Lindy Heinecken

Following the end of Apartheid, the newly formed South African National Defence Force (SANDF) in 1994 explicitly shifted its primary role to external defence, withdrawing from internal security. However, since 2009, the SANDF has seen an increasing number of domestic deployments, including border control, crime prevention, and disaster relief. The COVID-19 pandemic marked a significant expansion of the SANDF’s domestic role, with troops deployed to enforce lockdown regulations, provide health and humanitarian support, and assist with logistical needs. This extensive deployment, coupled with a consistently declining defence budget and pre-existing operational overstretch, raised serious concerns about the SANDF’s capacity, readiness, and overall effectiveness. Furthermore, the "securitization" of the pandemic and reported instances of human rights abuses by soldiers severely impacted civil-military relations and the public’s trust in the military, highlighting critical issues of civilian oversight and accountability.

Domestic military operations in democracies had historically been rare, reserved for extreme emergencies. However, the proliferation of unconventional threats, notably climate change, biosecurity hazards, and terrorism, has significantly increased the frequency, complexity, and duration of domestic deployments. This book provides a global comparative study of domestic military operations, with a specific focus on the COVID-19 pandemic. The diverse 26-country contributions investigate how varying national contexts, governmental systems, and military structures influenced these deployments, as well as the impact on civil-military relations. While the pandemic created similar demands, states responded differently, allowing for the identification of broader patterns. The research examines the legal frameworks for domestic operations, the specific roles militaries played during COVID-19 (e.g., medical support, logistics, security), and implications for civil-military relations. The case studies show that due to their readiness and organizational capacity, militaries across the globe are increasingly called on domestically as a “force of last resort.” However, extensive deployments and so-called “mission creep” are straining resources for force generation and sustainment, affecting operational readiness, especially for core combat missions. This trend challenges traditional conceptions of civil-military relations theories, raising concerns about blurred roles and professionalism. The volume draws on principal-agent theory for a more nuanced understanding of civil-military dynamics during the pandemic: political executives used the military as an agent, with heightened risk for "agency slack" or "securitization," depending on civilian oversight. The volume concludes that the armed forces need to be versatile, agile, and adaptable as "guardians of the nation" in response to the evolving security environment.

The demographic composition of armed forces has an impact on civil-military relations, the effectiveness of armed forces, their legitimacy, and regime stability. Accordingly, the first part of the chapter focuses on demographic manipulation of the military in autocratic regimes and the implications of ethnic stacking on regime (in)security, propensity towards violence, and military effectiveness. The second part looks at democratic regimes and the need to be representative of society. The various societal factors that influence demographic representation, the complexity of managing diversity, and the advantages of having a more diverse force are debated, including the impact this has on military functioning, effectiveness, and civil-military relations. Ultimately, the conclusion is reached that, irrespective of the type of regime, demographics not only shape armed forces, their conduct, and effectiveness, but can influence the propensity towards peace, conflict, or war.

The United Nation’s Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) 16 calls for the establishment of peaceful, just and inclusive societies. The security sector has the potential to contribute to SDG16 through the fulfilment of its traditional and non-traditional security tasks. However, the security sector can also detract from SDG16 when it acts outside the confines of the law. Good governance of the sector is therefore a prerequisite to achieving SDG16, and parliaments can make an important contribution to accountability and good governance. Parliaments contribute to both transparency and accountability of the sector through their various functions and act as a counterweight to executive dominance, including in the executive’s use of security forces. Yet, in times of crisis, states run a risk of executive dominance and executives are often quick to resort to the use of the security sector to address an array of challenges. This risk also emerged during the global Covid-19 pandemic where states used the security sector, notably the military and police, in various ways to respond to the pandemic. This study reviewed the utilisation of the security sector in South Africa, the Philippines and the UK during the first year of the Covid-19 outbreak, resulting in varied outcomes ranging from positive humanitarian contributions to misconduct and brutality that led to the death of citizens. The initial lockdowns in these countries constrained parliamentary activity, resulting in a lack of adequate parliamentary oversight of security sector utilisation when it was most needed. Parliaments did recover oversight of the sector to varied degrees, but often with limited depth of inquiry into the Covid-19 deployments. To prevent the security sector from detracting from SDG16, the study identified a need for a rapid parliamentary reaction capability to security sector utilisation, especially in cases of extraordinary deployments coupled with an elevated risk of executive dominance.

Ubiquity Press is an open access publisher of peer-reviewed academic journals, books and data. We operate a highly cost-efficient model that makes quality open access publishing affordable for everyone. We also make our platform available to the Ubiquity Partner Network, providing the infrastructure and services to enable university and society presses to run sustainably and successfully. The United Nation’s Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) 16 calls for the establishment of peaceful, just and inclusive societies. The security sector has the potential to contribute to SDG16 through the fulfilment of its traditional and non-traditional security tasks. However, the security sector can also detract from SDG16 when it acts outside the confines of the law. Good governance of the sector is therefore a prerequisite to achieving SDG16, and parliaments can make an important contribution to accountability and good governance. Parliaments contribute to both transparency and accountability of the sector through their various functions and act as a counterweight to executive dominance, including in the executive’s use of security forces. Yet, in times of crisis, states run a risk of executive dominance and executives are often quick to resort to the use of the security sector to address an array of challenges. This risk also emerged during the global Covid-19 pandemic where states used the security sector, notably the military and police, in various ways to respond to the pandemic. This study reviewed the utilisation of the security sector in South Africa, the Philippines and the UK during the first year of the Covid-19 outbreak, resulting in varied outcomes ranging from positive humanitarian contributions to misconduct and brutality that led to the death of citizens. The initial lockdowns in these countries constrained parliamentary activity, resulting in a lack of adequate parliamentary oversight of security sector utilisation when it was most needed. Parliaments did recover oversight of the sector to varied degrees, but often with limited depth of inquiry into the Covid-19 deployments. To prevent the security sector from detracting from SDG16, the study identified a need for a rapid parliamentary reaction capability to security sector utilisation, especially in cases of extraordinary deployments coupled with an elevated risk of executive dominance.