared, but the way they are deployed has taken older and newer forms. For example, during the past three decades, the involvement of militaries in contemporary conflicts has brought changes in doctrine and the deployment patterns of reserve forces and in their demographic composition (see Peele, 2014). In addition, the global financial crisis of the late 2000s, which shaped both military budgets and military families, also reshaped the economic dimension of reserve service and the kinds of formal and informal "contracts" or understandings governing relations between reservists, the military, employers, and families (Jenkings et al, 2019).…”