On the journal of military studies

Abstract

The first issue in volume 5 is a special issue on research methods in military science. It originates from a seminar in military science research methods, that was arranged in May 2014 by the Department of Tactics and Operational Art of the Finnish National Defence University. The conference organisers, Professor Jari Rantapelkonen and Ph.D. Juhani Hämäläinen, acted as co-editors in making this special issue. As the conference was held in Finland and its call-for-papers wer in Finnish, the participants turned out to be Finnish, too. This also explains that those three papers that were deemed to be of journal quality in the doubleblind review process and can be read from this issue, were all by Finnish authors. The papers are on narratology as a method by Jan Hanska, on wargaming by Hämäläinen, Sormunen, Rantapelkonen and Nikkarila and on focused interviews by Ulla Anttila. This issue is a special contribution to the methodology discussion in the military sciences, although due to multidisciplinary and multi-method nature of military studies, it does by no means cover completely the methodological choices available in the field.