| The programme is firmly rooted in the Moral
Component of Military Effectiveness and Fighting Power, as defined in
British Military Doctrine publications. There are four substantive
themes we are developing.
Military Ethics The emphasis for the programme
leader this past year has been to draft sections for the Development
Concepts and Doctrine Centre (formely Joint Doctrine and Concepts Centre)
during the process rewriting of British Defence Doctrine, 3rd
edition. OUr overarching definitions of the Moral Component, viz
Professional Integrity, Leadership and Moral Cohesion,
are likely to be accepted, the first-mentioned concept being our own
'brand' of thinking, with 'integrity' being used in a number of convergent
meanings, we hope to good effect. Additionally, the programme leader
is an external member of the Subject Matter Group for 'Command Leadership
and Management' (CLM) of the Defence Academy, charged with research and
syllabus development.
Lectures and presentations broadly on this subject and under
the CDiSS banner have been delivered to the Joint Services Command and
Staff College (JSCSC Sept '05), British Forces Symposia for
Non-commissioned Officers (Nov '05) Lubbecke), the Universities of
Reading (Jan '06) and Hull (Feb '06). Further presentations are
planned for June '06 on 'Teaching Military Ethics' at the University of
Hull and 'Ethics in Asymmetric Warfare' in Holland in October.
Officership This subject suddenly came to
fruition in 2005. In that year Sandhurst formally recognised
Officership as a helpful term, to be used alongside CLM
to express largely intangible but professionally significant
characteristics and actions expected of those who 'hold military office',
primarily but not exclusively those commissioned officers. On 2
February '06 at the invitation of the Commandant, CDiSS set up and led a
Symposium on Officership, to discuss and develop further what is already
part of the Sandhurst syllabus. It was attended by 6 members of
Sandhurst's staff. Martin Edmonds and Patrick Mileham of CDiSS,
representatives from Canada and Australia, other academics and
appropiriate staff officers from the Royal Navy, Army, Royal Air Force and
the Police Service. Proceedings will be published in due course.
Professional Armed Forces The findings of the
research in the UK for officers of the Armed Forces to define 'The
Profession of Arms' were announced at a Panel meeting at the Royal United
Services Institute (RUSI) on 1 February '06. Our aim is to have the
concepts and practices of military professionalism be defined and aspire
to best practice internationally. We have defined what we call
Professional Disciplines. There have been four
publications so far, three in refered/peer-reviewed articles and one in
the RUSI Newsbrief for December 2005.
Participants in the research so far have included the Royal
College of Defence Studies, JSCSC and a number of MOD directorates in
seminar groups, as well as interviews. A full survey was carried out
in the JSCSC, which included some overseas students.
The findings of this stage in the research will be published in
the early Summer, with the purpose of launching the research project
overseas later in 2006. Eventually we would hope to see the research
reach out to include not only NATO and EU natios but also all nations in
the Euro-Atlantic Partnership Council.
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