Conscription and social transformations: Estonia between security needs and social expectations

Abstract

ABSTRACT While most scholarly works on conscription in democracies focus on its abolition, the few works that explain its retention usually attribute it to countries’ security needs. Using the Estonian case, the article shifts the focus to ask how conscription systems are maintained to adapt to changing defense challenges, as well as transforming public expectations about security, military effectiveness and efficiency, recruitment policies, and social diversity. It offers a conceptual framework that opens-up the ‘black-box’ of conscription to analyze the actual organizational practices and arrangements by which this adaptation comes about. In this way, the article suggests comparative questions pertinent to other countries preserving mandatory military service.