Civil-Military Relations and the Changing Security Order in the Indo-Pacific

The Indo-Pacific is undergoing profound geopolitical and strategic transformation, shaped by intensifying great-power competition, shifting regional alignments, democratic uncertainty, and emerging security challenges. While much of the literature on the changing Indo-Pacific security order focuses on external balancing, alliance politics, maritime competition, and the rise of China, comparatively less attention has been devoted to civil-military relations and their influence on security policy. This panel addresses this gap by examining how variations in civil-military relations shape political decision-making, domestic stability, and regional security across the Indo-Pacific.
Building on established scholarship, the panel treats civilian control of the military, military autonomy, and civil-military contestation as important variables affecting foreign and security policy. Huntington’s distinction between objective and subjective civilian control, Janowitz’s emphasis on the military’s integration into society, and scholarship on military professionalism and political intervention provide conceptual foundations for examining these relationships. The panel also engages with International Relations concepts, including strategic culture and securitization, to explore how domestic civil-military arrangements shape threat perceptions and responses to the regional security environment.
The panel brings together individual and comparative case studies from Bangladesh, Pakistan, Indonesia, Myanmar, Thailand, and the Philippines. These cases offer substantial variation in the nature and degree of military influence over politics and security decision-making. The panel moves beyond treating civil-military relations primarily as a domestic political issue, instead conceptualising them as an important international and regional security variable. The composition of security establishments, levels of military autonomy, and relationships between civilian leaders and armed forces can influence threat perceptions, strategic preferences, alliance behaviour, crisis decision-making, and the use of coercive instruments.
By bringing together diverse cases, the panel seeks to identify country-specific dynamics and broader regional patterns. It asks whether different forms of military influence produce distinctive approaches to security and foreign policy and whether changing civil-military relations are contributing to the transformation of the Indo-Pacific security order. It also considers how political transitions, institutional reforms, and crises may alter military influence, potentially reshaping regional cooperation, strategic partnerships, and responses to emerging security challenges. This comparative approach connects domestic institutional dynamics with wider changes in the regional order.