Politicians in Uniform: Military Governments and Social Change in The Third World

Abstract

This paper examines three arguments about the impact of military regimes on social change (i.e., economic growth and social reform) in Third-World countries. The first asserts that military governments are progressive; the second claims that they are conservative or reactionary; while the third states that the impact of military regimes on social change varies by level of development. An analysis of covariance model is specified and used first to reanalyze data previously examined by Nordlinger. The results provide no support for any of the three hypotheses, but limitations of the data prevent this from being a convincing test. The model is therefore tested with a second set of data covering 77 politically independent countries of the Third World for the decade 1960 to 1970. Again, the estimates are inconsistent with all three hypotheses and suggest instead that military regimes have no unique effects on social change, regardless of societal type. The paper concludes that the civilian-military government distinction is of little use in the explanation of social change.