IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/gam/jscscx/v5y2016i3p45-d77009.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

The Importance of National Ethos in Military Victories

Author

Listed:
  • Eyal Lewin

    (Multidisciplinary Department, Ariel University, Ariel 40700, Israel)

Abstract

When nations are violently threatened, the choices that they make in order to cope with the challenge of war reflect different alternative possible reactions. They may choose to fiercely fight their battles; they may prefer to surrender, and sometimes the options lay in-between. One puzzle is, therefore, what makes nations fight, and more importantly—what causes them eventually to win or to lose the war. In search for an answer, this study inquires through secondary sources three historical case studies from World War II: Britain, France and Germany, and reviews how each of these major European powers acted throughout the war. After each historical description, the study examines the part that national ethos played in the manner in which each state handled war in moments of crisis. The national ethos of a people is the creed formed from the shared values and traditions through which the nation views its past, present and future; it is the integrating element that defines a nation’s identity and bonds it into a coherent social group. The study reveals how national ethos is intertwined with another phenomenon of social psychology that turns it into a crucial factor in the management of international campaigns: war enthusiasm. Since national ethos is so crucial for the results of the war that a country might lead in order to survive or prosper, it is imperative for decision makers to bear in mind that it is also subject to a process of shaping and reshaping, as the Soviets have proved in relation to their Russian national ethos during World War II. A word of caution, however, is noteworthy: a wide historical perspective shows that even though the right kind of national ethos is essential for winning a war it is far from being enough. Hence national ethos proves, at the end of the day, to be a necessary condition for military victory but certainly not a sufficient one.

Suggested Citation

  • Eyal Lewin, 2016. "The Importance of National Ethos in Military Victories," Social Sciences, MDPI, vol. 5(3), pages 1-16, August.
  • Handle: RePEc:gam:jscscx:v:5:y:2016:i:3:p:45-:d:77009
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www.mdpi.com/2076-0760/5/3/45/pdf
    Download Restriction: no

    File URL: https://www.mdpi.com/2076-0760/5/3/45/
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Organski, A.F.K. & Kugler, Jacek, 1977. "The Costs of Major Wars: The Phoenix Factor," American Political Science Review, Cambridge University Press, vol. 71(4), pages 1347-1366, December.
    2. Most, Benjamin A. & Starr, Harvey, 1980. "Diffusion, Reinforcement, Geopolitics, and the Spread of War," American Political Science Review, Cambridge University Press, vol. 74(4), pages 932-946, December.
    3. Unknown, 1982. "AAES Awards 1981," Australian Journal of Agricultural Economics, Australian Agricultural and Resource Economics Society, vol. 26(2), pages 1-2, August.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Serneels , Pieter & Verpoorten , Marijke, 2012. "The impact of armed conflict on economic performance. Evidence from Rwanda," NEPS Working Papers 5/2012, Network of European Peace Scientists.
    2. King, Elisabeth & Samii, Cyrus, 2014. "Fast-Track Institution Building in Conflict-Affected Countries? Insights from Recent Field Experiments," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 64(C), pages 740-754.
    3. Olaf J. de Groot & Tilman Brück & Carlos Bozzoli, 2009. "How Many Bucks in a Bang: On the Estimation of the Economic Costs of Conflict," Economics of Security Working Paper Series 21, DIW Berlin, German Institute for Economic Research.
    4. Naudé, Wim & Amorós, Ernesto & Brück, Tilman, 2023. "State-Based Conflict and Entrepreneurship: Empirical Evidence," IZA Discussion Papers 15946, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    5. Mojanoski Goran & Bucevska Vesna, 2022. "Event study on the reaction of the Balkan stock markets to the conflict between Russia and Ukraine," Croatian Review of Economic, Business and Social Statistics, Sciendo, vol. 8(2), pages 18-27, December.
    6. Joseph Mawejje & Patrick McSharry, 2021. "The economic cost of conflict: Evidence from South Sudan," Review of Development Economics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 25(4), pages 1969-1990, November.
    7. Silve, Arthur & Verdier, Thierry, 2018. "A theory of regional conflict complexes," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 133(C), pages 434-447.
    8. Carolyn Chisadza & Matthew Clance, 2021. "Conflict heterogeneity in Africa," South African Journal of Economics, Economic Society of South Africa, vol. 89(4), pages 459-479, December.
    9. Piotr Lis & Michael Spagat & Uih Ran Lee, 2021. "Civilian targeting in African conflicts: A poor actor’s game that spreads through space," Journal of Peace Research, Peace Research Institute Oslo, vol. 58(5), pages 900-914, September.
    10. Miguel, Edward & Roland, Gérard, 2011. "The long-run impact of bombing Vietnam," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 96(1), pages 1-15, September.
    11. Marc Vothknecht & Sudarno Sumarto, "undated". "Beyond the Overall Economic Downturn: Evidence on Sector-specific Effects of Violent Conflict from Indonesia," Working Papers 297, Publications Department.
    12. Oscar Hernan Cerquera Losada & Norvi Guaraca Trujillo & Stefany Marín Muñoz, 2019. "Conflicto Armado Y La Producción Agraria: Caso Departamento Del Huila," Dictamen Libre 19380, Universidad Libre Barranquilla.
    13. Dominic Rohner & Mathias Thoenig, 2021. "The Elusive Peace Dividend of Development Policy: From War Traps to Macro Complementarities," Annual Review of Economics, Annual Reviews, vol. 13(1), pages 111-131, August.
    14. Nguyen, Cuong Viet & Tran, Tuyen Quang & Van Vu, Huong, 2024. "The long-term effects of war on foreign direct investment and economic development: evidence from Vietnam," Journal of Urban Economics, Elsevier, vol. 143(C).
    15. Spencer Dorsey, 2020. "The opportunity cost of intrastate violence and the out-of-sample validity of commodity price shocks," The Journal of Defense Modeling and Simulation, , vol. 17(3), pages 309-324, July.
    16. Christopher Blattman & Edward Miguel, 2010. "Civil War," Journal of Economic Literature, American Economic Association, vol. 48(1), pages 3-57, March.
    17. Samer Matta & Simon Appleton & Michael Bleaney, 2019. "The Impact of the Arab Spring on the Tunisian Economy," The World Bank Economic Review, World Bank, vol. 33(1), pages 231-258.
    18. Benjamin A. Most & Harvey Starr, 1990. "Theoretical and Logical Issues in the Study of International Diffusion," Journal of Theoretical Politics, , vol. 2(4), pages 391-412, October.
    19. Ronald Umali Mendoza & Charles Siriban & Tea Jalin Ty, 2019. "Survey Of Economic Implications Of Maritime And Territorial Disputes," Journal of Economic Surveys, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 33(3), pages 1028-1049, July.
    20. Vahabi,Mehrdad, 2019. "The Political Economy of Predation," Cambridge Books, Cambridge University Press, number 9781107591370, September.

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:gam:jscscx:v:5:y:2016:i:3:p:45-:d:77009. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: MDPI Indexing Manager (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://www.mdpi.com .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.