The Saltzman Institute of War and Peace Studies presents:
Webinar Panel: Black Lives Matter, Racism and Civil-Military Relations
this presentation will be held via Zoom
Panelists to be added
The startling events of the past few weeks have evoked protests and discussions over the systemic racial injustice and treatment of Black, Indigenous, and People of Color (BIPOC), particularly sparked by police abuse and extrajudicial killings towards this community.
With presidential threats to deploy active-duty troops and political grandstanding with the military at the backdrop – and a militarized rhetoric and response to the protests – two ongoing trends become immediately recognizable: the involvement of the military in partisan politics and the legacy of racism in the military itself. These two trends are now colliding, raising questions about whether and how the military will be involved in domestic political contests and debates in the years to come.
In this panel we will review racism in the military, its impact on the trust between the military and the citizens it is supposed to protect, and its long-term effects. Could these protests stymie recruitment goals and erode how Americans view their military? Will the senior commanders continue to be mostly white men? What are the strategic implications of groupthink when national security policies are generated from homogenous teams? How can leaders, both emerging and senior, address racism in their purview?
