Integrated Military
Units and the Coordination of Policies on Women and Sexual Minorities.
Aaron Belkin of UC Santa Barbara, Project Leader
This year's project departs from the concentration on the impact
of boundary changes on identity and instead focuses on the impact
of European boundary changes on the relationship between the military
and society. It is guided by the central research question: How
do integrated military forces function when troops are governed
by sharply divergent personnel policies? Researchers will explore
this question in the context of policies relating to the participation
of women and sexual minorities among integrated military forces
of the United Nations, NATO, and NORAD (North American Aerospace
Defense Command). Member countries of these institutions maintain
very different policies and regulations with respect to the rights
and obligations of women and of gay and lesbian service personnel.
The U.S. armed forces discharge open gays and lesbians while all
other original NATO members aside from Turkey allow known homosexuals
to serve. Various members of these alliances restrict the participation
of women in combat. Yet male soldiers countries with restrictions
on the role of women interact with female combat troops from members
with more liberal policies. And soldiers from the U.S. fight side
by side with openly gay European and Canadian soldiers. In this
project, researchers will examine integrated military units of NATO,
NORAD and the United Nations in which American soldiers serve side
by side with openly gay colleagues from European countries. They
will assess the effectiveness and cohesion of units composed of
troops whose countries pursue divergent policies.
This group will hold its first meeting in the Spring of 2001
