Publication Type: Invited Paper
Abstract: This paper explores how African Americans in Reconstruction and early post-Reconstruction Georgia became members of the Georgia Volunteers, and later Georgia State Troops Colored, the state sponsored militia organizations that emerged in the mid-1870s among both African American and white volunteers.The work is proposed to examine black efforts at self-defense, 1865-1875 and the creation of black militia companies in the 1870s. Reconstruction in Georgia was clearly a time of turmoil for blacks and whites. It was a period of considerable political violence by whites aimed at African American efforts to define freedom, political power, and economic status. African Americans attempted to initiate and consolidate community development in Georgia�s cities and smaller residential situations. The study will examine the moments of white political violence and seek to explain how black volunteer militia companies came into being in the early 1870s and late in that same decade without the violence that defined Reconstruction.

Publication Type: Conference Paper/Unpublished Manuscript
Abstract: Much has been written about the resort to private military companies (PMCs) in the context of the contemporary “counter-insurgency operations” in Afghanistan and Iraq. Simultaneously it is admitted that the phenomenon of privatization of security is broad

Publication Type: Conference Paper/Unpublished Manuscript
Review Method: Peer Reviewed
Abstract: Abstract

Publication Type: Conference Paper/Unpublished Manuscript
Abstract: The errors associated with measuring the number of militia and patriot groups may cast doubt on conclusions drawn from prior studies of the spatial variation of these movements. Most studies of militias have been qualitative investigations of a single group, state, or region. A growing number of studies, however, have used quantitative techniques to assess the hypothesis that the number of militia groups by state covaries with structural and cultural forces. We outline a number of concerns with the instruments used to count militia groups and we reestimate models from previous studies using the four alternative measures of these groups employed in prior studies. We find that many inferences drawn for identical theoretical models differ based upon the measure used. These discrepancies apply not simply to tangential control variables but to indicators of key theoretical constructs. In other words, the decision as to whether or not a particular theoretical framework receives empirical support often depends upon which measure of the dependent variable is used. This suggests that the inconsistent findings in prior research may be due to measurement error and makes it difficult to assess the validity of the conclusions drawn from these studies.

Publication Type: Conference Paper/Unpublished Manuscript
Review Method: Peer Reviewed
Abstract: Eminent Historians of American political thought have
argued that Civic Republicanism was the primary ideological engine that
inspired the American Revolution and the framing of the constitution.
By its very nature this ideology made high moral demands on the
citizens of a republic whereby they were expected to subordinate
self-interest to the good of the community. Such a subordination of
self could obviously only be achieved through active participation of
citizens in civic affairs of the Republic. The literature from the
American founding era describes this obligation to participate as civic
virtue hence giving it a moral connotation. In addition to this various
scholars of American founding period have argued that republicanism is
essentially an ideology of opposites that is to say that for each
element in a virtuous state, there is a corollary corrupting opposite.
This paper is concerned with one of the particular concerns, rather
dislikes of Republicanism i.e. the danger of maintaining a Standing
Army and the dilemmas faced by the founding fathers as the nation’s
first policy makers. The perceptions of the military needs of a free
society and the development of political policy intended to secure
republican liberties in the United States presented tough choices. If
the new nation was to flourish and grow it needed protection against
internal and external threats of all kinds. The difficult question
however was how best to achieve that protection. Those who had closely
dealt with the militia were convinced that that system required major
overhaul to ensure effective national defense. On the other hand
suspicions regarding standing armies’ tendency to destroy rather than
protect liberties in a republican society were almost universal. Yet
another central point that this issue highlighted was that of
distribution of power between the states and the central government. In
sum therefore the question of devising an appropriate military setup in
the United States brought to the forefront not only issues related to
the security of the American republic but also the viability of
Republicanism itself. In the above context therefore, in this paper I
analyze the debates regarding militia reform on the lines of a
professional army during the federal constitutional convention, the
federalist papers and the first federal congress. Some of the key
figures whose arguments are analyzed include Washington, Madison,
Hamilton, Knox and Elbridge Gerry. My main objective through this
analysis is to show that regardless of their stand on the issue, all
involved in this national security debate had a strong ideological
commitment to Republicanism. This presents an interesting puzzle,
especially because in the Republican tradition of opposites, the
concept of militia serves the central purpose of blocking possible
formation of a tyrannical government through instituting several checks
in the system. In the presence of this ideological concern then, the
issue of militia reform on the lines of a non-geographically bound
professional army in the name of preserving Republicanism enhances our
appreciation of the great difficulty in understanding issues that
underlie translation of ideology into policy in general and the
peculiar complexity of the American case in this context in
particular.