Artemenko A. Military identity in the context of social (re)adaptation of ATO/JFO veterans

The dissertation carries out the heoretical and methodological approaches to the study of military practices in sociology, is devoted to the analysis of sociological conceptions of military practices, as well as the identification of essential features of the concept of “ATO / JFO veteran”. The main conceptions of military sociology according to temporal criteria were considered and analyzed in the context of classical, modernist and postmodernist theories. were studied the conceptual foundations of social identity in contemporary sociology; are identified the substantive characteristics of the conception of military identity; are given features of theoretical and methodological approaches to the study of the military identity transition were identified; were given the characteristic of military identity of female veterans of ATO / JFO. The definition of the military identity concept is formulated: military identity is the result of an actor’s social identification with the army or military groups, which is the consequence of the internalization of values and norms accepted in the army / military field. It was noted that the concept of military identity is related to the concepts of two transitions – the transition from civilian life into the army field (after military mobilization or voluntary enlistment in the armed forces) and the return transition from the army into the civilian field (after demobilization or release for health reasons). The gender aspects of military identity were considered with an emphasis on specific features of military experience of female veterans of the ATO / JFO. sociological methods for measuring military identity are presented; indicators of social (re)adaptation of ATO / JFO veterans at three levels – high, medium and low – are systematized; the results of the sociological study “The influence of military identity of ATO / JFO veterans on their social adaptation” are presented; the characteristics of main contexts of social (re) adaptation of ATO / JFO veterans to the civilian environment are considered. The sociological methods for measuring military identity are presented with the help of the following indicators: targeting of identification, commitment to military experience, the power of connection and the power of estrangement from the army, loyalty to military culture, performance of military practices, perception of the army as a family or as a professional organization, emotional attachment to the army, motivational justification for enlistment in the army, existential assessment of the army service. Three types of military identity were highlighted for the degree / intensity of its expression – steady, situational and unformed. The veteran‘s steady military identity is the result of a serviceman's social and emotional identification with army personnel and military culture, which leads to the dismantling of the previous structure of the individual’s subjective reality, which had been formed before conscription in the army.