In my speech I would firstly like to focus on compulsory military service, past and present practices. The conscription period served as a tool to shape the new citizen identity especially in the 1920s and 30s. It was crucial for the state to equip young male citizens with the new ideology, because those young male citizens were seen to be the commanders of their wives and children, and thus they could train the members of their families to be proper citizens, as defined by the state. Therefore, this discourse aimed to lead the “modernization” of the rural population as a whole. Then, I would like to discuss the existence of conscientious objectors. Although militaries are the primary institutions used by the state to create and impose the features of the “ideal citizens” within society, militaries and states do not only create ideal citizens, they also create pacifists, rebels and objectors.
