Overview

A Practitioner's Guide to Defense Sector Reform is a practitioner-oriented conceptual road map for program managers and implementers who have the difficult job of achieving reform in a wide range of defense sectors around the globe. The environment in which this work is being done has changed dramatically, needs are many and urgent, and resources are limited. Practitioners need guidance that fits the current context and helps them to determine what to do, and more specifically, where to start. The guide proposes ten goals for defense sector reform, each of which identifies a place to start and details how to implement programming across a range of country contexts. The goals include: (1) democratic control, (2) civilian oversight, (3) legislative and judicial oversight, (4) coordination and management, (5) functioning logistics, (6) defense planning, (7) financial management, (8) the right people, (9) strategy generation, and (10) military effectiveness. Examples from Colombia, Georgia, Iraq, Libya, Mali, and Tunisia help practitioners translate this guidance into effective programming. The manual closes with a discussion about starting and sequencing programming if there are many urgent and important needs and avoiding some programming pitfalls. Key issues include how to define success, generate political will, understand formal and informal systems, and balance the trade-offs between achieving fast results and sustainable change.

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Effective defense forces are at the core of every nation's sovereignty. In a world of sovereign nations, weak, failing, and failed states are a threat to local, regional, and international security. That is why the United States and other countries have invested so much in the development of foreign security forces-often in vain as the hoped-for reforms fail to take root. The problem, as Hanlon and Kerr note in this welcome practitioner's guide, is what to do? Hanlon and Kerr's book adds substantially to the growing literature on security sector assistance and defense sector reform, providing analytic insight informed by illustrative examples. Read it to familiarize yourself with the evolving concepts; study it to help calibrate expectations; and apply it to get the best possible results. -Michael Miklaucic, Senior Fellow, National Defense University A Practitioner's Guide to Defense Sector Reform serves as an indispensable reference tool and handbook for policy practitioners seeking to generate sustainable change in the defense sector. The guide frames defense sector reform along ten goals-conceptualized as assistant packages that cover the broad spectrum of activities, principles, and concepts that contribute to real, measurable, and sustainable change in the defense sector. The diversity and range of these goals is testament to the guide's comprehensive scope, covering topics directly related to democratic governance, such as democratic control and civilian control, to rather managerial areas such as logistics and military effectiveness. Combining the why, what, and how of reform within each of these respective areas makes the book a worthwhile read. Furthermore, its authors do not shy away from difficult topics-they acknowledge the multitude of interwoven challenges and are acutely aware of the political dimensions of defense sector reform, a process rife with resistance, bargaining, and conflict. Indeed, for an improved understanding as to why some reforms succeed while others fail, it is essential to examine them through a political lens. Finally, the authors clearly differentiate between defense sector reform and military assistance-support delivered via training and equipment-which is unalike reform. In conclusion, this is a sobering guide for anyone who believes that defense reform is simple, linear, and a military-technical process void of politics. However, it is empowering and full of insights for those who want to take defense sector reform to the next level. -Hans Born, Assistant Director and Head of Policy and Research Department, DCAF- Geneva Centre for Security Sector Governance

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