Morale, also known as esprit de corps (), is the capacity of a group's members to maintain belief in an institution or goal, particularly in the face of opposition or hardship. Morale is often referenced by authority figures as a generic
value judgment
A value judgment (or value judgement) is a judgment of the rightness or wrongness of something or someone, or of the usefulness of something or someone, based on a comparison or other relativity. As a generalization, a value judgment can refer ...
of the
willpower,
obedience, and
self-discipline
Discipline refers to rule following behavior, to regulate, order, control and authority. It may also refer to punishment. Discipline is used to create habits, routines, and automatic mechanisms such as blind obedience. It may be inflicted on ot ...
of a group tasked with performing
duties
A duty (from "due" meaning "that which is owing"; fro, deu, did, past participle of ''devoir''; la, debere, debitum, whence "debt") is a commitment or expectation to perform some action in general or if certain circumstances arise. A duty may ...
assigned by a
superior. According to
Alexander H. Leighton, "morale is the capacity of a group of people to pull together persistently and consistently in pursuit of a common purpose". Morale is important in the military, because it improves
unit cohesion
Unit cohesion is a military concept, defined by one former United States Chief of staff in the early 1980s as "the bonding together of soldiers in such a way as to sustain their will and commitment to each other, the unit, and mission accomplishmen ...
. With good morale, a force will be less likely to give up or surrender. Morale is usually assessed at a collective, rather than an individual level. In wartime, civilian morale is also important. Esprit de corps is considered to be an important part of a fighting unit.
Definition
Military history experts have not agreed on a precise definition of "morale". Clausewitz's comments on the subject have been described as "deliberately vague" by modern scholars.
George Francis Robert Henderson
Colonel George Francis Robert Henderson, CB (2 June 1854''Jersey, Church of England Births and Baptisms, 1813–1915'' – 5 March 1903) was a British soldier and military author.
Early life
Henderson was born in Saint Helier, Jersey in 1854 ...
, a widely read military author of the pre-
World War I
World War I (28 July 1914 11 November 1918), often abbreviated as WWI, was one of the deadliest global conflicts in history. Belligerents included much of Europe, the Russian Empire, the United States, and the Ottoman Empire, with fightin ...
era, viewed morale as related to the instinct of self-preservation, the suppression of which he said was "the moral fear of turning back", in other words, that a willingness to fight was bolstered by a strong sense of duty. Henderson wrote:
Human nature must be the basis of every leader's calculations. To sustain the ''moral ' of his own men; to break down the ''moral ' of his enemy—these are the great objects which, if he be ambitious of success, he must always keep in view.
During the proceedings of the
Southborough Committee inquiry concerning
shellshock, testimony by Colonel
J. F. C. Fuller
Major-General John Frederick Charles "Boney" Fuller (1 September 1878 – 10 February 1966) was a senior British Army officer, military historian, and strategist, known as an early theorist of modern armoured warfare, including categorising p ...
defined morale as "the acquired quality which in highly-trained troops counterbalances the influence of the instinct of self-preservation." Of Henderson's "moral fear", the soldier's sense of duty, it is contrasted with the fear of death, and to control one's troops required of a commander more than authoritarian force, but other strategies to be deployed to that purpose.
[
Esprit de corps means ''spirit of the body'', a French phrase.
]
Military
In military science, there are two meanings to morale. Primarily it means unit cohesion
Unit cohesion is a military concept, defined by one former United States Chief of staff in the early 1980s as "the bonding together of soldiers in such a way as to sustain their will and commitment to each other, the unit, and mission accomplishmen ...
: the cohesion of a unit, task force, or other military group. Morale is often highly dependent on soldier effectiveness, health, comfort, safety and belief-in-purpose, and therefore an army with good supply lines, sound air cover and a clear objective will typically possess, as a whole, better morale than one without. Historically, elite military units such as special operations forces have "high morale" due to their training and pride in their unit. When a unit's morale is said to be "depleted", it means it is close to "crack and surrender". It is well worth noting that generally speaking, most commanders do not look at the morale of specific individuals but rather the "fighting spirit" of squadrons, divisions, battalions, ships, etc.
In August 2012, an article entitled "Army morale declines in survey" states that "only a quarter of the SArmy's officers and enlisted soldiers believe the nation's largest military branch is headed in the right direction." The "... most common reasons cited for the bleak outlook were "ineffective leaders at senior levels," a fear of losing the best and the brightest after a decade of war, and the perception, especially among senior enlisted soldiers, that "the Army is too soft" and lacks sufficient discipline."
Employee morale
Employee morale is proven to have a direct effect on productivity
Productivity is the efficiency of production of goods or services expressed by some measure. Measurements of productivity are often expressed as a ratio of an aggregate output to a single input or an aggregate input used in a production proces ...
, it is one of the corner
stones of business
Business is the practice of making one's living or making money by producing or Trade, buying and selling Product (business), products (such as goods and Service (economics), services). It is also "any activity or enterprise entered into for pr ...
.
See also
* Military psychology
Military psychology is a specialization within psychology that applies psychological science to promote the readiness of military members, organizations, and operations. Military psychologists provide support to the military in many ways, includ ...
* Collective identity
* Demoralization (warfare)
Demoralization is, in a context of warfare, national security, and law enforcement, a process in psychological warfare with the objective to erode morale among enemy combatants and/or noncombatants. That can encourage them to retreat, surrend ...
* Information warfare
Information warfare (IW) (as different from cyber warfare that attacks computers, software, and command control systems) is a concept involving the battlespace use and management of information and communication technology (ICT) in pursuit of a ...
* Motivation
Motivation is the reason for which humans and other animals initiate, continue, or terminate a behavior at a given time. Motivational states are commonly understood as forces acting within the agent that create a disposition to engage in goal-dire ...
* Pre-work assembly
Throughout China, many organizations have their workers gather outdoors before their shift for a pre-work assembly. They stand at attention in formation, wearing their work uniforms, grouped by position in the company. They face one or two managers ...
* Psychological warfare
Psychological warfare (PSYWAR), or the basic aspects of modern psychological operations (PsyOp), have been known by many other names or terms, including Military Information Support Operations (MISO), Psy Ops, political warfare, "Hearts and Mi ...
* Rank theory of depression Rank theory is an evolutionary theory of depression, developed by Anthony Stevens and John Price, and proposes that depression promotes the survival of genes. Depression is an adaptive response to losing status (rank) and losing confidence in t ...
References
External links
*Matteo Ermacora
Civilian Morale
in
{{wiktionary
Psychological warfare
Psychological attitude
Motivation
Group processes